Some gun loving Americans have filed a Supreme Court suit to strike down DC’s restrictive gun laws. One of the defendants, openly gay Tom Palmer, equates gun rights to civil rights, saying the right to bear arms can be life and death for gay citizens… [National Journal]
Guns and Gays?
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fredo777
I’m not for guns + gays, but am for tasers + gays.
Only b/c they’re not lethal, but can shock the hell out of an attacker.
Norm Lane
Cops carry guns AND tasers because tasers are only effective under certain circumstances. Cops have been trained to make those distinctions quickly under pressure. Most of us haven’t.
If you have more than one assailant. If your assailant is wearing something particularly tough, like a leather motorcycle jacket. You’re dead, or beaten to a pulp.
M Shane
When I lied in S.F. some people had guns and i know for certain that street queens had and used scisssors. However, I’m not sure that Mr Palmer could make a case that just gay people were at risk, what about other marginal groups?
I can see however that the general argument has shifted, since the Government is hiring a private armie: Blackwater, for everyone to have protection against possible future Govt oppression such as we have promoted in other countries. When we relied on a citizen army and civil rights weren’t so much at risk, arms seemed to be more of a danger .
fredo777
Norm, you don’t have to shoot someone in the torso w/ a taser. That’s the beauty of it.
If the attacker is wearing something thick, like leather, shoot them in the leg. Hell, maybe even in the face! Also, I’m not talking about the get-up-close-to-the-attacker taser, but the projectiles you can shoot from 15 ft. away.
Norm Lane
It’s what the founders had in mind. The 2nd amendment isn’t about being able to hunt or to protect yourself from muggers, it’s about resisting a government gone mad. The NRA is usually too chickenshit to say it and chooses to speak in terms of hunting and self defense. Saying that citizens may have to resist their government with force is very scary stuff.
Norm Lane
fredo777,
Haven’t you ever been scared shitless? You think people are going to be thinking about what kind of clothes someone is wearing? Are they going to be thinking oh, that person is 18 feet away, if I shoot now I’m fucked ’cause I only have one shot?
You’re going to be thinking “is the safety off, which way does it go?” (keep a revolver)
fredo777
Point + shoot at the leg, regardless of what they’re wearing, + you’d never have to go through the should-I-or-shouldn’t-I inner debate.
emb
Norm, you’re right that the Founders weren’t talking about hunting and self-protection. But they also weren’t talking about every yahoo on the street packing either. Gunheads j’adore SOME of the 2nd’s words, and choose to ignore others: “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” Try not to ignore that first clause, because it modifies everything that follows. “Well regulated” and “militia” do not refer to everybody’s right to freely stick a gun in his or her pocket. The amendment clearly contemplates both government regulation of firearms, as well as assumes that the firearms are in the hands of an orderly and presumably trained people’s militia.
“[T]he right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed” is NOT the totality of the Second Amendment.
M Shane
Right norm, I don’t think that the framers of the Constitution were all that naive. I have always assumed that the second amendment had to do with more important concerns than turkey shoots or mugging.
M Shane
EMB:
I didn’t see your last post when wrote mine.
I don’t know that the second part of the Amendment is qualified by the first, it seems rather to stand separate. I don’t know how Bush can hire a private army otherwise.
As I say, the government like all governments can overstep it’s bounds and be a danger to the people, especially if we aren’t relying on the people, but mercinaries.
Norm Lane
I don’t know that mercenary vs. G.I. is relevant. Most coups are accomplished with government troops.
I don’t think it’s a matter of our government CAN overstep its bounds, I think it HAS done so. If Tom Paine were alive today there would be blood in the streets. “No right to privacy” indeed. What parts of “Pursuit of happiness” don’t require a right to privacy? Half?
As to the “Militia” issue, a simple check of the militia strength vs. the population demonstrates that they were talking about every swinging dick in the country. But it’s easiest to figure out what they meant by reading some of the other writings by the founders.
Of course I’m not advocating the violent overthrow of the goverment. You can get in deep shit for that. Perhaps I’ve said enough.
M Shane
Thanks Norm:
IYou are in good company with regards to sentiments about our government ‘s corruption. And you’re right about Thomas Paine. I often feel as though people have lost their critical faculties completely. This is not just new but has become an outrage. I’ve been reading lately Naomi Kliens book “Shock Doctrine” about America’s central role in the multiple overthow of democratic governments throughout South/central America and other parts of the world as part of an ecomomic program dominated by Milton Friedman which begat unbelievable barbarity and undid those countires to this day. I thought that this role was just speculative and never imagined that Friedman, govenment figures, and students trained at the U of Chicago were directly responsible. The use of the Military definitely involved citizens. It strikes me that mercinaries would be easier to trust in a gov’t overthrow here on American soil; Blackwater apparently plays quite a large role in Iraq.
But look at what has happened; I find it frightful, that Government leaders can spit right in the face of their constitutional powers
and dismiss the Geneva Convention. Torture and fear are normal. What next?