Great Op/Ed on Forbes.com

[Pofficer]

Somewhat long but worth every word.

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Folks, we respect copyright here. Fair use is fine, but that means a couple of paragraphs can be quoted, not the whole thing.

Thanks.
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This article is available online at:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/lawrenc...certain-virtues-of-a-heavily-armed-citizenry/

 

[10P8TRIOT]

Also posted here. But, this article deserves two threads ...

 

[Mr.V.]

Alas Thomas Jefferson did not appear to say:
"When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny."

http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/when-governments-fear-people-there-libertyquotation

Although I suppose it doesn't matter who said it, if it's right...

Still, all articles like these do is provide affirmation for people who already think similarly but do little to sway general public opinion.

"A heavily armed citizenry is not about overthrowing the government; it is about preventing the government from overthrowing liberty."

Like prophylactic medication, if you had a pill that would prevent cancer until you were 100 years old (awesome right?), but it caused daily diarrhea and abdominal pain, a large amount of people would refuse to take it.

Most people (okay...branch davidians excluded) don't live in daily fear of a coup d'état. But many are worried about the "30 people a day who are murdered by guns in the US". And that "many" are growing in number.

I'm not saying that they shouldn't be worried about tyranny. Afterall, Stalin killed a lot more people than US handguns ever did, but it's a boogie man argument, and much less tangible than elementary school children being murdered.

Somehow convincing people that having guns rather than banning them is a good thing is not an easy task and I don't think that article did much for that.

 

[Colonel]

many are worried about the "30 people a day who are murdered by guns in the US". And that "many" are growing in number.

Wrong.



By the way, people aren't "murdered by guns," though I can't find a picture to illustrate that.

 

[OldMac]

Awesome chart. Now who owns a newspaper that will put that on the front page.

 

[Mr.V.]

Your graph doesn't really get at a lot of what I said.
The total number of firearms is a function of the population size and is complicated by the fact that many gun owners purchase more than one gun. The question is, has the percentage of Americans who are gun owners dramatically increased, and your graph doesn't address that.

The percentage of Americans reporting they have at least one gun in the home has not dramatically changed and has remained between 40-50% for years (dipping slightly in the 90s and early 2000s and then coming back). And it's the percentage of American gun owners, not total guns, that indirectly will lead to the success or failure of gun control legislation.

New polls:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/...ll-gun-control-surge-20121227,0,6224756.story

suggest people (including some gun owners) are favoring a high capacity magazine ban again.

And I'm very aware that the firearm is simply a tool, albeit a very effective tool, used to either attack or defend by lawless and law abiding people alike. There was a reason I used the " "...

I'm trying to point out that the argument to save high capacity magazines, assault weapons, guns in general, in order to prevent the establishment of a tyrannical government probably isn't going to make a huge dent in the once again growing calls for tighter gun control.

I'd hate for the rest of you to suffer what we have here in Cali.