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The United States is not a dictatorship, it is a duly elected representative form of government as provided under the Constitution.
Stop spreading propaganda.
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Originally Posted by Wendell Phillips
"The government is afraid of the guns people have because they have to have control of the people at all times. Once you take away the guns, you can do anything to the people. You give them an inch and they take a mile. I believe we are slowly turning into a socialist government. The government is continually growing bigger and more powerful and the people need to prepare to defend themselves against government control."
- Timothy James McVeigh (1993)
you are right to a point, this country is a constitutional republic with no dictator. the problem though is that presidents have been working since the early 20th century to make congress irrelevant, and this current president has grabbed a lot of power for himself. granted bush was no better. but when presidents use executive orders to go around the laws that congress passes, and presidents sign into law, we have a serious problem. you quoted mcveigh, and while i dont agree with his methods of pushing back against a government that is growing more oppressive everyday, the statement you quoted is in fact correct.
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Originally Posted by KickAssArmyChick
If James Holmes had a drone, it would have been called foreign policy.
I am a gun owner and I am proud of it. Being raised in crime ridden Brazil where the population is much smaller than here and gun ownership is basically ony afforded to criminals, I got to see what gun control does to vulnerable and law-abiding citizens. I witnesses my first murder in my early teens, committed with an ilegal weapon.
If someone comes into my house with the intent of harming me, my daughter and my boyfriend, they won't make it out alive.
This incident has prompted me to apply for a CCW. I am not ashamed of it; I am a responsible gun owner as is my boyfriend. I am exercising my right, just as that 71 yr old in Florida a few days ago. I am sure the people in that internet cafe are glad he did and they didn't leave the place dead or wounded.
Nobody talks about the benefits of having law abiding citizens who are able to stop crimes with their weapons... It is always the same bashing on guns and gun owners.
Really? Did you ever actually READ the Constitution?
If the purpose of the 2nd is to preempt the need for a standing army, then why is the following also included in the Constitution?
"The Congress shall have Power ... To raise and support Armies ... To provide and maintain a Navy"
Like many pre-civil war Constitutional concepts the purpose of the 2nd Amendment is to provide the states some autonomy from the federal government. Thus why the 2nd Amendment was, until 2010 principally directed at the federal government and not the states, and why the phases "well regulated militia" and "security of a free State" are used, since at the time the state militia was the primary defense force of each individual state.
After the Civil War however the conception of the 2nd Amendment began to change because the post civil war amendments and in particular the 14th amendment essentially stripped individual states of a lot of their autonomy. Basically in the era between 1860-1880 the entire concept of how US citizens identified changed. Prior to 1860 most US citizens identified chiefly as Virginians, Rhode Islanders, Ohioans etc. by 1880 most US citizens viewed themselves first and foremost as Americans. Thus the original concept behind the 2nd amendment is a vestige of a bygone era, and this is again an example of why I think originalism is far from an ideal method of looking at the Constitution.
Last edited by Randomstudent; 07-21-2012 at 10:57 AM..
Tell that to King John of England (created the Magna Carta), Louis XVI (beheaded), or the British Government (lost possession of the 13 colonies), Tsar Nicholas II (abdicated) and many many others I can list (from Sumeria and Ancient Egypt to the Spring Rebellions in the Middle East). The right to rebellion has been historically shown to be a fundamental right, it might get you executed as a traitor, but no one said that rights come without responsibilities.
I think the thing that you fail to recognize is well two things, firstly the Bill of Rights is not exclusive, you don't have just those enumerated rights. The 9th Amendment specifically states
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The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Secondly in the case of some form of civil war or open rebellion, the group who will decide whether an action is seditious or treasonous is the group who wins.
Look at it this way, the War of Independence, if it had gone the other way, then the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and the supporters of the rebelling colonial governments who fought the British would have been tried and most likely executed for treason, because they rebelled against their lawful government. Thus by your argument if the founders acted lawfully, the US would not exist, there would be no Second Amendment, and we wouldn't be having this argument.
I think that when folks make such assertions the very least they can do is provide some substantiation.
Sure, and I agree.
See Barron v. Baltimore (1833) and US v. Cruikshank (1876), granted these are not good law anymore in the wake of McDonald v. Chigaco (2010) but they go to the historical conception of the bill of rights and second amendment in particular not applying to the states, but instead applying to the federal government. Additionally former Chief Justice Burger noted that...
"one of the greatest pieces of fraud, I repeat the word ‘fraud,’ on the American public by special interest groups that I've ever seen in my lifetime. The real purpose of the Second Amendment was to ensure that state armies-the militia-would be maintained for the defense of the state. The very language of the Second Amendment refutes any argument that it was intended to guarantee every citizen an unfettered right to any kind of weapon he or she desires."...(quoted in Silveira v. Lockyer 9th cir.) (2002) (again not good law but illustrative of historical ideas.)
Last edited by Randomstudent; 07-21-2012 at 12:06 PM..
Location: New Albany, Indiana (Greater Louisville)
11,974 posts, read 25,462,489 times
Reputation: 12187
Quote:
Originally Posted by 16trillionandcounting
Obama is running a dictatorship in all but name.
He stomped all over the constitution by passing NDAA.
He started a war (libya) without congressional approval.
He killed an American citizen without a trial.
And much more.
Where was all this outrage when George Dubya Bush was stomping on the constitution with the Patriot Act, starting an illegal war based on outright lies, releasing the name of Iraq War whistleblowers who called out his lies, banning the media from even taking pictures of returning coffins from the war, etc etc.
I think some people are afraid when it's a Black Man doing those things because they fear he may want some revenge for the many terrible things that White Americans have done to Blacks throughout US history.
Where was all this outrage when George Dubya Bush was stomping on the constitution with the Patriot Act, starting an illegal war based on outright lies, releasing the name of Iraq War whistleblowers who called out his lies, banning the media from even taking pictures of returning coffins from the war, etc etc.
I think some people are afraid when it's a Black Man doing those things because they fear he may want some revenge for the many terrible things that White Americans have done to Blacks throughout US history.
B.S. Plenty spoke out against those things. Dems in Congress voted for all of those things too, BTW. The race card is past its expiration date.
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