The Second Amendment needs amending

[GGJohn]

Back in May this year, Andrea Colledani wrote an article for The Beacon suggesting that the Second Amendment needed to be revised to fit modern needs. Unfortunately, she did not have any suggestion for what course of action might be taken.

Colledani was right of course, the Second Amendment is outdated. Militias are redundant in the modern developed world, but the right to bear arms goes beyond that. The guns used at Lexington and Concord were hunting rifles, and regardless of your participation in the sport, there is no denying that its practice is beneficial. When deer populations skyrocket, the creatures destroy crops worse than rats, and coyotes are more violent pests. I realize that these are less of an issue in Miami than in my native Iowa, but the U.S. is made of much more than South Florida.

If I had my way, the solution to gun rights would be in your wallet. I don’t believe anyone needs to own a gun. Some careers may benefit from their use, but that’s on a professional level, not a personal one. If you need a gun at work, you should pick up your sidearm when you punch in and drop it off when you punch out. But what about the every man, those hunters I spent my last paragraph defending? They wouldn’t own their guns or their relatives. I say all ranged weapons – shotguns, rifles, pistols and bows – need to be collected by the government, catalogued and put in a library. You want to shoot Bambi? Fine, but I’ll need to see your gun-library-card.

They would, of course, be exceptions to the rule. Your grandfather’s WWI rifle is an heirloom, not a weapon, and would be categorized as such. Antiques would be examined by an expert who would make sure they are safe enough to be kept in a home and then be returned to their cabinets.

http://fiusm.com/2015/06/03/the-second-amendment-needs-amending/

The 2A works just fine as it is, this author would have lawful citizens give up their firearms while the criminals would
just keep theirs. And what of the SCOTUS? Does the author really think that the SC would be ok with this? Much less the American people?
How about those in Congress that would vote for this? How long before they were voted out of office and replaced with those that would repeal this onerous law toot sweet?

And when did we get a Dept. Of Want's and Need's?

[beevul]

1. Yet another that wants a constitutionally protected right magically transformed into a privilege.

Not just no, but fuck no.

There is nothing, I repeat the word NOTHING, reasonable or common sense about doing such a thing.


It does, however, put lie, yet again, to this commonly repeated falsehood:

"nobody wants to take your guns".

[msongs]

2. if gun owners would stop killing people by the thousands every year perhaps the amend crowd

would go away

[GGJohn]

4. You do realize that 2/3rds of those firearm related deaths are suicide don't you?

And you do realize that the majority of firearms related homicides are criminals committing crimes don't you?
Fact is that less than .3 of 1% of firearms are used in an illegal or negligent way.

[Shamash]

11. You missed a few digits

It is .003 of 1% of the estimated guns in the country that are used as murder weapons in a given year. It would be .3% if you totaled all of them up for a century.

[GGJohn]

12. Ooooops!!

You're right, thanks for the correction.

[Shamash]

6. What do -I- look like to you?

When you see an African-American, do you think "criminal"? When you see someone Hispanic, do you think "illegal immigrant"? If you saw me on the street, would you think "killer"? Probably not, since you do not know me and I'm not typically carrying an assault rifle over my back and do not have a swastika tattooed on my forehead.

"Gun owners" are "killing people by the thousands" in the same way that "beer drinkers" or "car drivers" are. Go look up how many gun owners there are and how many gun murders there were last year. Then figure out the chance that a randomly selected "gun owner" is a "killer" and get back to me.

Just because someone shares a superficial characteristic with a group does not mean that you or I or anyone else in whatever that group is represent the worst of all possible people in that group.

We call that sort of attitude "stereotyping", "demonization" and "bigotry". You should be ashamed.

[beevul]

8. Less than a tenth of a percent of gun owners, you mean.

I'm sure you left that out by accident.

[Eleanors38]

19. Oh, that "amend crowd" I saw in the phone booth? nt

[Nuclear Unicorn]

24. Sixty to 70% of all gun homicides are perpetrated by individuals with criminal records or at least

known to police for suspected serious criminal offenses. Guns aren't causing crime.

[Shamash]

3. He is one reason why liberals can't have nice things ;(

Proposing gun laws that are stricter than anything in Europe, if only we could do something reasonable like repeal part of Bill of Rights.

That's going to go over real well.

Pick whatever Democrat you do not want to win in 2016 and insist they add this to their campaign speeches.

[Warpy]

5. The second amendment should have been scrapped

when this country finally realized that poorly trained local militias wouldn't provide adequate protection during an invasion by an imperial power and the professional military was established.

It's a relic, poorly written and open to too much silly interpretation, especially by gun manufacturers and their paid hack attorneys and admen.

And as for that silly canard that only criminals would have guns, see: Australia.

Two things will make this a safer country: end the drug war and get all those fucking guns off the street.

[GGJohn]

7. Australia is a totally different culture than America.

Two things will make this a safer country: end the drug war and get all those fucking guns off the street.

Wrong, ending the drug war would drop the crime rate like a rock, and the vast majority of firearms are never used in a criminal or negligent manner.

[beevul]

9. Strange, how folks like you say "off the street" but really mean "out of private possession".

Its almost like you think people wouldn't agree if you say what you really mean.

[clffrdjk]

20. Why would you think the gun war would go any different than the drug war?

[hack89]

21. The right to own guns was always seen as an individual right independent of militia service

that is the right our founding fathers enjoyed as Englishmen (see the First British Bill of Rights of 1690). The Bill of Rights was added to the Constitution to ensure fundamental individual rights were explicitly protected.

There is a good reason the Democratic Party platform says the 2A protects an individual right to keep and bear arms.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

23. If poorly trained militias are so ineffective against modern militaries please explain

Cuba
Viet Nam
Chechnya
Azerbaijan
Iraq
Afghanistan
Libya
ISIS

[Lizzie Poppet]

29. *sound of crickets chirping*

[Nuclear Unicorn]

30. I get that a lot.

[DonP]

10. Another Idiot with M/Soft Word and no view of reality is heard from

We seem to get at least one or two of these "repeal" or "amend" articles a year, then the usual suspects repeat it as if it's some kind of insightful Gospel.

But one thing I've noticed, none of the big mouths who propose it "philisophically" ever actually does anything about it, besides whining online here and there of course.

Nobody ever starts the petitions required, writes their congress critters demanding they create legislation to repeal the 2nd or for a Constitutional Congress to revise the whole thing. Way too much work for gun control people, who's stock and trade is relying on somebody else doing all the heavy lifting and paying all the bills. (Pay attention, Bloomberg won't live forever)

So I'm going to take this as seriously as I do our gun grabber friends calls for "Common Sense" solutions and ignore it until I hear about the millions of signatures on grass roots petitions in 37 or more states, and hundreds of Congress people demanding their name be listed as a co-sponsor to start that repeal process.

But if you point that out, you hear the "Well, all we really need is the right SCOTUS to fix everything". That's their best and only excuse for sitting on the couch and whining.

[Shamash]

13. You are 100% wrong!

Nobody ever starts the petitions required, writes their congress critters demanding they create legislation to repeal the 2nd or for a Constitutional Congress to revise the whole thing.

Here's the petition to the White House to repeal the Second Amendment, created December 15, 2012.

And since then, in a nation of approximately 200,000,000 adults who care deeply about the issue (or so I am led to believe), exactly 3,434 cared enough to sign it. By gun control standards, that's "a lot" or "many" or maybe even "most Americans", depending on who you ask over at GCRA.

In fact, if all 3,434 signatures came from DU members, that would be a whole 1.5% of the DU user base (i.e. virtually everyone), which gives you an idea of how incredibly important this sort of repeal is to the public at large.

And FYI, part of the president's reply to this petition was:
"I believe that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to bear arms."

ROFL.

[beevul]

14. How did they get all together on the same page like that?

And how did they triple the signatures?

[Shamash]

15. Just think of it!

If every last one of those people joined DU and then posted at GCRA fifty times each, they would have as many posts as RKBA!

Yes, if everyone in the entire country who wants to get rid of the Second Amendment joined DU and became a frequent GCRA poster, they would finally manage to be as relevant as they think we are right now.

[sarisataka]

16. It is possible...

Article V

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress; provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.

Thusly can it be changed or even rescinded. Congress doesn't even need to be involved; states can do it on their own.

[ileus]

17. What an ID10T....another "guns are for hunting" if the government permits type.

[Eleanors38]

18. The writer refers to a need for amending the Amendment, yet offers none...

...just like the other op ed author didn't offer a proposal.

He references some kind of "rule," but offers no legal framework himself, only some practices.

I think the cultural baggage gives a clue: His preoccupation with hunting, the flippant remarks about Bambi, the splatter about various armaments, and the ubiquitous Billy Joe, emerging from a trailer in overalls, beat-up straw hat, smoking a pipe, and whatever else the streotype de jour conjures up.

But no proposed amendment.

[Matrosov]

22. I have an excellent solution

Scrap the Second Amendment altogether. Then, in the best case, all 50 states ban private gun ownership. In the worst case, some states decide to allow private gun ownership.

The Second Amendment was created because the Founding Fathers were worried about attempts by the British to reconquer the United States and, at the same time, they were not very trusting of standing armies. Hence they counted on militias consisting of ordinary citizens, those militias being "well regulated."

It wasn't about Bubba and Earl being able to open carry their AR15s with 100-round drum magazines down at Starbucks to scare the shit out of other customers in the name of freedum.

[beevul]

25. And yet the authors restricted the government from infringement in all cases...

And yet the framers restricted the government from infringement in all cases, not just when militia is involved.

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.

I see no footnotes saying "feel free to ignore this where private ownership of firearms is concerned".

Because there are none, written, implied, or otherwise.

[Big_Mike]

26. Bill and Ted agree and say "Excellent!" The rest of us disagree

Why don't you just scrap all those pesky amendments. That way, the government call tell you what you can do, the hours you can do it, and anything else it deigns to allow you.

Safe. Warm. Government.

I kind of like Andrew Jackson's attitude towards government and governmental toadies: pugnacity in general and fury in the specific. He disliked much of government, and politicians in general.

Also, he founded this little enterprise called the Democratic Party.

[DonP]

27. You get right on that, and be sure and keep us posted on how it's going.

How to do it is all laid out in the Constitution already. And think of all the recognition you'll get for your "brilliant" solution.

We can't wait to hear which representative and senator you'll get to introduce a bill that repeals the 2nd. We'll follow their political career with much interest.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

28. Hot damn

I never thought of that!

You rock.


Impressive!