Kevin, I am not to familar with texas and so Joe Horn v. Texas. If i recall he shot 2 thieves in the back with out having been endagered personally. I think I saw a vidio where he spoke on the phone to 911, and then said he wasn't going to let the thieves who offered no violence to anyone so far as I can tell to get away.
If I have this right, he didn't yell stop, or anything he put the phone down and went out and just shot these thieves in the back.
Had i been on that jury I would have convicted Joe Horn of 2nd degree murder. Texas has different law than I do, and i am basing this on NH law where items of value like tvs are not something you can use lethal force like you can in Texas.
If it had been me and I took the gun and said STOP and they ran away, I would not and could not shoot them in the back. Nothing I have is worth shooting a man in the back, when he is clearly running away, and most important no violence of any kind was offered.
Now my take on Texas and that event is that the people there have been let down by law enforcement so many times they have taken the law into their own hands, and for that alone I wouldn't convict Joe anymore.
The social order is broken, and the enforcement has failed whether or not they ment to.
Take virginia tech, which all the time other people call Vt and make me think they mean Vermont. The social system failed there too and the fat cops hid behind skinney trees, doing not one thing. This isn't anti cops, it is what I saw.
So it must be that this is common or something like this is common in Texas, and perhaps where you are since you appear to have much harsher and lesser penalty by law than even in NH.
That would be the ability to shoot someone simply stealing items of some base value, like a tv set. While I think a thief is a bad guy, I am not so sure being sentanced to death for stealing a tv set is valid. Now if that thief raised a fingernail in violence I'ld say snuff his lights for keeps and call it, I simply tried to stop him and I did, he died but thats his bee's wax.
I go to a number of on line sites, and I find a lot of talk from city boys who never so much as hunted a squirrel, and to them killing seems as easy as pulling the trigger, and I guess maybe it is, but it isn't for me.
I suspect after their first kill, things will become a bit more complicated than just pulling a trigger. I am fairly certain the first time any of them kill a man it will get real complicated whether or not the law does anything.
As I personally see it the Govt can do what ever it wants and do what ever it thinks it can do. If say, somehow they could just come and take my guns that alone would be an event I'ld like to be the fly on the wall to see, and for a number of reasons.
And lets say they get every gun I have, i would just build another one the next day.
Then there seemingly is no one posting here with a gun collection worth over 1 million dollars. If there is a total ban and therfore a turn in demanded by law just how is the Govt going to compensate these collectors? No collector with a collection of that value or more is going to accept pennies on the dollar.
That same thing goes for sharp pointy things. Banning all knives is plain foolishness. With a hunk of junk steel and 2 minutes at the grinder I can have a crude knife. Who are they fooling? Surely not me.
Guns are simple tools anyone with some metal skills can duplicate with out much trouble. Sure they might be crude, but who cares it is still a gun.
To stop me I would have to be convicted and then placed in the pen somewhere far away from most tools.
If all this is true we must be going back into time pre man as even the first man had tools and that tool was a stick, a sharp stick, and the next was a rock, a very sharp rock and some sharper than the best steels we have today. I know because i get cut on these very same sharp rocks anytime I work with them. They cut on the molecular level dividing cells rather neatly I might add. Quite painless, but very messy.
So I suppose the Govt can ban rocks too? Please excuse me, but I don't think so. I also just happen to really start fire with a bow drill, so I can't wait for the Govt to ban fire.
Maybe you are right on, as it sure does appear to me some members of the Fedral Govt are much more like early man than they are modern people. Some of them are just frightening to see! I can almost visualize that nacy with Biden squatting over a camp fire nearly nakes wearing plants.
Ahhh Stop it Kevin stop it now!