Is Gun Control Ever Legitimate?

[millwright]

Anytime you think a gun control law is reasonable, consider if you would agree to the same restrictions upon your public speech or use of the internet. >MW

[Marlin T]

User, will you post your name so we can write you in for President?

[SaddleSarge]

Oh, sounds like just a bunch of "bitter" gun owners clinging to our, I mean "your," firearms and religion.

You know though, as a neighbor of mine and I were talking across the barbed wire a while back, he had an excellent point.....As the left moves farther left, the right remains constant and steadfast. That means that the moderates continue to move farther left in order to stay in the middle. To wit, the moderates are now what the left was in the not too distant past.

Think about it. It makes perfect mathematical sense that could be plotted on a graph.....unfortunately.

[user]

Originally Posted by Marlin T

User, will you post your name so we can write you in for President?

Thanks, but my view is that anyone who wants that job is psychologically unfit to have it.

[SolidVFR]

Originally Posted by user

Thanks, but my view is that anyone who wants that job is psychologically unfit to have it.

+1 Million

That means we've gotta force you...

[SolidVFR]

Originally Posted by SaddleSarge

"For the first time in history does a nation have complete gun registration. Our streets will be safer, our police more efficient.

The world will follow our lead in the future."
- Adolph Hitler, 15 April 1935

(Sound like anyone that is running for president?)

I thought this quote would be great to use against anti-gunners...so I did a search to find out its origins: http://www.saf.org/pub/rkba/general/...iGunQuotes.htm

PLEASE be careful...we are fighting a tough enemy and we must be very vigilant. Everything we say must be able to be verified.

If you can prove that site wrong though, please enlighten us(me).

Please understand: I am only questioning the validity so that anti-gunners can't tell me that I'm spreading a lie. That doesn't help our cause at all .

[DoesItMatter]

I think its a signature for one of the members...

Or I've seen it before.

Gun Control is hitting the target

or something to that effect...

That is still one of my favorite quotes.

--------------------------------

‘‘The most foolish mistake we could possibly make would be to allow the subjected people to carry arms. History shows that all conquerors who have allowed their subjected peoples to carry arms have prepared their own downfall by so doing. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that the underdog is a sine qua non ["something essential" lit. "without which not"] for the overthrow of any sovereignty. So let's not have any native militia or police.’’

-- Adolph Hitler, Edict of March 18, 1938

is another good quote - and spooky as well.

And hell - even Ghandi was against gun control...

‘‘Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the act of depriving a whole nation of arms, as the blackest.’’

— Mahatma Ghandi, "Gandhi, An Autobiography", page 446

[user]

I once heard a comedian on television complaining about political polls. He said he wanted a box he could check, as on a multiple choice test, that says, "None of the above." He wanted to be able to vote, and have his vote counted as part of the reported statistics, but as a protest against everyone who was running. There have been occasions when I've voted Libertarian because I generally support Libertarian views, I wished their candidate would get elected, I knew there wasn't a snowball's chance in [a very warm place] that he would be elected, and that my vote for the Libertarian candidate was, in effect, a vote for "None of the above."

In theory, one could get my name off my website, and write that in as a vote for "none of the above", if one wished. (I'm not exactly hiding.) And I'd think that was pretty funny, and flattering, too. But If more than a few people did that, it might attract the kind of attention I don't want.

[SaddleSarge]

Originally Posted by SolidVFR

I thought this quote would be great to use against anti-gunners...so I did a search to find out its origins: http://www.saf.org/pub/rkba/general/...iGunQuotes.htm

PLEASE be careful...we are fighting a tough enemy and we must be very vigilant. Everything we say must be able to be verified.

If you can prove that site wrong though, please enlighten us(me).

Please understand: I am only questioning the validity so that anti-gunners can't tell me that I'm spreading a lie. That doesn't help our cause at all .

SolidVFR,

You are absolutely correct on both counts. What I found is that the "alleged" quote is a capitulation of the German 1928 Gun Registration laws prior to Hitler coming into power, The Nuremberg Laws in 1933, and quote that DoesItMatter lists from, "The original German papers were known as 'Bormann-Vermerke.'"

Interesting to note, that the 1928 restrictions/registrations were stricter on the German people than when Hitler rose to power:

In 1928, five years before the rise of Hitler, Germany's freely elected government enacted a "Law on Firearms and Ammunition." This law required anyone who owned a firearm, or who wanted to own a firearm, to make themselves known to the authorities. Anyone who wanted to purchase a firearm had to get a "Firearms Acquisition Permit." If you needed ammunition, you had to get an "Ammunition Acquisition Permit." When you wanted to go hunting, you had to get an "Annual Hunting Permit." Every firearm that changed hands professionally had to have a serial number and the maker's or dealers name stamped into the metal. "Proof of need" was made a condition for issuance of all licenses, not just the carry permit. Mandatory prison sentences were imposed on anyone who professionally sold or transferred a firearm or ammunition without a license. Truncheons and stabbing weapons were subject to the same licensing requirements as firearms, in terms of their manufacture and sale.

As a result of the 1928 Law, all firearms and firearms owners were registered. To take firearms from anyone they distrusted, the Nazis simply did not renew permits. Under the law, their privately created law, the Nazis could now easily confiscate all firearms and ammunition from any, or all, selected groups. The gun law of 1928 had served the Nazis well. It made almost all law abiding firearms owners known to the authorities. The 1928 law on firearms and ammunition helped the Nazis to destroy democracy in Germany, by disarming the law abiding majority, whom they feared.

By the end of 1931, a rising tide of violence, mainly between Nazi and Communist street fighters, moved the authorities to tighten restrictions. Under new regulations, the police could order everyone's firearms and ammunition ... even items not normally used as weapons ... to be put into police custody,

"If the maintenance of public security and order require it."

Once the Nazis rose to power under Hitler, the Nuremberg Laws were enacted in which the Jew's, whether or not native Germans, were the target in which possession of one round of ammunition was not only a death sentence, it was an immediate death sentence.

(Edit: To note that when the Nuremberg Laws were enacted, the "German People" did not include the Jews who were summarily disarmed by the use of the 1928 law in addition to the Nuremberg Laws thus leaving the Jewish Germans defenseless and subject to the camps for any violation of. The German people (non-Jewish) were actually given more firearms freedom under Hitler than by their 1928 law.)

"This just shows what you can expect from Jews if they lay hands on weapons." - Joseph Goebbels, commenting on the Warsaw Ghetto uprising

So with the two combinations (and I'll close now because of the mounds of information available on the subject in general) along with DoesItMatter's quote, thoughts being combined, came up with that quote which I too now will dispel after doing hours of research after shift this morning.

I appreciate the feed back and urge us all to make question as I too fell into the trap having heard/seeing that quote for years and thus trusted it to be correct instead of "knowing" it was correct.

[SolidVFR]

Originally Posted by SaddleSarge

SolidVFR...

Thank you for your response, very enlightening.

[SaddleSarge]

I feel I should state that I came to an "opinion" that the quote was derived from the many sentiments that I researched involving the subject matter at hand. There were plenty of sites refuting the quotes which can be easily found, but none where the quote was located in an ability to verify it. Therefore I surmised an opinion that the quote was a compilation of various sentiments expressed throughout the period unless proven otherwise.

I offer a sampling of the reading and web exploration that I did which brought about my opinion of how the quote "may" have been derived to allow others to come to their own opinion as well.

Interesting and thought provoking (and scary) reading none the less.

SaddleSarge
(Dang, took me as long to copy the links as it did to read'em!)

Keeping the necessary evil in check
A Gun Control Law Passed by the German Government One Day After Kristallnacht
Our Hitler
The Enabling Act - March 23, 1933
Nazi Gun Control (full quote of DoesItMatters')
NAZI GUN LAW by Joyce Rosenwald
Means Used by the Nazi Conspiractors in Gaining Control of the German State (Part 8 of 55)
The Myth of Nazi Gun Control
The Nuremberg Laws
Jewish Virtual Library-The Nuremberg Laws
The Reich Citizenship Law
Why Jews Must Oppose Gun Control
Bernard E. Harcourt: Hitler and Gun Registration
Gun Ownership in Iraq
TIMELINE: THE GROWTH OF ANTI-SEMITISM IN NAZI GERMANY
Gun Control in Germany, 1928-1945
Nazi Firearms Law and the Disarming of the German Jews by Stephen P. Halbrook
Documents of the Holocaust - Germany and Austria

(Edit: The relationship between then and now, the U.N., etc... is incredible. So for more than the quote that initially started this, the correlation of the topic at hand is incredible.)

[Marlin T]

Originally Posted by user

He said he wanted a box he could check, as on a multiple choice test, that says, "None of the above."

That would be Jesse Ventura.

[myfaforumname]

"In any case, can anyone think of a legitimate form of gun control?

Obviously, I think it's a good idea not to let private citizens have access to nukes and a lot of other military type stuff, like tanks and stuff like that."

FYI, that makes you pro-gun control. Someone who doesn't want people who are say convicted of violent crimes such as assault, rape, child molestation, murder, etc, to have the legal ability to buy guns is also pro-gun control.

[CampingJosh]

Originally Posted by myfaforumname

Someone who doesn't want people who are say convicted of violent crimes such as assault, rape, child molestation, murder, etc, to have the legal ability to buy guns is also pro-gun control.

I don't think that's quite the case. I think, instead, that is pro-felon control. When a person ignores the rights of others, that person sacrifices his own rights, including the right to keep and bear arms.

[DoesItMatter]

Well... this one is gonna cause some issues am sure.

And in no way is this being said but other than to make a point.

The school shootings that have happened in the past few years.

Were primarily in mostly white neighborhoods in suburban areas...

IT would have NEVER happened in an innner-city or rougher school area
where other kids could've possibly been armed.

It's much harder to start something if you know others may just
be armed and able to fight back at you...

Aything with 'control' can be twisted, abused, and turned against the just.

How about more Gun Registration, Gun Education, and Gun Distribution.

Educate children so the mystery of it is gone at an early age.
Register weapons so they can be tracked (already done).
Distribute to those that may need and can't afford.

How much lower could crime be if everyone knew that everyone else was armed.
How much more likely would we be victims if the attackers knew we could fight back?

[Vladimir]

Of course there is legitimate gun control. Just like there are legitimate controls on our freedom of speech, on our freedoms in general. The problem here is that few realize what constitutes legitimate (or reasonable).

And no, I'm not being sarcastic. We can't make violent threats (limits our freedom of speech), we can't drink and drive (limit on our freedom) etc. etc. What constitutes reasonable and legitimate gun control? I'm sure I don't have all the answers. But for a start, people with a past ripe with violent crimes should be restricted. I really do feel comfortable with the fact that people cannot own armed rockets or tanks. But as Chief Justice John Roberts said, what is reasonable about a complete ban?

[SaddleSarge]

Originally Posted by myfaforumname

"In any case, can anyone think of a legitimate form of gun control?

Obviously, I think it's a good idea not to let private citizens have access to nukes and a lot of other military type stuff, like tanks and stuff like that."

FYI, that makes you pro-gun control. Someone who doesn't want people who are say convicted of violent crimes such as assault, rape, child molestation, murder, etc, to have the legal ability to buy guns is also pro-gun control.

The liberal machine hard at it. The 2nd Amendment is a "right" that is guaranteed by that amendment. The "right" to vote is also protected as such. But, screw up and be a convicted felon and lose that right. No different.

Originally Posted by CampingJosh

I don't think that's quite the case. I think, instead, that is pro-felon control. When a person ignores the rights of others, that person sacrifices his own rights, including the right to keep and bear arms.

There you go.

[RDak]

Yes. Duh!!

[CampingJosh]

Originally Posted by RDak

Yes. Duh!!

Duh? What about this question makes it seem like a no-brainer? I want to know why it is "obvious" to everyone that there is some legitimate control?

What where the main US naval ships of the Revolution? Anyone know? Privately owned ships. So why should I not be allowed to own a battleship today? Why should I not be allowed to own a nuclear submarine? Why should I not be allowed to own whatever weapon I want?
Someone please give me an argument with a scrap of merit to it!!

[Vladimir]

Originally Posted by CampingJosh

Duh? What about this question makes it seem like a no-brainer? I want to know why it is "obvious" to everyone that there is some legitimate control?

What where the main US naval ships of the Revolution? Anyone know? Privately owned ships. So why should I not be allowed to own a battleship today? Why should I not be allowed to own a nuclear submarine? Why should I not be allowed to own whatever weapon I want?
Someone please give me an argument with a scrap of merit to it!!

The Cold War sucked, last thing we want is our own Cold War INSIDE the United States.

Everyone would just bitch about the two people who could afford battleships.

What happens when Bill Ayers wants to buy a battleship, and then donate it to al-Qaeda?

What happens when Ward Churchill buys a battleship and attacks Israel? Sure Ward Churchill is responsible, but I think Israel would be just a little pissed that we let it happen. What happens when Israel wants to go to war with us then? I don't want to get killed just because Ward Churchill is a friggen moron.

What happens when Ward Churchill, Bill Ayers, and George Soros get together, buy a ton of battleships and a small air force, and take over New York?

These are just a slice of the glaring and obvious reasons there needs to be some regulation on weapons.

[USMC-03]

Josh,

As far as I know there is no law against a private individual or business/corporation of some sort owning a nuclear submarine, other than the expense of constructing it. Maybe buy an old one from the Russians. The stopping block would be in fueling it. Ouch... What red tape that industry is.

[user]

Originally Posted by DoesItMatter

... The school shootings that have happened in the past few years. Were primarily in mostly white neighborhoods in suburban areas; IT would have NEVER happened in an innner-city or rougher school area where other kids could've possibly been armed. It's much harder to start something if you know others may just be armed and able to fight back at you......How much lower could crime be if everyone knew that everyone else was armed....

That's why I object to the phrase, "gun control", as if it really had anything to do with controlling anything. I prefer the phrase, "pro-crime legislation".

[USMC-03]

Originally Posted by user

That's why I object to the phrase, "gun control", as if it really had anything to do with controlling anything. I prefer the phrase, "pro-crime legislation".

Pro-crime legislation is exactly where the first gun control laws came from, as I recall. If memory serves, Bostonian gentlemen of the early 19th century regularly went armed after the hours of darkness and made robbery, as a profession, somewhat dangerous to say the least. The local gang leaders somehow ($$$) prevailed or the city politicians and, in the name of public safety, gun control was implemented. Thus, much of the risk taken by criminals was removed.

[myfaforumname]

"I don't think that's quite the case. I think, instead, that is pro-felon control. When a person ignores the rights of others, that person sacrifices his own rights, including the right to keep and bear arms."

Sorry, that's just an invalid argument. Controlling guns is controlling guns. A felon is still a citizen. Gun control is gun control. If you favor any control of weapons, then you favor gun control.

Nobody in the gun lobby really wants to address things in this way. It would force them to be pro-active and lay out what their ideal set of regulations would be. Denying anyone guns, whether it be minors, felons, high explosive rounds, etc, is gun control.

Lobbying bodies like the NRA will never outline how they want gun regulations to be across the USA. They make more money spreading fear and disinformation.

[SaddleSarge]

Originally Posted by myfaforumname

"I don't think that's quite the case. I think, instead, that is pro-felon control. When a person ignores the rights of others, that person sacrifices his own rights, including the right to keep and bear arms."

Sorry, that's just an invalid argument. Controlling guns is controlling guns. A felon is still a citizen. Gun control is gun control. If you favor any control of weapons, then you favor gun control.

Nobody in the gun lobby really wants to address things in this way. It would force them to be pro-active and lay out what their ideal set of regulations would be. Denying anyone guns, whether it be minors, felons, high explosive rounds, etc, is gun control.

Lobbying bodies like the NRA will never outline how they want gun regulations to be across the USA. They make more money spreading fear and disinformation.

You know, it was a whole lot easier in the old days in dealing with felons. Today they're felons without the right to vote or own guns, but maybe can vote in some states.

There was a day that they (felons) would be given a fair trial, then hanged. That would probably include what we call the "far left" today as well.

The founders were not talking about a lawless society and much to the contrary. To include idiots, the mentally ill, juveniles and habitual criminals was not the intent. And when talking about felons, there was not the tolerance then that there is today. It would be a non-issue since they would not be alive to be a firearms owner.

Look how far we have come.