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WebsterMark wrote on 10/05/15 at 09:24:40:As I said, Webstermark, do not assume, but try to understand.
Mpes there is not a person on this forum who tries to understand another point of view less than you. Your every reply is seething with an irritating condescending attitude.
And your last post about 2nd amendment and militias is typically wrong.
The original intend of the 2nd amendment has always been clear. The authors expressed their views clearly in other writings. Its only those ignorant of this or those purposely trying to fool others into believing something not true. I'll leave it to you to pick which side you're on.
OK, first things first, I apologize for stealing and hijacking the thread towards a new subject - but it's four pages now that everybody is discussing
"my" observations", so I have hit a "raw nerve", so to speak.
HOWEVER
I do not speak out of spite but out of love for the Nation I considered my Home as a Junior High School student
(you have no idea how distraught I was when I was told we'd be returning to Europe)
I speak my words because I firmly beliveve things can be made to improve not by forcing change down people's throats but by looking around and seeing how "different approaches" have worked very well in other comparable environments (I believe I could never compare the US to India, but I do believe I could compare the US to Canada or the UK or South Africa or Australia, for example)
My post about the 2nd Amendment is wrong ?
I can and will analyse it word by word; First of all, the wording:
As passed by the Congress and preserved in the National Archives:
"
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."
As ratified by the States and authenticated by Thomas Jefferson, then-Secretary of State:
"
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."
Can you see the first fundamental difference? I can.
There is a fundamental difference between "state" and "State".
"state" being "the state you're in", as in Freeman, serf, press-ganged sailor etc... not to mention slave...
"State" being that organized form of society where individual powers are given by the individual to a centralized form of administration for the gommon good of the "res publica", the public community which takes it onto itself to cater for the common requirements in a way as to ensure the gommon good.
It is irrelevant that the form of administration is a Monarchy, an Oligarchy, a Republic or a permanent Assembly (see Maoist China, the former USSR or former Lybia) - they are all forms of "State" with a capital "S".
So, the forst difference is that you must determine if the 2nd Amendment is to protect you as an individual or as a community.
Secondly: The right "of the People" or "of the people"?
Are you a mass of individuals or an organic, functional ensemble of citizens?
Can you feel the difference?
Third: "A well Regulated Militia"...
"Regulated" does not mean "common logistics" as one suggested, much less that it has leadership.
"Regulated" from Latin "Regula" means that it is determined by a satute, a set of Regulations or (Code of Discipline) and quite possibly a set of written Rules of Engagements and a set of Mission tasks.
All this through a Command Structure and well determined hierarchy.
Mind you, I am saying this as a professional military, I know what I am talking about.
Fourth: "The right of the P/people to keep and bear arms"
This determines the right of the individual/collectivity... it doesn NOT claim the right to keep them individually within their own home, or the collective obligation to keep them into custody at the "Village Armory"
It simply declares the P/people are entitled to keep and bear (i.e., have the availability of, be trained to use, and functionally deploy individual weapons)
Fifth: "shall not be infringed"
Believe it or not, THIS is the ONLY part of the 2nd Amendment which will not lend itself to discussion or interpretation.
Anything else is fodder for the Justices if their time; whatever the Supreme Court may have ruled in 1939, who is to say this will not be overruled next week, or next month, or next year ?
Who is to say
"a strictly literal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment demands that a Citizen MUST be enlisted in the State Militia / National Guard in order to benefit from said right" will not happen in... 2020?
I once read a thread in this Forum where the initiator sparked a discussion with the statement "Nowhere does it say in my State's nor in Federal law that you MUST hold a license in order to drive a car" and he was ... taken not very seriously.
Who knows, maybe he could appeal his driving ticket all the way to the Supreme Court!
So, all in all... NO, I do not speak out of spite, and YES I do wish things could improve.
I am convinced that if CCPs were made the only way to legally carry a gun, half the people currently carrying would either stop carrying or be denied CCPs.
I am saying this out of personal experience, bureaucrats are bureaucrats everywhere...
P.S. I lived in Falls Church, VA, 22044