Top Two Reasons to Own a Gun

My right to own a gun, to stroke it, to use it, and to pass it on to my children is not a matter of pragmatism, so I’m not going to argue statistics or polls, even though they’d be in my favor. And this list is in no particular order because, after the top two reasons, it really doesn’t matter how you order the rest. It’s like the top musical acts of the twentieth century; there’s Elvis and the Beatles and where you rank The Stones, The Who or Led Zeppelin is just a matter of preference. In this case, the top two reasons to own a gun are to “shoot a bastard” and to “shoot a tyrant,” or at least to have the capacity.

Yes, I like poking holes in paper at 1100 feet per second and I love to take a pheasant down with my Remington 870, but “sport” and “hunting” are not the reasons that our founders were so “fanatical” about gun rights. Guns are also a great investment and in the Obama age, that’s a rare commodity, so it cracks the top ten. Want a good return on your investment, buy gold; want a good return on your freedom – buy lead. Still, not in the top two. I even like to stare at the guns in my collection and to see the “O” face of my friends when they eye-fondle my antique Winchester rifle; but our fathers didn’t risk lives, fortunes, and sacred honor for my right to display museum pieces. So let’s get to the meat of the matter, shall we?

Guns are meant to kill. Amen! They’re a tool made for killing. As a tool they can be used rightly or wrongly, and in the commission of justice or malice, but most of the time, they’re never used at all. Killing animals is good for the belly and can give you an appreciation for God’s creation, the food chain and the Noahic Covenant; hunting can even increase the bond between individuals, but it’s not imprimis.

Killing bad guys is; it is good for the soul, the neighborhood, the nation and the universe. Killing bad guys is even good for the ungrateful, pacifist, worm that kvetches at the sight of four tweens playing Risk (because of the implied “conflict”). He doesn’t know it because he’s never read Orwell beyond the stripped and bleached quotes from The Daily Kos, but it is true, “people sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.”

One reason to own a gun is because you can. We’re Americans. The right to KEEP and BEAR guns is our heritage. Dianne Feinstein and Mayor Bloomberg may want us to barter that right away for a bowl of lentils, but our “right” transcends the 2nd Amendment. The founders didn’t grant the right to us; they simply recognized that as free men, we have that right. God gave us the right to protect and defend our lives and our property. We have not ceded that right to the policeman, the soldier or the politician; we have extended that right to them.

Personal defense is high on the list and because I live outside of Chicago, I know a thing or two about out-of-control violent crime in the face of draconian, stringent gun laws. Oh, I don’t mean an illegitimate child, here. By “bastard,” I mean a guy who tries to eat you on a Miami highway or tries to kick in the basement window to get jiggy with your five year old. The meth-head that would tie you up and light you on fire, just to get $25 for his next OMG, is a bastard; so is anyone who would separate you from your money, your children, or your heartbeat.

Another great reason to own a gun is because I’m not Chuck Norris or Barack Obama – ghosts don’t sit around the campfire telling “John Kirkwood” stories and I don’t have a personal Secret Service detail, so I’ll have to settle for my H&K .45. Colt gave us the great equalizer, a tool that could put Pee-Wee Herman on equal ground with Conan the Barbarian and civilization is better for it.

There’s something to say about those countries that have disarmed only to be faced with hundreds of thousands of bastards arriving on troop carriers. During World War II, the defenseless British begged the U.S. for arms and thousands of Americans sent their family shotguns and hunting rifles to aid the Limeys in their defense against Nazi bastards.

Personal defense and national defense are damn good reasons to be armed, to be armed well and to be as proficient as the average Hollywood hypocrite who makes a living playing with a gun, is protected by guys with guns and then makes PSA’s about taking our guns away.

“America is at that awkward stage. It’s too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards.” ~ Claire Wolfe

This is the top dog! Thank God for lead and gun powder or we’d still be living as serfs under a feudal lord. Our founders developed a healthy respect for an armed populace and gleaned their wisdom from guys like Samuel Rutherford. Rutherford wrote LEX REX (Law is King), and it was the garlic necklace to the vampire doctrine of the divine right of kings. He suggests that, while we do owe the King certain things, if that King comes through the front door to rape my wife, he is no longer a king – he’s a rapist and the right thing to do is to draw your sword and to run him through.

My Bushmaster is my sword. If our “representatives” make good on their threats to confiscate guns, then it’ll be time to draw the sword. I respect ballots and so did the founders, but we don’t live in freedom today because Sam Adams and Patrick Henry cast a ballot. Our founders stuffed a musket because the English were stuffing the ballots and as a free man, I retain my right to water the Tree of Liberty if tyranny should arise on my watch.

If that time comes in our generation, then we’ll find out what we’re made of. Christians are fond of quoting Paul’s aphorism, “for me to live is Christ” but when choosing between living by that statement and dying or even discomfort, the herd thins. “From my cold dead hands” is a witticism, a quip, but one day it may be a necessity. Pasting the bumper sticker on your Facebook wall or your Ford F-150 is one thing; living and dying by it is quite another. The pen may be mightier than the sword, but an armed populace is mightier than a tyrant’s pen. My AR-15 is freedom’s spade. It is the main tool in Liberty’s toolbox; the ultimate “just in case” if my generation would need to lay a new foundation. There are those in this country and many in this administration that would like to strip us of our guns, not to protect children, but to accumulate power. It is why they won’t listen to reason; it is why, in the face of contrary evidence, they turn their head and it is why they have a speech and a bill ready to be spewed out on command whenever the next tragedy occurs. If a room full of school children was swept away in Hurricane Sandy, Mayors Bloomberg and Emanuel would call for more gun control.

I will not turn in my spade for a gift card; your bark doesn’t intimidate me, I am not alone and let the resolve of millions of patriots with an understanding of history and firearms, give you pause. I pray to God that it won’t come to it; but if tyranny comes to our doorstep it is most likely to come in uniform, at the dictate of rogue politicians and guarded by the propaganda of a dozen news anchors. What will you do? I can tell you how a “free man” would respond: a short prayer followed by two to the chest and one to the head; come what may!

May it never be! And it will be a lot less likely the more that Americans arm themselves. Arm yourselves in every way and make no apologies for it – ask a Holocaust Jew if he would, ask an Armenian.

Our founders felt it necessary to include not only the protections to keep the citizen armed, but the injunction to keep him free:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. – That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

OTOH, just imagine how bad it would be without the Second Amendment?

Hm, not that leads to a good question: do we really have a 2nd Amendment?
Let me start with an illustration of the problem, rather than a proof, starting with city and going to state and then federal.

New Mexico State Constitution Sec. 6. [Right to bear arms.] No law shall abridge the right of the citizen to keep and bear arms for security and defense, for lawful hunting and recreational use and for other lawful purposes, but nothing herein shall be held to permit the carrying of concealed weapons. No municipality or county shall regulate, in any way, an incident of the right to keep and bear arms. (As amended November 2, 1971 and November 2, 1986.)

In my hometown (Las Cruces, NM) there are posted on all the municipal (and county) courthouses signs declaring that weapons are prohibited and that violators will be prosecuted. Unless there is a state statute, then this is a blatant case of those entities flouting the State Constitution's prohibition to do so, for the judiciary is part of the municipality (or county) which is explicitly barred from regulating it. If there is a state statute, then it is legal nullity, for to prosecute it, is to have a law which abridges the right of the citizen to catty arms for his security or defense; indeed, there is a whole class of people, who even unaccused of a crime, are legally compelled to appear in court: jurors.

Now the state itself has a statute, which is as follows:

NMSA 30-7-2.4. Unlawful carrying of a firearm on university premises; notice; penalty. A. Unlawful carrying of a firearm on university premises consists of carrying a firearm on university premises except by: (1) a peace officer; (2) university security personnel; (3) a student, instructor or other university-authorized personnel who are engaged in army, navy, marine corps or air force reserve officer training corps programs or a state-authorized hunter safety training program; (4) a person conducting or participating in a university-approved program, class or other activity involving the carrying of a firearm; or (5) a person older than nineteen years of age on university premises in a private automobile or other private means of conveyance, for lawful protection of the person's or another's person or property. B. A university shall conspicuously post notices on university premises that state that it is unlawful to carry a firearm on university premises. C. As used in this section: (1) "university" means a baccalaureate degree-granting post-secondary educational institution, a community college, a branch community college, a technical-vocational institute and an area vocational school; and (2) "university premises" means: (a) the buildings and grounds of a university, including playing fields and parking areas of a university, in or on which university or university-related activities are conducted; or (b) any other public buildings or grounds, including playing fields and parking areas that are not university property, in or on which university-related and sanctioned activities are performed. D. Whoever commits unlawful carrying of a firearm on university premises is guilty of a petty misdemeanor.

The above clearly abridges the right of the students of universities (many of whom are citizens) to bear arms and, in the case of student-housing, even keeping arms. (To assert that there are other places they could keep their arms, like their car or family's house, is to justify the abridging and to assert that the keeping of arms is subject [arbitrary] governmental regulation.)

The point of these city/state issues is not as proof that we do not have a second amendment, but illustration of an underlying mode of thought which nullifies it: entities that are under their Constitutions are less and less bound by their Constitutions -- this is prevalent not only w/ the federal government, but at every level and every political subdivision. ~ Indeed, might makes right is more the rule, and more embraced, than a love of justice by "'Law' Enforcement Officers."

This brings us to the federal [and national] level: and very first, we must realize, that the US Constitution is not a national constitution, but a federal constitution. It is written for the operation of the federal government, and there are only a few things which are prohibited the states: entering treaties, Ex Post Facto Law, etc. The US Constitution has, however, been twisted around -- especially by 'incorporation' to mean things which it does not and cannot mean -- a prime example would be the 1st Amendment: the prohibitions therein are explicitly placed upon Congress, yet the courts have magically altered that (via incorporation) to mean legislature, and then applied that twisted interpretation to the states.

The same is true of the commerce clause: the 'states' portion by which the courts have granted unlimited power to the federal government is in a list, between foreign nations and Indian nations. (Indian nations might even be thought of as native nations, as opposed to foreign, but that is a tangent.) To apply the regulatory powers claimed by the federal government (WRT the States) in a foreign nation would be to wage war thereon -- thus we can see that the powers assumed and asserted by the federal government over the several States fits the definition of Treason given in the US Constitution; yet, even though such is true, it is so inconvenient and contrary to modern thought that it would be dismissed out-of-hand.

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