Gun Ban

[Larry Gude]

Thanks for...

...the corrections, Bruz.

The liberal, "civil rights" position on the 2nd Amendment as so succinctly summed up by dems4:

Without this ban far too many people would have access to weapons that have the potential to mass destruction in the gun sense

I've always said that it is the perception of power that a weapon gives the individual that the left so hates. Much harder to impose your will on a people who might be able to fight back, eh dems?

The most horrific part of all this to me is the fact that supporters do not mention once, not once, what to do with people who use guns, any gun, in a criminal fashion. There focus is completely and by definition, on the...law abiding.

Civil libertarians huh?

PS: You are right; The car analogy is silly. The right of private ownership of a car is not guaranteed in the Constitution.

PPS: I'm ordering a new plate rack this week. Anyone wanna help me break it in? I'm getting a rifle shield for it as well.

 

[Larry Gude]

oops...

...sorry. The question:

Any thoughts on President Bush's support for the renewal?

I hold out hope that he'll come around on this one. He's not perfect, you know.

 

[Kyle]

Originally posted by vraiblonde
Yes - why do Democrats keep saying he's such a radical conservative?

Because they believe anything to the right of Lenin is "far right"

 

[Bruce]

This thread has gone on quite a while now and still no one has even attempted to answer my query re: how bans benifit us and what evidence is there to support that position. Is it perhaps because bans DON'T help and there IS no evidence ?????

I find it fascinating that anti gunners seem oblivious to the reality of the issue.

C'mon, someone step up to the plate and give me some REAL reason I should become a gun ban zealot !

 

[Larry Gude]

OK Bruce...

...I can multi task.

If there are NO guns in the world then, no innocent people will get shot.

Reasonable, right?

 

[Bruzilla]

No, bans do not work unless they are implemented with draconian methods. There can be no exemptions, no exceptions, and no grandfathering. For a ban to be effective you would need to pursue gun owners the way that Canada and Australia have, and there's no way to do that thanks to the 2nd Ammendment.

You also need to make sure that you're banning the right items. Banning weapons that are used in less than 1% of crimes is not going to yield more than a 1% change in crime statistics. Unless your goal is a 1% change, you aren't going to get much in return for banning assault weapons. And anyone who says that banning these weapons has yielded 10 or 20 percent changes is cooking the numbers.

You also need to take into account our free-market system. It is not static!!! If you ban foreign-made weapons, the market for these types of rifles will still exist and it now becomes profitable for a US maker to pick up that niche and run with it. Same deal with high-capacity magazines. Force magazines to hold less rounds and you excourage gun makers to make smaller guns. It's like squeezing a balloon... you may compress one area but other areas expand. The US free market will always find a way to meet the needs of consumers provided they are willing to pay for the product.

I'll go back to my earlier statement about banning sports cars. If you are going to legitimize a ban based on preventing deaths and injuries, speeding cars pose a vastly larger threat to life and limb than assault weapons. If you are going to make the case that there is no legitimate use, you'll have to face the fact that a car that's designed to go two or three times the speed limit would have no legitimite use.

The real truth about the assault weapons ban is that some politicians want to show that they are doing something, anything, to stem crime. It doesn't matter if it really works or not, just so that you can say that some progress is being made. It's easier and cheaper to deny the rights of the innocent than to arrest, convict, and incarcerate the guilty. And since not a lot of people own, or are interested in, assault weapons, they're an easier target.