Sometimes you have to wonder what the fuck idiots who are in power are thinking when they try to "interpret" the Constitution.
For example, I don't think there's anyone here who would interpret the right to Freedom of Speech to mean anything other than an individuals right to say what they want, right?
So, it just galls me when people seem to think that there is no right to individuals to own firearms.
It's pretty clear what that means. In case you're an idiot, I'll explain. A "well regulated militia" is an EXAMPLE of why the "right of the people" to be armed is needed.
Yet, you have people STILL, to this day, fighting to prevent law abiding citizens from owning firearms.
Despite mountains of scholarly research, enough books to fill a library shelf and decades of political battles about gun control, the Supreme Court will have an opportunity this week that is almost unique for a modern court when it examines whether the District's handgun ban violates the Second Amendment.
The nine justices, none of whom has ever ruled directly on the amendment's meaning, will consider a part of the Bill of Rights that has existed without a definitive interpretation for more than 200 years.
"This may be one of the only cases in our lifetime when the Supreme Court is going to be interpreting the meaning of an important provision of the Constitution unencumbered by precedent,'' said Randy E. Barnett, a constitutional scholar at the Georgetown University Law Center. "And that's why there's so much discussion on the original meaning of the Second Amendment.''
The outcome could roil the 2008 political campaigns, send a national message about what kinds of gun control are constitutional and finally settle the question of whether the 27-word amendment, with its odd structure and antiquated punctuation, provides an individual right to gun ownership or simply pertains to militia service.
"The case has been structured so that they have to confront the threshold question," said Robert A. Levy, the wealthy libertarian lawyer who has spent five years and his own money to bring District of Columbia v. Heller to the Supreme Court. "I think they have to come to grips with that."
The stakes are obviously high for the District, which passed the nation's strictest gun-control law in 1976, just after residents were granted the authority to govern themselves. It virtually bans the private possession of handguns, and requires that rifles and shotguns in the home be kept unloaded and disassembled or outfitted with a trigger lock.
The law's challengers -- security guard Dick Anthony Heller is the named party in the suit -- say the measure has been an abysmal failure at cutting crime or stanching the city's homicide rate, and a success only in depriving the law-abiding of a ready weapon for protection. The District contends that banning handguns is a logical decision in an urban setting, where more guns would result in more killings.
Ever notice that Washington DC has one of the highest murder rates in the country? Do you know WHY that is? The public isn't armed. Name me one place in say Texas or Montana, where murder is running rampant. There isn't one and the reason is because law abiding citizens are armed.
Yet, you have people who want to argue otherwise:
The city's lawyers argue that the Second Amendment does not provide an individual right and that, even if it does, the amendment is not implicated by legislation that concerns only the District of Columbia.
They argue that it doesn't provide an individual right even though the Amendment specifically says "the right of the people", and then have the nerve to argue, that even if they are wrong, they are right because it only concerns DC? What kind of retarded idiot thinks this way?
When John Ashcroft said that his position was that individuals didn't have the right to own weapons, I knew he had to go. I simply cannot have someone in the government who wants to infringe upon my Constitutional rights. Yet, we have liberals, at least the vast majority of Gun Control advocates are liberals, who want to infringe on that right as well.
Yet, if you try to infringe on one of THEIR rights, they spin out of control. Hypocritical at BEST.
But what most people don't know is that you can LEGALLY own a machine gun right now. You need a special permit from the ATF, but it is possible for a citizen to own such a weapon. You can also own silencers and other types of "illegal" weapons with the right permit.
So, I would be very interested to hear what the Supreme Court has to say about such a thing. I just hope they actually rule on this instead of "setting it down" to a lower court and taking the cowards way out.
Of course, since they are starting the arguments this week, it will be months before we know the outcome of this case.
Travis
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