Interesting police opinion

Pat

Supporter
Better questions to ask are: can the government prohibit me from protecting my home and loved ones, even if I have been prescribed an acne drug that may have demonstrated to rarely produce depression and erratic behavior? Can the government determine that because I have had an ugly, emotional divorce that I am not allowed to protect my home as I see fit? Can the government determine that since my child was pictured in Facebook holding a weapon that I am an unfit parent and not only should my weapon be seized but my child remove from my care? Can the government determine that as a military veteran who has served in a combat zone, I should not be allowed a weapon in case, as a senator recently put it, "I might suddenly snap"? Can the government require my physician to report that I am depressed over the loss of a child and the government subsequently raid my home and confiscate any weapon found? And finally, just supposed I am a sadistic, rage filled murderer and my brilliant attorney, Jeff Young, gets me acquitted on a murderer charge. Can the government require Mr. Young to disclose his belief that I am in fact guilty, criminally insane and should not be allowed to have a weapon?
As I have mentioned before, comparisons to pornography, crying fire in a theater or walking onto an airplane with a gun are absurd and a fool’s errand. The issue with the favorably DECLINING death rate by guns continues to be suicides resulting from the abysmal state of proactive mental health and the overwhelming gang/drug related murder rate.
Lanza and Newtown are comforting distractions. They allow us to take refuge in the fantasy that homicides in America are the work of the occasional serial killer practicing his evil craft in one of those picturesque middle American small towns that always show up in murder mysteries or Stephen King novels. They fool us into thinking that there is something American about our murder rate that can be traced to hunting season, patriotism, support for a balanced budget and perverted Tea Party demonstrating mothers. The pretense that there needs to be a national conversation about rural American gun owners is a dishonest and cynical ploy that distracts attention from the real problem that Mr. Obama and politicians like him have sat on for generations. It also detracts from the fact that our economy is failing and the future sadly is certainly one of continued decline.
We do not need to have a conversation about the NRA, "racist" middle age white guy gun collectors or rednecks hunters on reality shows. We need to have a conversation about Chicago, New Orleans, Baltimore, Philadelphia St. Louis, Oakland and why murders go unsolved, criminals, already prohibited from owning guns murder each other with legal impunity and local governments ignoring the real issues. Why are gun show gun sales to be policed when unregulated guns are readily available in any inner city ghetto in exchange for some quick cash or some dope. And why inner cities like Detroit have a worse murder rate than Colombia. If New Orleans were a country, it would have the 2nd highest murder rate in the world, beating out El Salvador. Chicago’s murder rate rivals Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Zimbabwe. To achieve Chicago’s rate, African countries usually have to experience a bloody genocidal civil war or decades of tyranny, (which some would argue, it has) and so we refuse to see that our major cities are in the same boat as some of the worst trouble spots in the world. Instead we have pretend feel-good solutions that result having dad get a police and mental check on his hunting buddy before he sells him his Mossberg will solve anything other than the left being able to punish those on the other side of the political spectrum and feel oh so good about it. Meanwhile more bodies pile up in our inner cities.
You eliminate gangs, enforce current laws -even if the ACLU accuses you of "profiling", aggressively address the dangerously mentally ill, proactively prevent suicides and you eliminate 90% of the gun violence in the U.S. period; everything else is nonsensical blather.
 

Jeff Young

GT40s Supporter
Pete! I don't want to control much of anything! For example, I don't want to tell Muslims they can't practice their religion here, or who they can marry, or kick out Bulgarians or Romanians because they are "thieves," or basically tell anyone how to live their lives, who they can marry, or what they can smoke or eat or drink, or where they can live, or what they can read or say (unless it hurts someone else) and so on.

Really, in regards to this last mess, all I really wanted was some laws that would have encouraged the "gun ethusiast" Ms. Lanza from keeping in an arsenal in a house with a very disturbed 20 year old, resulting in the deaths of 24 kids and teachers.

I just read Cliff's post in detail and I couldn't agree more. I have no desire to tell you what to do with your shotguns or pistols or rifles or semiauto rifles once you acquire them legally, other than to make sure you don't use or store them in a way that can hurt others.

That's pretty much it. And in response we get posts like Larry's above, where he is essentially asserting that the Constitution says mentally ill folks can shoot bazookas in their backyard while reading printing child porn.
 
Pete! I don't want to control much of anything! For example, I don't want to tell Muslims they can't practice their religion here, or who they can marry, or kick out Bulgarians or Romanians because they are "thieves," or basically tell anyone how to live their lives, who they can marry, or what they can smoke or eat or drink, or where they can live, or what they can read or say (unless it hurts someone else) and so on.

Really, in regards to this last mess, all I really wanted was some laws that would have encouraged the "gun ethusiast" Ms. Lanza from keeping in an arsenal in a house with a very disturbed 20 year old, resulting in the deaths of 24 kids and teachers.

I just read Cliff's post in detail and I couldn't agree more. I have no desire to tell you what to do with your shotguns or pistols or rifles or semiauto rifles once you acquire them legally, other than to make sure you don't use or store them in a way that can hurt others.

That's pretty much it. And in response we get posts like Larry's above, where he is essentially asserting that the Constitution says mentally ill folks can shoot bazookas in their backyard while reading printing child porn.

I couldn't agree with you more! Now what in the hell have you done with Jeff? :)
 

Pete McCluskey.

Lifetime Supporter
Well surprisingly Jeff I agree with all but your last paragraph.
I don't think Larry said that at all.
I have no gripe with Muslims who obey our law and don't try and force their god and Sharia law on me or want to kill me because I don't follow Allah.
I want to kick out illegal immigrants because they are wrongly using up the resources that have been made available for legal immigrants.
In Australia we have Italian, German, Dutch, British, Indonesian, Vietnamese,
Indian, American, Canadian , Romanian , Bulgarian , Afghan, African and many others from all parts of the globe and all cultures and religions. We even have Kiwis and bloody Irish. We are a truly multi cultural society. ( Or is that multi 21) And as long as our immigrants respect our laws and flag and try and learn the language (English) most including me have no problem.
 

Jeff Young

GT40s Supporter
Post 90 and your response, and the followig post from me.

It's a simple question. Do you accept the fact that the rights in the 1st and 2nd Amendment (and others) are not absolute and can be limited (as the founders intended and the courts have held since day one), or do you think they are absolute?

You have indicated they are absolute. That is not spin. That is what you said. If you think they are absolute, then yes, you end up with insane child pornographers with bazookas.

Own the concept, if you truly believe in it, but don't dance around it.
 

Larry L.

Lifetime Supporter
Post 90 and your response, and the followig post from me.

It's a simple question. Do you accept the fact that the rights in the 1st and 2nd Amendment (and others) are not absolute and can be limited (as the founders intended and the courts have held since day one), or do you think they are absolute?

You have indicated they are absolute. That is not spin. That is what you said. If you think they are absolute, then yes, you end up with insane child pornographers with bazookas.

Own the concept, if you truly believe in it, but don't dance around it.


Post #90: "If you don't LIKE the way the '2nd' is written, feel free to try to change it. Short of doing that, it will continue to say what it says."

Not surprisingly, that's light-years away from your claim. The words you have claimed are mine are actually total fabrications of your own making.

I'd wager Pete isn't the only one here who has recognized that.

But, enough. The lawns at the lake house await. Hopefully I can get those mowed before the sky opens up. :stunned:
 

Jeff Young

GT40s Supporter
I don't have to think about it. I know what the record says.

Prior to the Constitutional convention, some states had state constitutions guaranteeing the individual right to own arms, and others only allowed it on a collective basis as part of a militia.

Whether to put a collective right, or an individual one, in the Bill of Rights was a hot topic at the Constitutional convention. A proposal specifically allowing an individual right, rather than one conditioned on participation in a well-regulated militia, was in fact put into a draft of the proposed amendment and then shot down.

So, like many things in the Constitution (i.e. slavery), the issue was punted down the road for later generations to sort out, and we got a mish mash of individual and collective language in the 2nd, which was interpreted to only grant a collective right (allowing regulation of all fire arms) essentially until Heller (the DC case).

For the individualist position, the Federalist papers and other source materials support the idea that the individuals should be allowed to own guns for personal defense and as a defense against government overreach (an anachronims now -- you certainly aren't stopping the US government with your Glock or AR-15 and if you try you will end up dead). Other sources suggest the idea was to allow the states to arm themselves collectively against two strong of a central government (another issue we sorted out during the Civil War).

The point is that at all times, both the Founders and the Supreme Court for over 200 years always held that ALL firearms were subject to varying degress of regulation. Admittedly, Heller changed that, but even Heller -- Justice Scalia is quite clear on this -- specifically endorsed the idea that the 2nd Amendment leaves much room for legal and constitutional gun regulaton.

So the real question for you is the same one I posed to Larry: is the 2nd Amendment absolute or was the Founder's belief and that of the Supreme Court for the last 200 years correct?
 

Jeff Young

GT40s Supporter
Post #90: "If you don't LIKE the way the '2nd' is written, feel free to try to change it. Short of doing that, it will continue to say what it says."

Not surprisingly, that's light-years away from your claim. The words you have claimed are mine are actually total fabrications of your own making.

I'd wager Pete isn't the only one here who has recognized that.

But, enough. The lawns at the lake house await. Hopefully I can get those mowed before the sky opens up. :stunned:

Dance, dance, dance Larry.

It's a simple question and you've avoied it three times now. Is the 2nd Amendment absolute or can the right to own firearms be reasonably restricted? How about the 1st?

Your previous answer said EXACTLY THIS: they are absolute -- as you keep posting "shall not be infringed" in red. Which again means you are all for the child pornographer with the bazooka and you keep saying that if folks want to regulate firearms they need to change the Amendment.

At least be intellectually honest.
 
(an anachronims now -- you certainly aren't stopping the US government with your Glock or AR-15 and if you try you will end up dead)

While I would agree that one person doesn't stand much of chance at stopping the US government alone, that was never the intention of second amendment and would only bring anarchy if it was. Though I digress for a moment, recent events do show that a single person can disrupt an entire state police force if they are indeed committed to the act.

Clearly, the way our governmental system is set up is to prevent large and sweeping unpopular changes from happening "too quickly". Like it or hate it, guns are a part of this system.

This may seem absurd to you, but I can assure you politicians do weigh the consequences of their actions before committing them. Don't forget that many of our leaders on both sides are influenced by lobbies which may not have our best interests in mind. If those leaders that allow themselves to be influenced by these groups stop and think, even if only for a second, that their actions might invoke violent reactions against them, the second amendment has done its job.

The moment a government has no fear of its people is usually a bad day for everyone.

An anachronism? I think we will just have to disagree.
 

Jeff Young

GT40s Supporter
I am pretty certain guns are no longer part of that system. The two party system (like it or hate it), check and balances, the judiciary and the higher educational attainment of the populace are.

Like either Brokaw or Jennings said, if you are in a situation where you feel you have to use a gun to protect yourself from society, then a whole lot more has gone wrong than can be fixed........

The idea that the 2nd protects against Government tyranny is, without question, an anachronism. I agree that it is a necessary part of home/personal defense, and also that we have a long tradition of gun ownership and sportmanship with guns that a modern interpretation of the 2nd is congruent with.

But back to the question: do you believe the 2nd Amendment is absolute, or can be limited by Congress?
 
.

I am pretty certain guns are no longer part of that system. The two party system (like it or hate it), check and balances, the judiciary and the higher educational attainment of the populace are.

Then you agree that America is exceptional.

But to answer your question, i do believe that amendments in general can be changed. But, where we disagree is how and what it should take to change them.
 

Jim Craik

Lifetime Supporter
Guns are like pit bulls, not always the best way to protect yourself............
 
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Ron Earp

Admin
Minds are like parachutes, they only function when open; I get that one.

Guns are like parachutes, if you need one and don't have it then you are unlikely to ever need one again; I get that one too.

But the pit bull one, I don't get it.
 
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