Saturday, December 6, 2008

It's late just like everything else I do

Why do I vote gun rights first?

Because any politician or bureaucrat that wants to remove my right to keep and bear the same arms as our army views me as a serf, a peasant, a servant, a member of the collective. I will not vote for someone who will not trust his fellow citizens with arms. There are other views and beliefs that I expect a candidate to have but if he or she doesn’t believe in the right to keep and bear arms they aren’t getting my vote no matter what position they hold on any other matter. How can I trust a politician if he doesn’t trust me? How can I trust a politician that says “I need armed bodyguards to protect my important person” but your wife will need to fend that rapist off with her bare fists because he doesn’t believe the common people should be allowed to carry a firearm? How can I trust a man or woman who says I should wait for the police to protect me when state and federal courts as well as the US Supreme Court have repeatedly said the state has no obligation to protect individuals only the populace as a whole. See Castle Rock v. Gonzales, wiki link here- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town_of_Castle_Rock_v._Gonzales

Also see Bowers v. DeVito and South v. Maryland.

“But what about reasonable restrictions” you ask. African Americans were denied the use of arms for over 130 years in the name of those self same reasonable restrictions. Examine the reasons for and effect of gun laws throughout the south during the antebellum period, they were primarily enacted to deny blacks, freemen or otherwise the right to arms because there was a fear of slave uprisings. Laws passed following the Civil War and reconstruction were again about restricting the rights of recently freed slaves to defend himself or his family from the Klan and other assholes. It’s hard to stand up to a lynch mob unarmed.

“Certainly the founding fathers didn’t foresee machine guns or rifles capable of hitting targets a mile away?” So? They didn’t foresee the internet, television or radio either and there is no one calling for background checks before one is allowed to speak in public or licensing before a religious or political text may be checked out of the library. It could reasonably be argued that speech has killed more people than firearms. Some fun quicky examples are Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot and of course Rwandan Hutu singers and radio personalities. The pen is mightier than the sword or so I’ve heard.

What they did see was that if they wanted their fledgling republic to survive the citizen would need to be empowered. What better way to maintain the right to vote for your representation than for the people to be as well armed as the army. We have to remember there were those who wanted to crown George Washington. Representative government was decidedly uncommon in the 18th century and many both here and abroad were unsure we’d make it work. Then and through our entire history the armed forces make up but a couple percent of the population at most and that usually only during wartime. At the very least having an armed and well trained citizenry gave those interested in a coup a bad case of insomnia and heartburn. Because really the 2nd Amendment is the doomsday clause in the Bill of Rights it’s there to defend and protect the rest of our rights enumerated or not from predators and tyrants not so Billy Joe Bob can put food on the table although that is a nice benefit for Billy Joe Bob and the one politicians give lip service to.

As L. Neil Smith says it is the perfect litmus test. If a politician won’t trust you with any firearm bought with cash from the local hardware store or garage sale what is it he has planned that he needs you unarmed?

3 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. "If a politician won’t trust you with any firearm bought with cash from the local hardware store or garage sale"

    If i were a politician (and, presumably, my vote makes me one), i would say that i don't trust the girl who buys a gun on the street or from a friend.

    I like your point about politicians needing to trust their constituents. Sadly, I don't trust other people. I'm sure there are plenty of truths about the rights of individuals, but I'm more afraid of people who are listening to the voices in their head rather than the ones who are supposed to be listening to the voices of the people.

    --your loving, fence-sitting wife

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  3. Okay my little fence sitter... example 1) We have two people who have bought a gun through a face to face private transaction (legal in WI). One is a battered wife who is seperated from her husband and has a protection order against him, the other is the husband who has decided if he can't have her no one can. He is already a "prohibited person" according to the Lautenberg Act which bans people accused or convicted of domestic violence from possessing a firearm. In fact the police came and confiscated all of his guns last week after she got the order. Both have gotten their gun through a local newspaper ad. If we ban FTF transactions she will probably die. She doesn't have 48 hours of liesure time while the state of WI waits for her to "cool off", she has a armed psycho stalking her. The state won't give her 24/7 security as she is not Governor Doyle. She has an order of protection but what good does that do if the police are 20 minutes away? The only difference between these two people is intent and by government delaying or attempting to prevent one sale they may indirectly cause the death of an innocent.
    Here is another thought, in the 20th century governments have killed easily 20 to 30 times as many of their citizens as criminals have. Traditionally these government sanctioned killing sprees occur after disarming the population. If we were really serious about stopping gun deaths maybe we should disarm government.

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