The Nuke Bomb Argument and the 2nd Amendment

[Pteropuss 0]

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I like the idea of a well armed militia. Let private individuals buy the arms, then the rest of us taxpayers won't have to pay for a bloated military.

How much do you think the U.S. military should be cut?

[kallend 1,625]

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I like the idea of a well armed militia. Let private individuals buy the arms, then the rest of us taxpayers won't have to pay for a bloated military.

It is a good thing there is a huge difference between a militia and our military.

Funny, I keep seeing references right here in this forum to the Japanese in WWII saying invading the USA would be impossible on account of all the privately owned (i.e. "militia") guns.

Please try to be consistent in your arguments.

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The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[kallend 1,625]

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I like the idea of a well armed militia. Let private individuals buy the arms, then the rest of us taxpayers won't have to pay for a bloated military.

How much do you think the U.S. military should be cut?

50%, and it will STILL be bigger than the next 5 nations combined.

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The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[billvon 2,400]

>Where in the 2nd does it, "refer to muzzle loading single shot weapons"?

It doesn't. RushMC was making the argument that "it can't refer to big weapons like nukes because it was clearly referring to weapons like they had back then - not nukes!"* If so then muzzle loading single shot weapons are what he's talking about.

Several other people have claimed that it _does_ include larger weapons like the ships and cannons extant at the time, partly because that gives people the right to revolt against a military that has such weapons. If so, then it does refer to larger military weapons as well.

(* - he is now arguing that the Constitution meant portable weapons, so it should include modern small automatic weapons but not Revolutionary-era cannons; again, some people are disagreeing)

[rushmc 18]

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I like the idea of a well armed militia. Let private individuals buy the arms, then the rest of us taxpayers won't have to pay for a bloated military.

It is a good thing there is a huge difference between a militia and our military.

Funny, I keep seeing references right here in this forum to the Japanese in WWII saying invading the USA would be impossible on account of all the privately owned (i.e. "militia") guns.

Please try to be consistent in your arguments.

Your political agenda is clouding your memory if not your thought process

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[rushmc 18]

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>Where in the 2nd does it, "refer to muzzle loading single shot weapons"?

It doesn't. RushMC was making the argument that "it can't refer to big weapons like nukes because it was clearly referring to weapons like they had back then - not nukes!"* If so then muzzle loading single shot weapons are what he's talking about.

Several other people have claimed that it _does_ include larger weapons like the ships and cannons extant at the time, partly because that gives people the right to revolt against a military that has such weapons. If so, then it does refer to larger military weapons as well.

(* - he is now arguing that the Constitution meant portable weapons, so it should include modern small automatic weapons but not Revolutionary-era cannons; again, some people are disagreeing)

All things are relative

To keep and bear arms

Hard to bear a cannon
You can keep one however

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[Pteropuss 0]

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I like the idea of a well armed militia. Let private individuals buy the arms, then the rest of us taxpayers won't have to pay for a bloated military.

How much do you think the U.S. military should be cut?

50%, and it will STILL be bigger than the next 5 nations combined.

So you would be okay with America being unable to project power in other parts of the world, becoming more isolationist, letting tyrants run amok without restraint, and letting other nations like Russia and China become the world superpowers? Do you think the world will be better off like that?

[kallend 1,625]

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I like the idea of a well armed militia. Let private individuals buy the arms, then the rest of us taxpayers won't have to pay for a bloated military.

How much do you think the U.S. military should be cut?

50%, and it will STILL be bigger than the next 5 nations combined.

So you would be okay with America being unable to project power in other parts of the world, becoming more isolationist, letting tyrants run amok without restraint, and letting other nations like Russia and China become the world superpowers? Do you think the world will be better off like that?

If that's what it takes to live within our means, then YES. The US taxpayer is not responsible for the world outside of the US borders. Why are we still defending Japan and Germany, which are perfectly able to pay for their own defense?

How well did our invasion of Iraq work out? Only cost us a $TRILLION that was not budgeted.

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The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[kallend 1,625]

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>Where in the 2nd does it, "refer to muzzle loading single shot weapons"?

It doesn't. RushMC was making the argument that "it can't refer to big weapons like nukes because it was clearly referring to weapons like they had back then - not nukes!"* If so then muzzle loading single shot weapons are what he's talking about.

Several other people have claimed that it _does_ include larger weapons like the ships and cannons extant at the time, partly because that gives people the right to revolt against a military that has such weapons. If so, then it does refer to larger military weapons as well.

(* - he is now arguing that the Constitution meant portable weapons, so it should include modern small automatic weapons but not Revolutionary-era cannons; again, some people are disagreeing)

Are you rally expecting logic and consistency from rushmc and popsjumper?

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The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[billvon 2,400]

>So you would be okay with America being unable to project power in other parts of
>the world, becoming more isolationist, letting tyrants run amok without restraint,
>and letting other nations like Russia and China become the world superpowers? Do
>you think the world will be better off like that?

John Quincy Adams said it best:

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And now, friends and countrymen, if the wise and learned philosophers of the elder world, the first observers of nutation and aberration, the discoverers of maddening ether and invisible planets, the inventors of Congreve rockets and Shrapnel shells, should find their hearts disposed to enquire what has America done for the benefit of mankind?

Let our answer be this: America, with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as a nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government. America, in the assembly of nations, since her admission among them, has invariably, though often fruitlessly, held forth to them the hand of honest friendship, of equal freedom, of generous reciprocity.

She has uniformly spoken among them, though often to heedless and often to disdainful ears, the language of equal liberty, of equal justice, and of equal rights.

She has, in the lapse of nearly half a century, without a single exception, respected the independence of other nations while asserting and maintaining her own.

She has abstained from interference in the concerns of others, even when conflict has been for principles to which she clings, as to the last vital drop that visits the heart. She has seen that probably for centuries to come, all the contests of that Aceldama the European world, will be contests of inveterate power, and emerging right. Wherever the standard of freedom and Independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy.

She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all.

She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.

She will commend the general cause by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example.

She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force.

She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit.

[ America's] glory is not dominion, but liberty. Her march is the march of the mind. She has a spear and a shield: but the motto upon her shield is, Freedom, Independence, Peace. This has been her Declaration: this has been, as far as her necessary intercourse with the rest of mankind would permit, her practice.
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[skypuppy 1]

my own interpretation includes the right to bear all arms. While certainly a majority of individuals may only have small arms, this would not preclude a community from purchasing larger arms for defence (ie cannon back then, rpg or mortars, or tanks nowadays) and as has been noted, ships could be outfitted with guns and even helicopters/etc in the case that someone so desired and had the money to do it. That would not entitle them to go to war with it, but they would have the right to have it for protection, or whatever.

I would not necessarily want to see individuals with nuclear or chemical weapons, but I see that as more of an exception I would make, then that they are not included in the 2nd.

So I guess I am saying there are some limits I would want on the 2nd, but only very minimal - nuclear and chemical/biological.

If some old guy can do it then obviously it can't be very extreme. Otherwise he'd already be dead.
Bruce McConkey 'I thought we were gonna die, and I couldn't think of anyone

[popsjumper 2]

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Are you rally expecting logic and consistency from rushmc and popsjumper?

Brilliant, my man. Just par-for-the-course brilliant.

My reality and yours are quite different.
I think we're all Bozos on this bus.
Falcon5232, SCS8170, SCSA353, POPS9398, DS239

[rushmc 18]

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my own interpretation includes the right to bear all arms. While certainly a majority of individuals may only have small arms, this would not preclude a community from purchasing larger arms for defence (ie cannon back then, rpg or mortars, or tanks nowadays) and as has been noted, ships could be outfitted with guns and even helicopters/etc in the case that someone so desired and had the money to do it. That would not entitle them to go to war with it, but they would have the right to have it for protection, or whatever.

I would not necessarily want to see individuals with nuclear or chemical weapons, but I see that as more of an exception I would make, then that they are not included in the 2nd.

So I guess I am saying there are some limits I would want on the 2nd, but only very minimal - nuclear and chemical/biological.

Agreed

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[SkyDekker 1,123]

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Agreed. The nuclear weapon argument is really ridiculous.

What I think is ridiculous is that world wide, less people are killed by terrorist attacks, than get killed by guns in America alone.

Yet, the war on terror gets billions in funding, but preventing gun violence gets almost no funding.

Seems like priorities are completely screwed up...

[LyraM45 0]

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my own interpretation includes the right to bear all arms. While certainly a majority of individuals may only have small arms, this would not preclude a community from purchasing larger arms for defence (ie cannon back then, rpg or mortars, or tanks nowadays) and as has been noted, ships could be outfitted with guns and even helicopters/etc in the case that someone so desired and had the money to do it. That would not entitle them to go to war with it, but they would have the right to have it for protection, or whatever.

I would not necessarily want to see individuals with nuclear or chemical weapons, but I see that as more of an exception I would make, then that they are not included in the 2nd.

So I guess I am saying there are some limits I would want on the 2nd, but only very minimal - nuclear and chemical/biological.

Agreed

So, what makes some limitations OK, but not others? Again, this is coming down to everybody's own interpretations. You guys are saying "well, I'd like to see these limitations," yet you are screaming bloody murder over people who want to see other limitations, like restricting the use of automatic weapons.

Nobody will ever win this argument. Somebody will always end up unhappy no matter what happens.

Apologies for the spelling (and grammar).... I got a B.S, not a B.A. :)

[DrewEckhardt 0]

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The nuke bomb argument was raised in another thread

So, does the 2nd Amendment protect nuke bomb ownership?

Yes although I'd support a constitutional amendment banning them for everyone along with lethal and permanently debilitating chemical and biological agents.

In practical terms when something is so dangerous you can't trust individuals with it the same thing holds for a government comprised of individuals. I like the moral purity of such a restriction too - it means no animals (together in government) are more equal than others (those outside it).

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“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.”

It does not speak of bombs, tanks, surface to air missiles, hardly.

It says "arms" which is an all-inclusive term. The STrategic Arms Reduction Treaty was about nuclear bombs not small arms like shoulder launched surface to air missiles, rocket propelled grenades, and machine guns.

In the Founding Fathers' time the term included everything up to the pinnacle of current technology: cannon armed warships. Letters of marquee and reprisal (allowing private citizens to seize enemy nations' assets) would have been relatively meaningless without that (privateers played roles in the Revolutionary War and War of 1812).

It covers current technologies the same way the First Amendment does. The prohibition on "abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press" still applies when news purveyors publish via radio waves, web sites for on-line viewing, and downloadable digital podcasts for later consumption instead of orating atop soap boxes and publishing with human-powered printing presses.

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The other part of the argument it at times directed to the point that the founders had no idea what the weapons of today might be. I dispute that. And again, it is clear in the amendment they are speaking to arms. Not any arms, but rather, arms you can “bear”.

Keep and bear are separate.

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A detonated nuke of that type would not protect one’s life or property.

Except when applied against a large group of opposing foes and/or their assets.

If the Soviets parachuted in Red Dawn style and started seizing Kansas farmland an ICBM launched from every Mid West spread that could afford one to the heads of those supply chains in Eastern Europe and political centers behind them would end that fight.

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The arms the founders were talking about are clearly those that can be carried. Carried at all times and everywhere

Nope.

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Weapons that were to send a projectile at another person

Or grapeshot at a group of people, or a canon ball at a ship.

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And in the end, this is all 2nd Amendment supporters and the NRA are trying to protect

The NRA is a revenue generating organization and revenue is the product of customer count and revenue per. Maximizing that requires a large number of customers and something like "hunters" gets more than "strict constitutionalists" and "pure libertarians". "hunters" are too mainstream to threaten legislatively. Sport utility rifles are not. There should be few million sport utility rifles not covered by The National Firearms Act of 1934 in private hands which Obama has said he'll "vigorously" pursue. Not too many people have spent a few hundred thousand dollars on one WW2 Sherman tank. Ergo the NRA focusses on things like semi-automatic sport-utility guns.

I let my membership lapse and joined JPFO plus GOA when I saw the NRA-ILA endorsing anti-gun Republicans over less unfavorable Democrats. They seem to have noticed that's a loosing strategy and come around so I joined up again.

I also decided that as a man abortion isn't a personal issue for me (I can afford to fly women in my family to free states), as some one saving for my retirement Social Security isn't something I care about given the inevitable means testing, education doesn't matter now that our kids have under graduate degrees, and as a straight white guy gay marriage is a purely theoretical thing.

Gun rights are personal, so I think I'll be funding the GOP, California GOP, and a few politicians fighting winnable contested battles elsewhere since representation decided according to geographic boundaries means my vote usually does not count.

[DrewEckhardt 0]

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I like the idea of a well armed militia. Let private individuals buy the arms, then the rest of us taxpayers won't have to pay for a bloated military.

How much do you think the U.S. military should be cut?

I'd start at $500B a year or $5T/decade ($5000B) the way Congress people talk.

To put that in perspective the Economist reported that taxing capital gains as ordinary income would yield $240B/decade or $24B/year (that surprised me). This is 20X better for our deficit. Both Bush 43's Medicare Part D and Obamacare projections are 1T/decade with such military cuts 5X better.

That way we'd still be spending more than #2 (China), 2.7X #2 in NATO (the UK), and 6.5X the nearest first world country with the same land mass (Canada) not including other defense spending like DOE protection of nuclear assets and other homeland security like the TSA.

[Arvoitus 1]

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Agreed. The nuclear weapon argument is really ridiculous.

What I think is ridiculous is that world wide, less people are killed by terrorist attacks, than get killed by guns in America alone.

Yet, the war on terror gets billions in funding, but preventing gun violence gets almost no funding.

Seems like priorities are completely screwed up...

Terrorism targets white people.

Most victims of American gun violence are black/hispanic gang members.

Your rights end where my feelings begin.