Here it comes....

[Loophole LaRue, SASS #51438]

It seems that a certain person of some national prominance has announced that AK-47s belong in the hands of soldiers, and not on our streets:

 

"I also believe that a lot of gun owners would agree that AK-47s belong in the hands of soldiers, not in the hands of criminals," (The First Big Guy)said. "That they belong on the battlefield of war, not on the streets of our cities."

 

He went on to propose some other steps to attack gun violence:

 

On Wednesday, (The First Big Guy) emphasized a need for background checks and the prevention of "mentally unbalanced" individuals from obtaining guns. He faulted opposition in Congress for lack of progress made in reducing violence.

 

"These steps shouldn't be controversial. They should be common sense," (he)said, though without elaborating too specifically on measures of enforcement.

 

 

Meanwhile, another Big Guy, who usually doesn't agree with the First Big Guy, said that we don't need more gun laws, but rather a better approach toward keeping the unbalanced folks away from guns:

 

"I don't know that I'm going be able to find a way to prevent people who want to provide harm from being able to purchase things that can carry out that harm. What I want to do is find the people that represent a danger to America and find them and keep them from having the capacity to use or buy things that can harm or hurt other people," (he) said in an interview with NBC News.

 

So, I have a theory:

 

- the First Big Guy is not going to talk about gun control, other than in vague policy terms, during an election year;

- After the election, all bets are off;

- The other Big Guy is not going to talk about gun control, other than in vague policy terms, during an election year;

- After the election, all bets are off (but at least he belongs to the NRA).

 

I'm sure glad that campaigns help to clarify the issues and the candidates positions...sheesh!

 

LL

[Captain Bill Burt]

I think both big guys have an extreme case of cranial rectal inversion.

[Utah Bob #35998]

I cannot begin to express my disgust over this election. If I did it would be a political post.

[Badger Mountain Charlie SASS #43172]

The really big flaw with government, is that it is filled with politicians and bureaucrats.

[Whiplash LaRue]

The really big flaw with government, is that it is filled with politicians and bureaucrats.

 

+1

[Wolfgang, SASS #53480]

The really big flaw with government, is that it is filled with politicians and bureaucrats.

 

An excellent deduction thur pard, . . ......

[Four-Eyed Buck,SASS #14795]

Spot on, BMC

[The O'Meara Himself]

Our founding fathers (Franklin, Jefferson, Washington, Adams, etc) never dreamed there could be such things as professional politicians. In the late 1770s you left your job to serve your term then went baqck to work when it was over. Political pay, if any, was lousy, living conditions in the D.C. swamp were miserable, nobody wanted to stay there any longer than they had do to do their duty for their country. We need to go back to those days.

 

Re-institute the draft I say, but for congressmen and senators, not the military. Pay them military scale and put them up in Quonsett huts on the D.C. mall. After their 2 or 6 year hitch they get a discharge. There is no such thing as re-enlistment.

 

The O'Meara Himself

[Captain Bill Burt]

Not bad O'Meara.

 

R.A. Heinlein had some interesting ideas about voting rights and running for public office.

 

Want to vote? Serve a stretch in the military, vote for the rest of your life. You laid your life on the line (potentially) for your country, you earned it.

 

OR

 

Want to vote, step into the booth, select from a menu of subjects, answer the question. Answer correctly, vote. Answer incorrectly the door of the booth opens and the booth is empty (no back door).

[Charlie Whiskers]

I think they all should serve 2 terms.1st one in office and 2nd one in prison.

[Forty Rod SASS 3935]

Either way we end up supporting them for way too long.

[Subdeacon Joe]

Tench Coxe (May 22, 1755 – July 17, 1824) was an American political economist and a delegate for Pennsylvania to the Continental Congress in 1788-1789, and a key anti-Federalist, writing under the pseudonym "A Pennsylvanian".

Sourced

 

The power of the sword, say the minority..., is in the hands of Congress. My friends and countrymen, it is not so, for The powers of the sword are in the hands of the yeomanry of America from sixteen to sixty. The militia of these free commonwealths, entitled and accustomed to their arms, when compared with any possible army, must be tremendous and irresistible. Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves? Is it feared, then, that we shall turn our arms each man against his own bosom. Congress has no power to disarm the militia. Their swords and every terrible implement of the soldier are the birthright of Americans. The unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments but where, I trust in God, it will always remain, in the hands of the people.

The Pennsylvania Gazette, Feb. 20, 1788.

 

And from "A View of the Constitution" by Wm. Rawle, 1829, which book was used as a text at the US Military Academy, chapter the Tenth:

 

In the second article, it is declared, that a well regulated Militia is necessary to the security of a free state; a proposition from which few will dissent. Although in actual war, the services of regular troops are confessedly more valuable; yet, while peace prevails, and in the commencement of a war before a regular force can be raised, the militia form the palladium of the country. They are ready to repel invasion, to suppress insurrection, and preserve the good order and peace of government. That they should be well regulated, is judiciously added. A disorderly militia is disgraceful to itself, and dangerous not to the enemy, but to its own country. The duty of the state government is, to adopt such regulations as will tend to make good soldiers with the least interruptions of the ordinary and useful occupations of civil life. In this all the Union has a strong and visible interest.

 

The corollary, from the first position, is, that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

 

The prohibition is general. No clause in the Constitution could by any rule of construction be conceived to give to congress a power to disarm the people. Such a flagitious attempt could only be made under some general pretence by a state legislature. But if in any blind pursuit of inordinate power, either should attempt it, this amendment may be appealed to as a restraint on both.

 

In most of the countries of Europe, this right does not seem to be denied, although it is allowed more, or less sparingly, according to circumstances. In England, a country which boasts so much of its freedom, the right was secured to Protestant subjects only, on the revolution of 1688; and it is cautiously described to be that of bearing arms for their defence, "suitable to their conditions, and as allowed by law." 6 An arbitrary code for the preservation of game in that country has long disgraced them. A very small proportion of the people being permitted to kill it, though for their own subsistence; a gun or other instrument, used for that purpose by an unqualified person, may be seized and forfeited. Blackstone, in whom we regret that we cannot always trace the expanded principles of rational liberty, observes however, on this subject, that the prevention of popular insurrections and resistance to government by disarming the people, is oftener meant than avowed, by the makers of forest and game laws. 7

 

This right ought not, however, in any government, to be abused to the disturbance of the public peace.

 

An assemblage of persons with arms, for an unlawful purpose, is an indictable offence, and even the carrying of arms abroad by a single, individual, attended with circumstances giving just reason to fear that he purposes to make an unlawful use of them, would be sufficient cause to require him to give surety of the peace. If he refused he would be liable to imprisonments.

 

Seems like some of the capons need to brush up on their history.

[Long Branch Louie]

Tench Coxe (May 22, 1755 – July 17, 1824) was an American political economist and a delegate for Pennsylvania to the Continental Congress in 1788-1789, and a key anti-Federalist, writing under the pseudonym "A Pennsylvanian".

Sourced

 

The power of the sword, say the minority..., is in the hands of Congress. My friends and countrymen, it is not so, for The powers of the sword are in the hands of the yeomanry of America from sixteen to sixty. The militia of these free commonwealths, entitled and accustomed to their arms, when compared with any possible army, must be tremendous and irresistible. Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves? Is it feared, then, that we shall turn our arms each man against his own bosom. Congress has no power to disarm the militia. Their swords and every terrible implement of the soldier are the birthright of Americans. The unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments but where, I trust in God, it will always remain, in the hands of the people.

The Pennsylvania Gazette, Feb. 20, 1788.

 

And from "A View of the Constitution" by Wm. Rawle, 1829, which book was used as a text at the US Military Academy, chapter the Tenth:

 

In the second article, it is declared, that a well regulated Militia is necessary to the security of a free state; a proposition from which few will dissent. Although in actual war, the services of regular troops are confessedly more valuable; yet, while peace prevails, and in the commencement of a war before a regular force can be raised, the militia form the palladium of the country. They are ready to repel invasion, to suppress insurrection, and preserve the good order and peace of government. That they should be well regulated, is judiciously added. A disorderly militia is disgraceful to itself, and dangerous not to the enemy, but to its own country. The duty of the state government is, to adopt such regulations as will tend to make good soldiers with the least interruptions of the ordinary and useful occupations of civil life. In this all the Union has a strong and visible interest.

 

The corollary, from the first position, is, that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

 

The prohibition is general. No clause in the Constitution could by any rule of construction be conceived to give to congress a power to disarm the people. Such a flagitious attempt could only be made under some general pretence by a state legislature. But if in any blind pursuit of inordinate power, either should attempt it, this amendment may be appealed to as a restraint on both.

 

In most of the countries of Europe, this right does not seem to be denied, although it is allowed more, or less sparingly, according to circumstances. In England, a country which boasts so much of its freedom, the right was secured to Protestant subjects only, on the revolution of 1688; and it is cautiously described to be that of bearing arms for their defence, "suitable to their conditions, and as allowed by law." 6 An arbitrary code for the preservation of game in that country has long disgraced them. A very small proportion of the people being permitted to kill it, though for their own subsistence; a gun or other instrument, used for that purpose by an unqualified person, may be seized and forfeited. Blackstone, in whom we regret that we cannot always trace the expanded principles of rational liberty, observes however, on this subject, that the prevention of popular insurrections and resistance to government by disarming the people, is oftener meant than avowed, by the makers of forest and game laws. 7

 

This right ought not, however, in any government, to be abused to the disturbance of the public peace.

 

An assemblage of persons with arms, for an unlawful purpose, is an indictable offence, and even the carrying of arms abroad by a single, individual, attended with circumstances giving just reason to fear that he purposes to make an unlawful use of them, would be sufficient cause to require him to give surety of the peace. If he refused he would be liable to imprisonments.

 

Seems like some of the capons need to brush up on their history.

 

I'm assuming all this is available to SCOTUS, since it is available to everyone else. So how is it that liberal Justices can make statements saying they saw nothing in the Framers documents to suggest they were referring to PEOPLE, not a militia, when declaring a Right to Bear Arms???

[Bad Hand]

Still a lot of out right lies being promulgated, such as buying guns over the Internet, machine guns by mail, usual calls for "common sense". The latest knee jerk reaction is more stringent background checks. My question is what would have prevented the shooter from buying a firearm? He had a clean criminal history, was a citizen of the state, and no documented mental health issues.

[Subdeacon Joe]

I'm assuming all this is available to SCOTUS, since it is available to everyone else. So how is it that liberal Justices can make statements saying they saw nothing in the Framers documents to suggest they were referring to PEOPLE, not a militia, when declaring a Right to Bear Arms???

 

Not just that but that every other use of "the people" in the BoR is seen as the individual, not the State. Only in the Second do they see "the right of the people" being only a collective, that is to say, a State right. In the Tenth we see clearly that the framers knew the difference between the State and the people.

 

 

 

Still a lot of out right lies being promulgated, such as buying guns over the Internet, machine guns by mail, usual calls for "common sense". The latest knee jerk reaction is more stringent background checks. My question is what would have prevented the shooter from buying a firearm? He had a clean criminal history, was a citizen of the state, and no documented mental health issues.

 

Just more smoke and noise to confuse things. We need to take back the language of the debate and make it about a civil right, just as all the other rights in the BoR are seen as.

[Captain Woodrow Cahill, SASS # 54363]

The Bill of Rights was written as individual rights. All of them.

Anybody who tries to parse it into "collective" rights, e.g. only rights for a select group is treading on thin ice. With their reasoning, rights could be granted to some and denied others based on the arbitrary and capricious whims of whatever group or individual is in power at the time.

The Founders were smarter than that, and obviously much smarter than many of our enlightened geniuses today.

 

Regarding the militia, the various definitions are:

1. An army composed of ordinary citizens rather than professional soldiers.

2. A military force that is not part of a regular army and is subject to call for service in an emergency.

3. The whole body of physically fit civilians eligible by law for military service.

4. A body of citizen (as opposed to professional) soldiers.

 

And from United States Code 10 Section 311 ...

The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.

The classes of the militia are—

(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and

(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia

 

That pretty much covers everyone except criminals and the insane.

[Long Branch Louie]

I wonder if he knows OUR military is not issued AK-47's? In fact, if you showed him a picture of an AK and an M-16, I wonder if he would know the difference.

More laws would make somebody happy, I guess, but since building bombs and killing people are already illegal, I sorta doubt more laws would stop anybody.....

[Capt. James H. Callahan]

Well, I would agree about the part about not belonging in the hands of criminals. But neither do knives, baseball bats, chain saws, motor vehicles, etc etc. Problem is how to keep them out of their hands.

 

JHC