This seems like a fun game. Can we lump viruses and/or diseases into a single "entity"?

There is an interesting quote concerning the last sentence that i know you will appreciate.

"Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him? Let history answer this question."

-Thomas Jefferson

I agree with the notion of providing mental health care completely. This is where the whole debate needs to focus, in my opinion. This would theoretically separate who you are calling "irresponsible" citizens from the "responsible" ones. A means of directing the energy to the source of our violence instead of casting blanket policies that limit that power and rights of the public as a whole.

However where i disagree is with the need for new gun control measures, as the measures already in place would potentially prevent a mentally dysfunctional person from obtaining said firearms (from legal means). For instance; the background check given to anyone buying a new firearm already checks for things like restraining orders, violent histories, and previous felony charges. It is still any medical professional's responsibility to report any statement made by a client (or anyone by the matter) that would lead him/her to believe this person intends to do harm. This is then made accessible to any law enforcement agency. Maybe an awareness campaign to enforce rules in place?

There are always back doors to obtaining these firearms, whether by theft, or by borrowing them friend friends/relatives. This is difficult to regulate without taking away from those who are "responsible" as well. Even then, there is no indication, or information that can support the hypothesis that new restrictions would even help achieve that goal. Under those realizations i cannot condone (or even understand) any further restriction on the general populace.

FYI I altered my original response. Didn't intent the "goodnight my brothers and sisters" response to sound as pompous as it did. Truthfully it never had anything to do with the rest of my post. Was just trying to bid you all adieu and wish you all happy debating.

SO, again, goodtnight all, and take care

Indeed, i agree. It is difficult for other countries that run on different principles to understand why we have our principles. Its sort of a discrimination via ignorance (which i guess means all discrimination). But unlike other prejudgments, people are taught to fear firearms in general and prejudge the owners. It's just another knee-jerk reaction.

Ok, perhaps i got sidetracked. No, the right to bear arms for citizens would not prevent someone from dropping a nuke on us.

The U.S. having nukes on the other hand would (as mentioned above).

And the aftermath of such an event, were it to happen, would tie in with the "economic takeover" portion of my previous statement.

It would be a deterrent, for an all out occupation (meaning it would be nearly impossible to actually take us over without an indefinite insurgent activity). The likelihood of said occupation would be very, very minuscule as a result of our nuclear weapons, so on that point we would agree completely.

In fact, the ownership of nukes would prevent nearly any full scale invasion for any country. Hostile take-overs today would be done by other means; either economic, or the takeover of political influence, etc. This brings us to an entirely different scenario.

#1. Economic takeover could leave a country broke, diminished welfare and social services leaving the public to fend for themselves for food, shelter, protection, etc. There public ownership of weapons would help with independence by the balance power.

#2. Political influence would obviously involve corruption of a system and manipulating policies toward the benefit of said nation. People can only be taken advantage of for so long before becoming angered. With a well armed populace you would have to keep things much more subtle as political powers could potentially be overthrown and even local police forces rendered useless when enough citizens revolt.

The above ties into the primary reason for not infringing on our second amendment. When a government becomes too corrupt, and i mean to the point of those speaking out suddenly disappearing and citizens on large scales being detained (in camps and such). In this case citizens can stop abductions (or at least have a chance to), and overthrow efforts to imprison towns/cities, etc.

Now, the government's weapons are much bigger, and more powerful, but the use of said weapons (for instance dropping a nuke on a revolting city), or large scale use of bombs/drones/etc. would be VERY tough to keep under wraps from other citizens, other countries, and even our military, causing many, if not most, of them to turn their backs on the powers that be saying "that's just F-ed up". Which would combine with the likelihood that some countries will come to our aid at that point.

Again assault weapons would only aid such an effort on the above scenario, but remember, the government can be corrupted by any force, not just foreign military. Corporations, for example, banks have a HUGE influence on our government and its policies. Regardless of the force performing the takeover the result is ultimately the same... People will be taken advantage of progressively until it becomes enslavement. But people usually break, and get very angry before this occurs. The 2nd amendment ensures they have the power to direct that anger toward the enemy trying to enslave them.

That being said. The department of justice statistics and FBI records show that gun control has no impact on gun-related crime. This stands true for the Clinton era assault weapons bans, as well as on gun laws/revocation of said laws on major U.S. cities. This leads to me ask the very important question; "Why are they still trying to pass new restrictions?"

Apologies for the long-winded response.

On a side note:

Goodnight my bothers and sisters for now

Where were nukes mentioned? Besides, an "assault" rifle with a 30 round mag is far from having nukes. Not to mention only responsible for a very small amount of gun related deaths, and many of them were accomplished with black-market purchases.

So why ban them?

I can see where, at first glance, one can hypothesize that gun control can curb gun violence. This, however is a knee-jerk reaction. These only get people in trouble and its also responsible for dwindling rights of the body public, leaving them less and less powerful every day. Yet many of the same people talk about how socialism is a good idea... Contradicting, yes?

The fallacy here is the belief that we can remove guns from the criminals and mentally deranged. It has never worked for us in the past, and will most likely not work for us in the future. (Ex. #1 Clinton's era "assault weapons ban" had no impact on our country's gun violence, nor did the expiration of said ban. In fact the Columbine school shootings occur right in the middle of it.)

The only thing that would be accomplished is the removal of a very important balance in our system of checks and balances. One unique to our country and its founding principles.

Therefore, it is illogical and irresponsible to attempt the further limitation of any firearm and/or magazine currently available. As a matter of fact if the politicians truly cared for its people (instead of just trying to win votes) we would have a strong focus on mental health care as well as awareness campaigns instead of following this stupid debate which is costing us time, money, and dwindling the public's faith in our current government.

Oh yeah, another random fact. There is a direct correlation between the economy and violent crime. Yet, we seem to be pushing the debate on economics aside. Interesting, is it not?

There is no information supporting the hypothesis that any further restrictions on firearms will make the general public any safer, period. This is just an assumption.

Department of Justice and FBI records all show that in the U.S. gun control has nothing to do with gun homicides. So one could retaliate with "Your paranoia about my guns doesn't trump the right of the people to expect reasonable provisions to protect them from violence". Few people have given any attention to things that would help to prevent mass shootings from happening again.

For the record you do not sound at all like a jerk. Truth is I too have strong feelings considering political issue (which can be burdening at times).

Now, on the issue of what our founding fathers intended... I believe our forefathers new very well that technology would continue to advance. (Although, i agree, nuclear warheads may have been a bit of a stretch for the imagination).

But the heart behind the bill of rights was to limit government control/power over the people. The 2nd amendment, which is in question, was specifically designed as a last resort for the people to overthrow the powers that be, were they to become too corrupt. If police started "black bagging" protesters, and random threats to powerful, corrupt leaders, started disappearing (lets say under the patriot act), the people need firepower to fight this. Again, I realize that this is an extreme case scenario. But historically, it will happen as it has many times, in many countries. Especially if we let things like the patriot act, the fairness doctrine and gun ownership infringements continually pass under the guise of safety.


"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -Benjamin Franklin

That all being said, if we all take a gander to statistics provided by the Department of Justice, and the FBI records, we will find no correlation between gun laws and gun violence. (This tends to anger both sides of the debate.) Clinton's assault weapon bans had no impact on gun violence (didn't even prevent the Columbine shootings), states/cities with the strictest gun laws still remain the most dangerous, and even the argument of europe having less crime is trumped by Mexico (illegal for citizens to own guns, yet has one of the highest rates of gun violence) and switzerland ( 1 in 10 citizens own a military issued machine gun, yet gun violence is low even when compared to europe). Heck, I'm pretty sure every single (or at least almost every) incident of mass shootings occurred in a "gun free" zone.

SO we have a separate issue(s) leading to violence here. I only wish politicians would forget about agendas for a minute and try avenues that don't involve taking away liberty from the populace. Funny how mental health care is only now being addressed (with very minor tweaks) and only in passing. I believe this, over-medication of the population, and unawareness are much bigger issues. Heck they seem to be ignoring our economic issues (which is still fading), and there IS a direct relationship between the economy and violent crime.

Now imagine the slaves also owning/possessing firearms... Balance of power? It would be much harder to keep them as slaves if they all had guns, would it not?

<--- Future gun totin Doc everyone. If you are good boys and girls I'll invite ya to my shootin range. ( I guess i could integrate that into my eye exams and have insurance pay for the ammo! )

I wonder how many other differences other countries, such as those in Europe have from the U.S... To assume that base on this one difference would be a fallacy as Mexico doesn't allow civilians to have guns yet they have a higher homicide rate, and Switzerland requires (or strongly encourages) military issued assault rifles be kept in the closet of every household (this is linked to military service). The Swiss have a much lower homicide rates than most countries.

Now that we are on the subject... In the U.S. Clinton banned assault rifles, yet, Columbine occurred smack dab in the middle of this ban. And furthermore gun violence, overall, continued to decline after the ban was lifted... This can't help but make you wonder... As with Washington D.C. who lifted its strict gun laws without a climb in gun violence. Another example would be Chicago, Illinois. They have the strictest gun laws in the country, yet the one of the highest crime rates. Given this information how can one conclude that restricting firearms would have any impact on the U.S. and its crime rates? In fact, gun laws seem to have virtually no impact on crime, which is unfortunate for both sides of the debate. (Although making them illegal does help cartels make a few extra bucks.) So why are we not pursuing mental healthcare as a better alternative method of preventing tragedies? This would do nothing but benefit everyone, would it not?

That being said... I understand your frustration with those who believe they are untouchable because they have a firearm. However, people do fear losing them as it does put them at a disadvantage to anyone still wielding the said firearm (which is anyone with the political pull to still own one or career criminal who purchases one on the black market). Power is so subjective in this argument as, in a way, it would give a 90 lb woman more "power" to defend herself against a 250 lb man under certain circumstances. Again, i point out, UNDER CERTAIN CIRCUMSTANCES, as nothing is, or ever will be, fool proof. Which leads me to question... You say the government has no fear of guns because they have bigger and more powerful ones. But if guns don't make you more powerful then how did they achieve this status?

I guess that was my point. For a few years after the gun ban there was no change in australia. But that may have changed. Heck the whole world has followed that same pattern, including the U.S. with or without gun bans. As a matter of fact, in the U.S. as a whole crime (murder rates i belive) have actually gone down quite steadily since Bush lifted Clinton's assault rifle ban back in the 90's (not that i actually think it's related). As far as the NRA is concerned,facts have been manipulated on both sides (that's the funny thing about statistics) I wish both sides would have the power to intelligently argue their point. It would appear the NRA could have chosen more equipped debaters...

I know right? IF there is no fear of our pea-shooters why are his bodyguards armed? If the mere presence of a firearm makes "everyone" less safe, why shouldn't the man they spend millions upon millions of taxpayer dollars protecting follow this advice?

Boy, im starting to get deja vu here. Good to see you both Adj4u and Yellowrose.

Seems to be the first course of action for any tyrant/dictator throughout history...

I have discovered that people start getting lazy when it comes to information in these threads. Or perhaps they didn't find any logical argument against your post.... don't know. But it sure gave me chills. I may need to print it out to save for debates with my friends. With your permission, of course...