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Posted on 12/08/2008 11:20:28 AM PST by SecAmndmt
Gun Control: Protecting Terrorists and Despots
Tragically, over the Thanksgiving holiday, the world was reminded how evil and cruel people can be. According to emerging accounts of the events in India, about a dozen well-armed and devastatingly well-trained terrorists laid siege on the city of Mumbai, killing almost two hundred people, and terrorizing thousands.
Regardless of the reasons, the indiscriminate shooting on masses of unarmed and defenseless people is chilling and reprehensible. How were these terrorists able to continue so long, relatively unchallenged, killing so many?
India’s gun laws are her business, of course. However, once the shock of these events and the initial reaction of fear passes, Americans should take away a valuable lesson about real homeland security and gun control from this tragedy.
Gun control advocates tell us that removing guns from society makes us safer. If that were the case why do the worst shootings happen in gun free zones, like schools? And while accidents do happen, aggressive, terroristic shootings like this are unheard of at gun and knife shows, or military bases. It bears repeating that an armed society truly is a polite society.
The fact is that firearm technology exists. It cannot be uninvented. As long as there is metalworking and welding capability, it matters not what gun laws are imposed upon law-abiding people. Those that wish to have guns, and disregard the law, will have guns. Gun control makes violence safer and more effective for the aggressive, whether the aggressor is a terrorist or a government.
History shows us that another tragedy of gun laws is genocide. Hitler, for example, knew well that in order to enact his “final solution,” disarmament was a necessary precursor. While it is not always the case that an unarmed populace WILL be killed by their government, if a government is going to kill its own people, it MUST disarm them first so they cannot fight back. Disarmament must happen at a time when overall trust in government is high, and under the guise of safety for the people, or perhaps the children. Knowing that any government, no matter how idealistically started, can become despotic, the Founding Fathers enabled the future freedom of Americans by enacting the second amendment.
In our own country, we should be ever vigilant against any attempts to disarm the people, especially in this economic downturn. I expect violent crime to rise sharply in the coming days, and as states and municipalities are even more financially strained, the police will be even less able or willing to respond to crime. In many areas, local police could become more and more absorbed with revenue generating activities, like minor traffic violations and the asset forfeiture opportunities of non-violent drug offenses. Your safety has always, ultimately been your own responsibility, but never more so than now. People have a natural right to defend themselves. Governments that take that away from their people should be highly suspect.
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I heard some guy saying that if we didn’t have guns, we wouldn’t have the hundreds of accidental shootings and killing that happen to children and that those deaths out weigh the supposed (his words) benefits of an armed society. He failed to realize how many criminal attacks are stopped by the fact that someone produces a gun. It’s a huge deterrent and rarely does the gun need to actually be fired for the crime to be stopped.
Besides, there’s this thing called the 2nd Amendment.
Why how crazy. What a nut! Anyone who posts anything by Ron Paul should be banned for life < /sarcasm> (that is sarcasm for me, but not for a lot of so-called "conservative " freepers who stated those sentiments repeatedly in the last year or so.
I know, most of these so call small government didn’t support the only small government candidate. In fact, they called him crazy. I makes me think we will never get small government.
It certainly seems like we will never get limited government especially with the Hamiltonian worship I’ve seen recently. But it’ll be difficult to bash Paul on this subject. But I’ll bet someone will find a way...
I know that the book Freakonomics was not high on most Conservatives' reading list. However, there was example in Freakonomics on how statistics get misused and it referred to children and "having a gun in the house".
A parent refused to allow her child to visit one of her friends, because the friend's parents kept a gun in the house. The authors pointed out that the chances of their child or any child getting harmed by a parent's gun, were infinitesimally small. What the parent should have been asking about concerning the safety of her child, was whether or not the friend had a swimming pool at their house. Because the accidental child death rate from swimming pools was many times multiple of that from having a gun in the house!
As usual Ron Paul speaks the truth.
And a swimming pool can’t save your life.
People will unfortunately always manipulate statistics but at the end of the day we have the Constitution on our side... although it’s rapidly becoming a dead letter. I’m still waiting for the day when a politician refuses to uphold the Constitution overtly rather than saying he will but not really doing it.
I grew up in a house filled with loaded guns and weapons of all kinds - my dad was a state policeman. Not once did any of his 3 kids play with them. My dad taught firearm safety and scared the hell out of us in 2 ways - 1) showing what a 45 mag can do, and 2) promising to beat the hell out of us if we messed with them. But any time we wanted, he was always willing to take us out shooting under his supervision. That took the mystery out of guns and allowed him to keep them ready to fire when needed.
I couldn’t back RP because of some of his leanings, especially in the WoT, but on 2nd Amendment issues, he has never wavered in support of law-abiding gunowners.
We’ve been at war in Iraq for nearly 6 years.
Did Congress ever declare war as it should have?
BTTT
Those affiliated with the pediatric practice tell me they won’t own guns because of the accident statistics and because they have seen gunshot wounds in the ER. I always ask if car accident statistics and car accident victims make them question the wisdom of owning a car.
Conservatives are foolish to defend gun ownership using statistics or benefits to society. Those arguments have merits, but I think that sometimes we end up implicitly conceding that guns should not be possessed privately if the statistics are not in our favor.
It is far better to defend gun ownership on principle and as a matter of foundational law.
PAUL’S A KOOK! THAT MEANS 9/11 TRUTHERS AND ANTI-WAR PEACENIKS WILL HAVE ACCESS TO GUNS!
If the airlines HAD been armed instead of being under federal regulations that prohibited airline staff from being armed, 9/11 would have never happened.
Iraq is already a moot point because the deal was in the works for the troops to come home shortly regardless who would have been elected president.
The Republican Party completely screwed the pooch on Ron Paul and evidence exists that many of his supporters stayed home and swung the election to Obama.
“But it’ll be difficult to bash Paul on this subject. But I’ll bet someone will find a way...”
As you know, for devoted anti-RP folks, absolutely no justification is needed to bash RP.
If needed, some NRA “compromise” gun control bill which RP voted against can be brought up.
Never mind that the incredibly successful (/s) gun control compromise strategy supported by the NRA and Republicans has done nothing but move the Republic further down the road to disarmament.
I agree. I like to throw in both when I’m talking about gun control. And if principle and statistics fail (which they haven’t so far), I can always throw the Constitution into the argument (which I do anyway). Although I suppose principle and the Constitution are hard to keep separate.
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