Please don't hate me: Confessions from a 2nd Ammendment Hypocrite

[bogie]

It's very easy for me to buy a gun right now. I go in the gun store, show 'em my ID and do the paperwork, and they make the "is this guy a crook" call, and I'm out the door in just a few minutes.

If I wasn't a fine upstanding citizen, I'd have to have contacts on the black market to buy the gun. And if I get caught with it, that should be added time. Should be, but hey...

Sorry, but when someone commits a crime, they do the time - all of it.

 

[cordex]

bogie,
I may not completely agree with you, but I respect your position.
However, I am curious how you respond to Greg's question:

The loss of the right to free speach, the loss of the right to not incriminate ones self, the loss of the right to be secure in one's home, the loss of the right to practice one's own religion? Or is it just voting and 2nd amendment rights in your point of view?

 

[another okie]

1. There is a federal procedure for restoring the right to own firearms after a felony, but the anti-gun people managed to sneak a rider in that forbids the feds from spending any money to do it, which means it is not available.

2. At the time the Constitution was written, most writers said that the right to bear arms subsisted in "peaceable" citizens, and the local town militias of the time would have excluded criminals.

3. In my opinion only, if someone can't be trusted to walk the streets with firearms, they probably shouldn't be trusted to walk the streets at all.

 

[Tamara]

bogie,

It's very easy for me to buy a gun right now. I go in the gun store, show 'em my ID and do the paperwork, and they make the "is this guy a crook" call, and I'm out the door in just a few minutes.

Yes, but you're old enough to remember when it was much easier than it is now. Have those new restrictions done anything to stop crime, or do they do nothing but inconvenience and annoy good folk like you and I?

 

[amprecon]

I would like to add that if people weren't so afraid of guns and there weren't so many laws inhibiting gun ownership, there would be alot of dead criminals with no chance at the revolving justice system, problem solved.

 

[Glamdring]

IMO there should only be two types of punishment:

1. Restitution for most things. If they don't have the money they have to work it off. They also have to pay for their own upkeep, if they don't they don't eat.

2. Capital punishment for a few crimes.

I suspect the people you wouldn't want to have guns would be the ones that I would use capital punishment for.

 

[only1asterisk]

No one can take your rights from you, but you can give them up. Convicted felons gave up their rights when they started to violate the rights of others. Without these rights, they are at the mercy of others. This is the way I think it should be. Under some rare circumstances, I can see the need for a system by which a felon might be restored to full status in society, but under a good system with felonies restricted to serious crimes, it would be uncommon.


David

 

[GregoryTech]

No one can take your rights from you, but you can give them up. Convicted felons gave up their rights when they started to violate the rights of others. Without these rights, they are at the mercy of others. This is the way I think it should be. Under some rare circumstances, I can see the need for a system by which a felon might be restored to full status in society, but under a good system with felonies restricted to serious crimes, it would be uncommon.

So once a felon, it's okay to dictate which religion someone practices and it's okay for the police to search his house without any probable cause and a warrant? Or is it just 2nd amendment rights?

 

[mattd]

All felons should be put on probation for 5 years, and that 5 years is a part of his punishment, they can take certain rights away they want, like no bolt cutters or guns. That doesn't mean there will be background checks at gun stores, only that he can't possess them.

 

[GregoryTech]

It's very easy for me to buy a gun right now. I go in the gun store, show 'em my ID and do the paperwork, and they make the "is this guy a crook" call, and I'm out the door in just a few minutes.

I'll bet your name isn't "John Smith" or "Abdul Mohomid ..something". I'll bet law abiding citizens with those names (and plenty of others) don't think it's "very easy".

If I wasn't a fine upstanding citizen, I'd have to have contacts on the black market to buy the gun.

After having been an incarcerated felon, how hard do you really think that is.

And if I get caught with it, that should be added time. Should be, but hey...

Sorry, but when someone commits a crime, they do the time - all of it.

I understand the sentiment, but the net result is an obsticle to law abiding Americans.

 

[TheOtherOne]

My biggest concern is; we don't trust him to own a gun, but we will let him out of prison in the first place???

Ditto.

If they really can't be trusted to own a gun, then they should still be locked up.

 

[Don Gwinn]

I don't hate ya. But I disagree. The problem is that everyone is trying to be practical and deal with the real world, and for most seriously pro-gun people, that can go one of two ways.

1. We have to acknowledge that a lot of people are released from prison without having changed or given up violent ways. Both sides agree on this, generally, but this branch responds that if it's true, we must then deny felons the RKBA for society's protection.

2. We shouldn't be letting people out of prison if we know they're too dangerous to own a gun. This is my position, but I realize that it's perhaps less feasible than the other in the real world. In the real world, in modern America, that kind of total reversal of our national attitude toward crime and punishment is just not likely to happen.