On Tue, 19 Feb 2013 20:09:10 -0600, Richard
wrote:

On 2/19/2013 4:52 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:

How do you know in advance that you will never need to defend
yourself? Or if awareness of your carry permit deterred a break-in?
You have only absence of evidence, not evidence of absence.

"If you never need it for self defense" is a false assumption
supporting a false conclusion.


Jim, you're arguing the 2nd, not the words in that silly quip. It's
the quip that I said was mindless.

All it says is that you won't need the 2nd until someone tries to take
it away. It doesn't say anything about any USE. It says, in so many
words, you won't need it.

Look at it again:

"The beauty of the 2nd Amendment is that it will not be needed
until they try to take it. --Thomas Jefferson"

"It won't be needed until..." Gee, I thought the idea was that was a
PURPOSE to having it, like, as you say, defending yourself, or
whatever you think you need a gun for. That quip says you don't need
it unless someone tries to take it away.

As I pointed out many posts ago, that makes no sense. What we have
there is someone who's a little dim, who thought he had a clever play
on words going for him, but who didn't think about the meaning of what
he wrote. It sure as hell wasn't Thomas Jefferson.g



Hey, Ed.
Welcome back to the monkey cage.

I've recently seen the quip about how the founding fathers didn't mean
ASSAULT weapons, but their quaint muzzle loading muskets.

There was a really interesting show on PBS tonight, with considerable
comments by NRA President David Keene, in which one historian pointed
out the obvious, which every gun nut gleefully ignores: Shooting
muzzle loaders, one shot at a time, presents a QUALITATIVELY different
issue than 30-round ARs. The historian had tracked homicides in
America for the past couple of centuries and found that the sharpest
jump occurred in the decade after Colt introduced the six-shooter.

So it's hard to say what they would have said about the situation we
face today. As it is, that doesn't matter, because we have a dead
Constitution. g


Only problem with that is that those WERE the assault weapons of their time.

But how about let's give the 2nd amendment a break and take a really
close look at the 10th?

Sure. Start with the most conservative view, that of Judge Bork. He
said it was a meaningless redundancy.

Or you could try Madison:

"“The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal
government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in State
governments are numerous and indefinite.” – James Madison, "The
Federalist" No. 45,

Then came the 14th Amendment. As a governor of Texas once said,
"Oops..."

Next issue?



And, a thought about what happens when the feds can't pay their (THEIR)
bills?

Those are our bills. And they can always pay them. They have the
printing presses.

Of course, the Tea Party may decide we don't really have to pay them.



Who ya gonna call THEN?

When?




BTW, glad to see you back as Ed.
I hated that asshole TMT persona.



Shirley you jest. TMT's antics are a big part of why I left. I
couldn't stand the noise.

--
Ed Huntress