Posted on 01/18/2013 6:46:02 AM PST by darrellmaurina
SYDNEY, Australia -- It is for Americans and their elected representatives to determine the right response to President Obama’s proposals on gun control. I wouldn’t presume to lecture Americans on the subject. I can, however, describe what I, as prime minister of Australia, did to curb gun violence following a horrific massacre 17 years ago in the hope that it will contribute constructively to the debate in the United States.
I was elected prime minister in early 1996, leading a center-right coalition. Virtually every nonurban electoral district in the country — where gun ownership was higher than elsewhere — sent a member of my coalition to Parliament.
Six weeks later, on April 28, 1996, Martin Bryant, a psychologically disturbed man, used a semiautomatic Armalite rifle and a semiautomatic SKS assault weapon to kill 35 people in a murderous rampage in Port Arthur, Tasmania.
After this wanton slaughter, I knew that I had to use the authority of my office to curb the possession and use of the type of weapons that killed 35 innocent people. I also knew it wouldn’t be easy.
Our challenges were different from America’s. Australia is an even more intensely urban society, with close to 60 percent of our people living in large cities. Our gun lobby isn’t as powerful or well-financed as the National Rifle Association in the United States. Australia, correctly in my view, does not have a Bill of Rights, so our legislatures have more say than America’s over many issues of individual rights, and our courts have less control. Also, we have no constitutional right to bear arms. (After all, the British granted us nationhood peacefully; the United States had to fight for it.)
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Circle on the helmet makes a nice target.
Yeah, you acted in a way that caused an increase in violence against innocents. Way to go!
And, this should not come as a surprise to anybody with more than half a brain, he's PROUD of the results. Exactly what was intended. Enable thugs, disparage honesty.
That line right there said everything I needed to know in order to form my opinion about what this guy thinks.
It’s a pity that we have someone of the same mindset as Mr. Howard in our own Oval Office. It’s downright frightening that the seats of our Congress may very well be filled with this man’s ilk as well.
God save this country when we go down the path of Australia, because at that point no one else will.
To avoid any misunderstandings, I am in **TOTAL** disagreement with the Australian prime minister on gun control.
We have a Bill of Rights for a reason. I don't know Australian law and history well enough to comment, but my fear is that this example will get used by gun grabbers to make a so-called conservative case for gun control.
As supporters of the Second Amendment, I believe we need to watch this carefully. Efforts will be made to divide Republicans on gun control issues so we fight each other instead of the gun grabbers. We need to remain unified — either we have a Second Amendment, or we don't, and there is no excuse whatsoever for trying to do an end-run around the clear and obvious language of the Second Amendment.
Frankly, letting the courts or Congress ignore part of the Bill of Rights would be even more dangerous than actually repealing the Second Amendment. Once one fundamental right is voted away or judged away, we have no guarantee that any other right in the Constitution can be preserved.
Don’t sell the Aussies so short. While they did confiscate 700K guns, there were (and are) a hell of a lot more guns than that out there.
According to this article:
http://reason.com/archives/2012/12/22/gun-restrictions-have-always-bred-defian
their police say the compliance rate was only around 20%, and it is a safe bet that such a number is optimistic.
Thus I would say that most Aussie gun owners simply gave the government the finger.
Australia, correctly in my view, does not have a Bill of Rights,
______________________________________
ever heard of the Magna Carta, fellow ???
Around 1 million guns were surrendered and destroyed. The Australian government claims it was 1/3 of the nation's private arsenal, so by their own admission 2/3 of the guns are still in private hands as contraband.
The difference is here in the colonies we kicked the bastards out of power and adopted a Bill of Rights.
Australia continued to be under British Law and never corrected that problem when they became officially independent.
I’ll never understand surrender monkeys. A lot of Australians have their roots in people who were imprisoned and sent there by the Brits. You would think that they would re-assess some of the baggage of being a British serf.
Its sort of like the Welsh and Scots volunteering to fight for the evil descendents of Edward Long Shanks.
‘I wouldn’t presume to lecture Americans on the subject.’
Your first inclination was the correct one Matey.
Don’t f*@!ing waste your breath lecturing us. We as Americans went out and won our freedom through the sweat and blood of our forefathers.
Unlike the people, ‘Down Under’, who were cast out of England for being undesireables and then, ‘given’, your freedom by a monarchy that didn’t want to be bothered by you riff-raff anymore.
The truth is, Australians don’t know real freedom. You are all just a Hitler away from marching to the same tune.
They didn’t.
The Aussies I know, buried theirs in lock boxes.
“Once one fundamental right is voted away or judged away, we have no guarantee that any other right in the Constitution can be preserved.”
Exactly, this is just another attempt to chipping away at our rights.
Met a mine owner from Australia on a plane long ago. I said, well, we have the same basic language and I presume the same culture. He looked at me and said you are naive...australia is becoming more socialist by the day. For example, did you know we pay a higher salary when people are on vacation then when they are working. I asked why and he said because the state feels one spends more while on vacation then while working.
Not long on me is this asshat’s comment about Australia not having a bill of rights. He sees that as a good thing because the supreme law of the land does not interfer with whatever the benevolent government lackeys deign to let the populace do without constraints.
Hey John, you’re lecturing. Martin Bryant, the mentally disturbed shooter was the problem, not the gun.
All your actions on gun control reminds me of the guy who took his car to the shop because his brakes quit working.
When he picked up his car, the mechanic told him
“We couldn’t fix the brakes, so we turned up the volume on the horn”
You fix everything but the problem.
I’m guessing that half of the firearms purchased since Obama seized power would be turned in if the tyrant demanded it. That leaves only 33 million firearms for the ATF and others willing to violate the Constitution and our God-given human rights to take by force. When you consider how many things will go wrong in the first few hundred thousand attempted seizures, with each side knowing that the other side is armed and at least potentially willing to shoot, that will become problematic quickly.
I would have made the rifle short-barreled and suppressed, just to show who’s boss. It isn’t enough for the rifles they carry to be potential, future felonies for us to own ... they have to use rifles that would be felonies for us to own RIGHT NOW. (Sadly, the fact they are recently-made, select-fire can’t be shown so easily on the graphic. But suppressed and short-barreled can.)
Maybe this popular Australian young adult fiction series would have been less popular if everybody knew that an invasion of the large Australian land mass by land-hungry Chinese would be unthinkable since there'd be a gun-toting behind every kangaroo?
“Penalizing decent, law-abiding citizens because of the criminal behavior of others seemed unfair.”
SEEMED unfair? It IS unfair! For example, if a lunatic steals a car and uses it to kill 20 kindergarteners during recess, is that a reason to take my car away? Apparently Obama, Cuomo, and the NYS legistlature think so.
IH8NYS and will be leaving ASAP. FU Il Duce’ Cuomo, FU Dean Skelos, F All of you in the NY Legislature.
You are correct.
I have already sent letters my Congressman and Senators to stand firm in support of the 2nd ammendment. One is a dumble, tho...so I expect a rambling nonsensical reply about having to do SOMETHING....
Many, many more people have died in Australia of gun violence in the intervening years, than had died in that one horrific incident. Criminals still have access to various kinds of small arms, because they are, well, criminals.
And in using guns against unarmed civilians, the aspect of bullying and arrogant domination is greatly magnified. It takes a certain amount of mental disorder to even express that motive openly, and even greater to fire a weapon at a person already apparently pretty defenseless.
Most powerful deterrent to this improper use of sidearms? Mandatory sentencing to the maximum practical for the use of ANY weapon by the perpetrator in an assault. One exception must be made, that if it may be demonstrated and proven that when such an assault took place, the weapon was used as a defense by the victim. Successfully.
Self-defense that ends in the death or serious incapacitation of the assailant should NEVER be considered to be a crime in the eyes of the law. It should not be that hard, in most instances, to determine if the person who fired the weapon that resulted in death was the perpetrator or the victim.
The United States, unlike Australia, still has the words of the Second Amendment of the Constitution as our assurance and guarantee that arms will not be seized from citizens on the mere passage of a law. What part of “..the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed” does ANYBODY not understand?
The right to keep and bear arms is the mark of a free citizen. History has demonstrated this over and over.
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