I dont understand Obama and gun? Simply put will he mend the constitution jefferson wrote?

Hopefully he'll at least be able to do something to make your sentences coherent...

So what you're proposing is allowing guns in public schools?

What does Obama have against new flavours of Power Thirst?

John McCain can't remember how many Pac Man machines he has, so he doesn't deserve to be president.

Obama has said he believes that the Second Amendment grants an individual right to gun ownership, but that this right is "subject to common-sense regulation." Obama's idea of common-sense regulation is pretty broad.

Also, he can't amend the Constitution if he's elected.

Common sense is also something you cannot define easily. What's common sense to one person may be strange to another.

I was really scared of Obama's views on the second amendment, until he started campaigning, and in interviews started saying stuff like "I am starting to see why people want their gats." (paraphrased)

So at least he has the potential for intelligent growth. I guess.

As long as I get to carry my roscoe, and people like me (people who know what the **** we are doing with our heaters) get to carry theirs, I am cool.

uk do well w/o bang bang bang

maybe america?

The UK isn't doing as great as some people think without cannons. I mean sure some of the crimes of passion that were enabled by firearms may have disappeared, but from what I have seen there is still a healthy network of criminal firearms ownership.

And it's a bovine point anyway. It's a different country, and a different social climate. Switzerland does better than the UK and US with (metric) assloads of guns. Australia has had a hell of a time ridding themselves of the evil little beasties. Canada isn't having huge problems, but not doing perfect either.

The US is a unique entity, just like those other countries. We can look for inspiration all we want, but we can't ever expect a solution to carry over unmodified.

If the UK can create a stable society that is truly free of firearms more power to them. But that doesn't mean everyone else should try the same thing. It just won't work in a society so saturated by firearms ownership.

UK does well with the English language as well.

Yes I'm bitter right now.

I'm too lazy to pull up the numbers, but the majority of deaths by privately owned weapons are suicides. In regions where firearm restrictions are heavy, the suicide rate doesn't change, they just use different methods.

Yes, gun deaths are low in the UK. Knife rates are much higher...

*Bans knives*

Not for long!

Then stoning will go up!

I can just hear the rap songs now.

"Drop a stone on that *****! Stone that foo!"

That is one of his positions on the subject. Another is where he supports Washington DC gun control regulation but I prefer his other view that the supreme court was right in striking it down. Basically, no matter what your personal belief on the topic, Obama has an opinion to suit you.

That's the whole point -- so the courts can interpret each case (if they come to occur) on an individual basis. Statutes rarely aim to establish immutable definitions because of how difficult it is to be both precise and fair regarding things like this -- if, for example, a statute was passed that defined what that "common sense" is, then it would be unfair to those people you mentioned who have a different idea of what "should" be common sense; if they tried to make list of things that are or are not common sense, the list would go on forever. As long as it isn't too vague (which it isn't -- vague would be something like "Regulation when it is necessary"), it's an acceptable basis for interpretation of cases, I think. @_@

I actually saw a news article the other day about a group that is trying to do this in the UK. Ban knives over a certain size since they could only be used for killing people or some such nonsense.

Yeah, nonsense because they think smaller knifes are less lethal.

The two views aren't necessarily contradictory. It is possible for a reasonable person to believe that the DC regulation didn't violate an individual right to gun ownership.

In many ways it did not violate the right to ownership but that wasn't the issue. Forcing a person to keep one's arm in such a way that it is practically impossible to use if necessary is what was the problem. That and the fact that 4 justices essentially voted the second ammendment unconstitutional...

I like the idea of being able to defend myself/loved ones/property, and therefore will always support my right to bear arms.

Bearing arms in the 1780's is a little different than bearing arms today.

Sorry, I don't come around that much, but is this IAMSOLGATT guy for real.


no offense, IAM

look out! he's got a shootah! a shoootah!

if(getThingFlags(source) & 0x8){
  do her}
elseif(getThingFlags(source) & 0x4){
  do other babe}
else{
  do a dude}

puppet master

Um. That was exactly the issue.



Yes, because in the view of the Court it effectively violates an individual right to firearm ownership.



No, they voted that the right to firearm ownership is a collective right, an approach that many lower courts have taken in the past. Breyer also argued separately that the regulation would be constitutional even under an individual rights interpretation.

Reminded me of that Robin Thicke song they used to play on the radio alot.

Walking around with a knife over 3" long without a legitimate reason can get you into trouble here.

I think we've been lucky with not having much guncrime due to our history. Guns were associated with the military, the rural and upperclass; and the general population couldn't afford them. Criminals only needed to escalate the violence they used to knives. We also never had a frontier where the law was weak as America had. I'm not sure our knife crime is actually any higher than America's, our media bleats about it because it's the nastiest crime going on here. Your paper's are filled with gun homicides rather than knife crimes but it doesn't mean they're not happening.

Hardly. The only difference is that firearms now enable crimes of passion more easily because they can be kept condition 1 indefinitely.

Me carrying a pistol now isn't much different than some guy carrying a finely crafted sword a long *** time ago, or even someone toting a black powder pistol. It still requires responsibility and maturity to not make stupid moves.

If you're talking about reasons for bearing arms, of course it is different. However, the need has not disappeared. If it has where you live, that's great. But it's probably only because there are people carrying weapons that you don't have to. Professionals or otherwise.

Which I believe is unbelievably stupid since the motivation behind the Bill of Rights in the first place was to protect the individual against the government aka the collective. They also choose to conveniently ignore "...the right of the People to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." Instead they decided to focus on the militia part and even misconstrue the term militia to mean the National Guard and Reserves.

It has always confused me that people think only 9 out of 10 rights are individual. (Rather, of the rights in the first 10 amendments, of the ones not specifically granted to states (10th) people randomly pick the 2nd to be granted to a collective only. WTF)

Maybe freedom of religion is only a collective right, hmm?

I agree with you on the overall issue. I agree with the Court that the right to firearm ownership is an individual right, subject only to the same kinds of limitations we place on other individual rights. I'd point out though that there are arguments for the other view -- probably too numerous and detailed to list here -- that can't be easily dismissed as stupid or absurd. And for Wookie to say that the minority in D.C. v. Heller voted to invalidate the second amendment is just plain wrong. They had a different, ultimately less persuasive interpretation, and that's all.

There is a less persuasive argument than "We can unilaterally invalidate a piece of the constitution we don't like"?

Ah, sorry, that's ambiguous. I meant less persuasive than the majority's argument

I guess we are dealing with semantics here. The law overbearingly required storage of one's firearms in such a way that they were virtually unusable when needed.



Which validates my point. They don't care what the second amendment actually says.

They were looking for a way to invalidate. That is clear.

Nonsense. They simply don't think it says what you and I and the Supreme Court majority think it says. I might think they're wrong, but I'm at least willing to assume they're sincere.

You can rationalize anything into absurdity. If the constitution is open to any all rationalization it's just as if we don't have one.


Oh wait....