Are you a Democrat, a Republican, or a Redneck?

Michael Jackson is 3 months behind on his mortgage ?

Don't worry Michael, B H Obama will save you.

Well, you kinda zeroed in on mag capacity as an issue and thats fine and we can talk about that. I was more interested in the specific types of high end weapons the NRA is ok with. Do they truly have a "sky is the limit" stance on weapons?

The "safe" capacity of mags debate/restrictions could be argued down to a single shot. I have an AR-15 with multiple 20 and 30 rd mags. Do I really need them for the target shooting that I do? No, not really. But I'm not doing anything illegal with my gun so I don't really see an issue there. You're looking at it from a "what they might do" perspective and I can understand that to some degree. But there's a lot of mights, maybes, and possibilities out there can can be thought up. And that statement goes for the pro-gun people too. They are also going to come with possible situations that would require a high cap mag. Its tough to say what is reasonable really. Everyone has different comfort levels that in turn reflect the risks they are willing to take in their lives. The recent school shootings are getting more attention because of the number of people shot. If the shooter had been using a low cap mag would that have made a difference in how people viewed these tragedies and the gun used? Guns and magazines are not the culprit here. They can be used for good deeds and good clean fun as well as bad things. Millions of guns owners out there that aren't doing anything wrong with them. Don't know the numbers but its safe to say there are thousands of semi-autos with high cap mags out there that haven't been misused. Its what you do with them that matters. When a big jumbo jet goes down, hundreds of people have the very real and likely possibilty of dieing all at once. One accident. One terrorist on a plane can destroy hundreds of lives in one crash. One nut with a gun can kill many people too, though far less than the plane. But some people jump all over the idea of getting rid of or limiting the guns after a shooting because they're an easy target. That's it for now. You're turn.

John

[quote="Devil5052
My argument is that the average citizen rarely fiinds himself in a situation where he/she is being attacked by hordes of drugged up Chinese/Japanese/Whatever soldiers or "Human Wave" assaults by groups of criminals. The threats faced by the military & police are totaly different than what you & I can reasonably expect to face. This is what I mean....In my opinion the NRA position is just ludicrous.[/quote]

In general I agree with you. But, I don't make my health, welfare and safety contingency plans based on what I can reasonably expect, I make them on worse case senario. That's why I have a coal boiler and a 4 ton coal bin, a 1,000 gallon propane tank with a propane fired generator, a pantry that could sustain my family for several months, etc.
Remember the LA riots after the Rodney King incident? The police were no shows. The only homes and businesses that survived were the ones protected by homeowners and shop keepers with hand guns and rifles. I'm sure I'll be called a right wing nut job by some here but I live 30 minutes north of Baltimore City. If there were to be some triggering incident that lead to rioting, I may need more than 10 round mags to defend my home. Suppose there were a terrorist incident in Baltimore such as a nuke, radiological bomb or biological agent released that made large geographic areas uninhabitable? There would be a mass exodus of "citizens" from the city to the suburbs. If they were peaceful and in need of aid, I would render it without reservation, including providing shelter. But if maruading hoardes of looters descended on my neighborhood, I'm making a stand and not with 10 round mags. It's not unprecented. During the civil rights riots in the 60's large mobs in most major cities did just that. By the way, pre-ban higher capacity mags are grandfathered and still legal to pocess, just don't get caught putting one in a post ban weapon!

69Drag wrote:Well, you kinda zeroed in on mag capacity as an issue and thats fine and we can talk about that. I was more interested in the specific types of high end weapons the NRA is ok with. Do they truly have a "sky is the limit" stance on weapons?

The "safe" capacity of mags debate/restrictions could be argued down to a single shot. I have an AR-15 with multiple 20 and 30 rd mags. Do I really need them for the target shooting that I do? No, not really. But I'm not doing anything illegal with my gun so I don't really see an issue there. You're looking at it from a "what they might do" perspective and I can understand that to some degree. But there's a lot of mights, maybes, and possibilities out there can can be thought up. And that statement goes for the pro-gun people too. They are also going to come with possible situations that would require a high cap mag. Its tough to say what is reasonable really. Everyone has different comfort levels that in turn reflect the risks they are willing to take in their lives. The recent school shootings are getting more attention because of the number of people shot. If the shooter had been using a low cap mag would that have made a difference in how people viewed these tragedies and the gun used? Guns and magazines are not the culprit here. They can be used for good deeds and good clean fun as well as bad things. Millions of guns owners out there that aren't doing anything wrong with them. Don't know the numbers but its safe to say there are thousands of semi-autos with high cap mags out there that haven't been misused. Its what you do with them that matters. When a big jumbo jet goes down, hundreds of people have the very real and likely possibilty of dieing all at once. One accident. One terrorist on a plane can destroy hundreds of lives in one crash. One nut with a gun can kill many people too, though far less than the plane. But some people jump all over the idea of getting rid of or limiting the guns after a shooting because they're an easy target. That's it for now. You're turn.

John

Sorry about zeroing in on high capacity magazines as I misread your question..."My question is, do you have any specific examples of what the NRA's view is on high end weapons? "....as you asking about high capacity rather than "high end". I eally dont know how you define "high end" weapons so I will leave that for further clarification.

Getting back to the high capacity magazine debate, my arguments against them are these:

1. You yourself agree that you have no need for them for target practise.
2. I argue that the ordinary citizen has no need for them for self/home protection purposes for reasons I stated b4.
3. While you would probably never cause a problem to society with any type of weapon, you could conceivably suffer a nervous breakdown, your home could be burglarized & weapons stolen or a friend/family member, knowing about your weapons, could themselves go crazy & steal them to attack a mall.

My point is that, since you admitt you really have no need for such high capacity mags, the societal right to defend itself against them in the wrong hands is more reasonable & therefore should trump, in my opinion.
As far as your statement in re the recent mall/school massacres: "If the shooter had been using a low cap mag would that have made a difference in how people viewed these tragedies and the gun used?"
My answer is that every life not taken while the shooter was forced to reload is sacred & is your answer.

coalkirk wrote:
In general I agree with you. But, I don't make my health, welfare and safety contingency plans based on what I can reasonably expect, I make them on worse case senario. That's why I have a coal boiler and a 4 ton coal bin, a 1,000 gallon propane tank with a propane fired generator, a pantry that could sustain my family for several months, etc.
Remember the LA riots after the Rodney King incident? The police were no shows. The only homes and businesses that survived were the ones protected by homeowners and shop keepers with hand guns and rifles. I'm sure I'll be called a right wing nut job by some here but I live 30 minutes north of Baltimore City. If there were to be some triggering incident that lead to rioting, I may need more than 10 round mags to defend my home. Suppose there were a terrorist incident in Baltimore such as a nuke, radiological bomb or biological agent released that made large geographic areas uninhabitable? There would be a mass exodus of "citizens" from the city to the suburbs. If they were peaceful and in need of aid, I would render it without reservation, including providing shelter. But if maruading hoardes of looters descended on my neighborhood, I'm making a stand and not with 10 round mags. It's not unprecented. During the civil rights riots in the 60's large mobs in most major cities did just that. By the way, pre-ban higher capacity mags are grandfathered and still legal to pocess, just don't get caught putting one in a post ban weapon!

Good morning my good friend coalkirk.....Hard to believe we are on opposite sides of a debate again!
I can't really agree with your defend yourself against the worst case scenario as it loses the individual right to own vs collective right to defend ourselves argument, in my opinion. If I was able to collect weapons to defend myself against any threat my mind can conjure up, being a very imaginative person , I can think of a galaxy of possible threats:

1. If attacked by a herd of wild charging elephants I could probably use a mini-gun, flame thrower or mortar to defend myself.
2. If I somehow managed to anger the entire population of Denmark, & they vowed revenge, I could justify owning & using an Ohio class SSBN to defend myself.

I'm not trying to be a wise guy here, just having some fun but my point is still "reasonability" should be the goal.

Devil5052 wrote:2. I argue that the ordinary citizen has no need for them for self/home protection purposes for reasons I stated b4.

True but why take such weapons out of the hands of ordinary citizens. There's already hundreds of thousands of weapons like these on the streets and making them illegal isn't going to prevent there use. When they put the ban in place the last time the only thing it did was make them expensive.

Well Devil5052, I think we'll just have to agree to disagree on this. Its been fun but I think I'm gonna withdraw myself from this debate. Not because I'm upset or anything like that. I really just don't have anything more to contribute. So, carry on Gents.

John

The NRA has become a caricature of itself; that's why Michael Moore was able to parody them so effectively (whatever you think about Moore, his films stimulate thinking and are widely viewed). Not Charlton's greatest role.

By happenstance, I've recently seen the film Munich (about the hunt for the '72 Olympics assassins) as well as a documentary on Bonnie and Clyde. And I wonder: when have we seen more than a few-shot assault on somebody's home? I mean, this side of Scarface?

Common sense dictates that police need a few more shots in their clips than those of us defending our homes.

Oh, and by the way, has anybody here ever fired a shot, or even personally known somebody who has, in defense of their castle? I ask because (a) I believe those stories exceedingly rare, and (b) I seriously doubt any will involve the need for, to say nothing of the use of, an assault weapon.

But, as I've now said a couple times, the Supreme Court has the 2nd Amendment before it as we debate these issues. And it's really going to be fascinating to see just how far the right wing of the Court will go in giving the "broad" interpretation to the 2nd Amendment that the NRA has been promoting for the last generation. The basic question whether it refers to private or community arms possession is open; if the Supremes hold that it's a personal right, it's going to be very difficult to restrict any form of private possession of "arms", whether you choose to "keep" them in your home or "bear" them when you move about in public.

You want Armegeddon scenarios? You don't have to have a film maker's imagination to create them if, as I noted above, any of our nutty neighbors suddenly has the constitutional right to drive around in a surplus Jeep with a 50 cal machine gun and a magazine, or buy a mortar and set it up in his back yard.

The good news? You'll be able to have as many rounds in your clip as you want. The bad news? So will everybody else.

Liberal militia. Steady.
or redneck kitten?

The more I think of it, the more obvious it is that the 2nd Amendment must refer to the right to have community militias, not the private right to bear limitless kinds of arms.

I say that because the language of the 2nd Amendment is so brief: "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."

So, even if, or perhaps especially if you're a "textualist" or "originalist" in your interpretation of the Constitution, the only way to give effect to the predicate clause of that one-sentence constitutional right is to interpret the right which follows to refer to militias. Militias can possess the means to destroy society because they are "well regulated." It's the only way the language makes sense.

Don't get me wrong: that's not to say we don't have the personal right to keep and/or bear arms, but it is to say that the legislatures of the various states do have the right to legislate in that area. (And, I would argue, the obligation.) Why is that? Because the genius of our "federal" government design is that the citizens of Wyoming don't have to have the same laws as the citizens of Rhode Island or Massachusetts -- or the District of Columbia (where the Supreme Court case originates). As to personal gun possession laws, I believe the Constitution upholds that federal characteristic.

I predict that will be the Court's holding. Mark my words.

This may be a good spot to discuss exactly who is the NRA (National Rifle Assoc) & who do they represent? Just as the Tobacco Industry, the Oil Industry & the Transportation Industry have powerful trade organizations/Lobbyists to promote their interests, the NRA is similarly one of this country's most powerful trade & lLobbying organizations whose purpose is to promote the hugely wealthy firearms industry. ...Period! ...Regardless of the "window dressing" literature they regulary put out to support their clients, they care nothing about Constitutional Rights, hunter's rights, your right of self sefense or anything else. They care about money.
Would anyone here really like to argue that the NRA's real purpose is to represent the average law abiding, gun owning "Joe?"
So let's stop worshipping this industry trade group as if it were a non-profit Cancer research organization or a subsidiary of Mother Theresa's Missionary Group & remember what their real agenda is.

stockingfull wrote: any of our nutty neighbors suddenly has the constitutional right to drive around in a surplus Jeep with a 50 cal machine gun and a magazine, or buy a mortar and set it up in his back yard.

And what magazine would that be? Penthouse?

A 50 cal. machine gun will more than likely be belt fed so it has no magazine and the magazine rules just went out the window.
And you have to have a special liscense to have a machine gun so if he has one and is not properly liscensed then you can see how well the gun laws work. But yet we need more laws!

This started off as a humorous topic. What happen? Maybe its time to start a new serious topic on gun control.

spc wrote:This started off as a humorous topic. What happen? Maybe its time to start a new serious topic on gun control.

Sounds like a plan if you want to start a new thread. or just continue it on the Guns thread.

Devil5052 wrote:

spc wrote:This started off as a humorous topic. What happen? Maybe its time to start a new serious topic on gun control.

Sounds like a plan if you want to start a new thread. or just continue it on the Guns thread.

If Flyer5 the author of the "guns" topic doesn't mind.