gun control ~ from Todd's Thread

[Siren]

Personal rights are not an industry

 

[Laurel]

COPA is not about minors - it's about limiting access to "offensive" material. It requires one to give a credit card number in order to access any site that contains "depicts, describes, or represents, in a manner patently offensive with respect to minors, an actual or simulated sexual act or sexual contact, an actual or simulated normal or perverted sexual act, or a lewd exhibition of the genitals or post-pubescent female breast...". If you have a pic of a boob on your site, a surfer must give a credit card number to see it.

A 16-year-old kid can get a credit card. Conversely, a 40-year-old man might not have a credit card. It doesn't keep minors out - it keeps out those without a credit card.

You want to keep your kids away? Put child blocking software on your computer. That's what responsible parents do. Literotica is registered with all the major child block systems. But I would think you of all people would be against the federal government making unnecessary, ineffective legislation...?

 

[Weird Harold]

So dont worry, your guns are safe as long as they are locked away with a trigger guard that is.

"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." (emphaisis mine.)

If I must have a lock on my gun, cannot transport it in a condition to be fire, cannot store or transport ammunition with it, (and all of the other nit-picking laws that are already on the books) My right to BEAR arms is infringed upon. A gun is useless unless it can be used, and there are many laws that regulate when, where, and how I can transport a weapon.

Oh sure, there are very few direct attempts to limit whether I can KEEP arms, but I can't BEAR arms in a Courthouse, Airport or in my car on a public highway.

Are those laws Constitutional?

 

[Siren]

Good Point WH

 

[Weird Harold]

Re: Good Point WH

Why does a person feel the need to bear arms in those places anyway?

Courthouse: If I have a reason to go to a couthouse, I would have to leavve it home because although I can bear it up to the courthouse, there is no place to store it while I go inside.

Airport/highways: I hunt. Where I hunt is not within walking distance. In the past I moved, on average, every 15 months over distances too far to walk.

Highways: The route to where I hunt passes three prisons. There are signs warning against stopping or picking up hitchhikers for five mile on either side of each -- bad places to break down at the wrong time without the means to fend off desperate men.

Because of Interstate commerce regulations, there is no legal way for me to use hand-loaded amunition on any hunt that is to far away to drive my personal vehicle. Ammunition cannot be transported with me by air or bus, and it can't be legally mailed ahead or shipped by most common carriers. It is just barely possible to make arrangements with TWO registerd firearms dealers to ship the ammo from one to the other, assumming I can find two dealers in the right locations, and can afford the fees.

I do understand the safety and terrorism concerns about guns in courthouses and airports, but the only people on the highways who are endager because I have a gun in my car are those who threaten me with personal violence. The potential for Road Rage doesn't wash there, because there are other laws that cover any action by one motorist aganst another -- traffic laws, assault/battery laws, etc.

 

[Kymberley]

Once all the guns are outlawed, do we get to go back to using swords?

 

[Unclebill]

Who's kidding whom? The President doesn't write the laws, nor does he pass amendments. If guns will ever be outlawed (which I seriously doubt), it will have to be through a mandate through Congress. Geez, the conservatives have a lot of conspiracists in their ranks. Watch out, those liberals are trying to take away all your rights...

What do you suppose are the myriad of regulations with the force of law which were never enacted by Congress? The EPA can prohibit your legitimate use of your property and there is no obligation to compensate you for the loss despite specificity in the Constitution to the contrary.

The IRS can seize your property and you are guilty until proven innocent. Property rights?

Property seizure has become a widespread practice by law enforcement agencies as they become beneficiaries of this ill-gotten revenue. See http://www.geocities.com/john_galt76/AssetForfeiture.html for details. Property rights?

The FCC can dictate inappropriate the content of radio and TV broadcasts but that is not considered censorship. Freedom of speech?

The idea of "Politically Correct" speech is becoming more and more acceptable despite the First Amendment. The extreme Left which pays constant lip service to tolerance is the most intolerant bunch of bigots I've ever encountered. Their idea of freedom of speech is the freedom to agree with them, otherwise, keep your mouth shut.

The latest ploy of "hate crimes" which advocates punishing the criminal not for his crime but for the thoughts involved is the next step down the path to "politically correct" thought and the necessary laws to enforce and punish incorrect thinking, a la PRC.

Imminent domain defined by the Constitution as the taking of land for public use and justly compensating the owner is being corrupted to allow valuable land in the hands of a private citizen to be passed to a developer for the purpose of increasing tax revenue for local governments. Property rights, anyone?

In California, the anti-smoking Nazis have even managed to have laws passed dictating that people are not permitted to smoke in privately owned premises. But that doesn't violate anyone's rights does it?

And affirmative action laws dictate who one may hire or not. But that doesn't violate anyone's right to free association, does it?

And I'm sure this is a very abbreviated list since I don't follow this sort of stuff very closely at all.

All these things are the product of the ever-increasing size, intrusiveness and invasiveness of government with the attendant abrogation of the individual citizen's rights. And while both Republicans and Democrats practice these atrocities, it is the Democrats who are most vocal and most blatant in their pursuit of a totalitarian type government. At least the Republicans make some public show of respecting the rights of people who earn property to retain it (e. g., tax rate reductions) while the Democrats have publicly adopted the collectivist principle that all property belongs to the government and what you are allowed to keep is subject only to their largess.

So if you think that the second amendment is the only aspect of your rights under siege, you are woefully ill informed. And the more appropriate term for the liberals to whom you refer is collectivists, i. e., Communist, Socialists, Fascists, National Socialists, etc., any and all of those who elevate the whim of the mob to superiority over the individual's rights and freedom.

I am far more liberal and tolerant than are they.

So under certain circumstances a right can not absolute.
Just like freedom of speech is not absolute...you can not yell Fire! in a crowded theatre and cause people to kill each other in a stampede out the door to safety.
So everything has a limit....every right has a limit.
That is just common sense.

If a right is not absolute, then it is NOT a RIGHT, it is a privilege. The ONLY limit on anyone's right is the implicit demand to respect the equal right of others and it is this respect of the rights of others that distinguishes between the honest man and the criminal.

The argument regarding speech above is specious. The declaration that "you can not…" is ludicrous because unless you are mute, nothing but responsible morality precludes it. It is the proper responsibility of government to exert its legitimate to hold you accountable for your actions that is the limiting criterion here, not a law or other edict prohibiting such an action.

This line of reasoning is a ludicrous as is the idea the Prohibition (Amendment 18) would stop the consumption of alcohol in America or that drug prohibition laws will curtail drug use by those who choose to do so.

If a law is the definition of a crime, then the absence of a law means that the act is not a crime. Thus, using that logic, if laws prohibiting murder are repealed, then murder is no longer a crime.

I certainly expect that you would find this a ludicrous idea. Yet this is the same line of reasoning that you're using in your arguments here.

And for Laurel, BRAVO! I am absolutely with you. The Federal government has trod far beyond its legitimate bounds as defined in the Constitution. And most of the things to which you refer are IMNTBHO the product of deeply held religious beliefs of people in government with potential authority to enact their religious ideology as law and since this country is composed of people who for the most part follow some variant of Christianity, they are willing to go along with it since it's "not their ox being gored".

But if someone tried to outlaw their beliefs and superstitions, the cry would be loud and long. Like Alan Colmes, they like it when the law is on their side but if the law is not to their liking, then it's definitely wrong! As is typical of the Left, they want to have it both ways as usual!