(Actually, this may well be what the writers of the constitution meant. Not having the balls to change that to something sane and modern 200+ years later says something about the progressiveness of America, though.)

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/nation/stories/DN-bab y_16nat.ART.State.Edition1.4d4f3b7.html

http://thevitalvoice.com/node/613

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-fg-stab9-2008jun0 9,0,4629101.story

http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/World/2008/06/27/6000611-sun.html

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/07/01/asia/AS-China-Police-Killed. php

http://www.itv.com/News/Articles/Man-killed-in-knife-attack-89198418.h tml

http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20080630/NEWS01/809057264/1005/BIZ

I always seem to aggree most with the side that actually reads the news and statistics, and doesn’t just gloss over them so they can move on to proving how stupid everyone else is.

i have a right to protect myself.

to protect myself from criminals that intend to cause me harm. see, criminals, by definition, break laws. therefore gun laws really don’t matter to them. thusly, gun laws only effect law abiding citizens.

all the same, i believe that guns should only be allowed to citizens that have not committed violent crimes.

I’m glad to see at least one other european that is freaked out over this decision. I am Swiss and be asured that we both will take the heat here.

Firstly let me say that we are NOT talking about WW2 here. That has nothin to do with this discussion at all.

I really feel bad for all those US citicens who have to fear for their lives everytime they approach a public street. Or even in their homes! Yikes!
I heard they cannot longer let their children go to school alone. How awful.
I remember my childhood. When I was six. My first day in school. My father accompanied me to school because I didn’t know the way. He did so for a few days. Then the parents organised us into a group of four to go to school together. It worked out perfectly. We were taught how to avoid cars and certainly not to go with strangers. It all worked out. Fine. We were allowed to go to the forest. Do whatever we wanted to do. And you know what? Nothing bad happened. And you know why? Because our parents taught us the way. Were there for us. Taught us the basics in a natural way. By being there for us. And by doing so raised us into NORMAL AND DECENT people. All my childhood long I have never seen a firearm. All the time I never had ANY whatsoever contact with a gun. So did the chaps around me. Most of them had their first gun handed over to them when they were drawn into the military. They were at least 18 years old back then.

Well; this is the general story of most people here. And the statistics speak for themselves: We (Switzerland) are amongst those countries that have a very high rate of firearm per person. Every soldier has to keep his (SIG 550 or for the officers his SIG 75)gun along with a sealed package of ammo at home.

Yet, with a neglectable amount of exceptions, we have no shootings around here.

I can say that I am probably one of the very lucky ones that have never come into contact with firearms. That might be the reason why I am so utterly alienated by the idea of everyone being allowed to carry a gun.

Furthermore I want to add that I totally agree to weapons as sporting or hunting equipment. No complaints about that at all. I consider joining a sports club myself. I think It might be fun afterall.

But if I had to consider buying a weapon for my protection - I would prefer to change country…

I’m aghast that someone like you living in a country with such a rich past can consider 60 or 70 years ago ancient history — that is VERY short term, and most pertinent to our lives today! You should consider a little better historical perspective on European politics; as an example the ongoing problems in the Balkans have their roots in the fall of the Austro-Hungarian empire and the dissolution of the tenuous peace that they maintained over the many factions within that empire. If we don’t understand things like this (and remember the crimes of Laval, et al) we are doomed to relearn some very hard lessons.

That said, I wasn’t saying that the reason for WWII itself was that the French citizenry wasn’t armed. By the mid-1930s, the war was unavoidable and clearly a result of Nazi aggression (although it’s not difficult to make a case that the National Socialism itself was enabled by a very flawed Treaty of Versailles, but I digress).

The point I was attempting to make is that an unarmed populace lets despotic or collaborationist governments (as Vichy was) take power. Laval eventually got what he deserved of course, but how many innocents (including French) died first? A well-armed general population keeps the government honest and enables the weak to defend themselves against scoundrels within and without. A well-armed citizenry is *essential* to maintaining liberty. To provide a good French example, Charlotte Corday was courageous enough to rid France of the butcher Marat during your Revolution. Nowadays, though, despots don’t frequently open themselves up to knife attacks in their bathtubs, so firearms in the hands of the public are essential.

Finally, whether or not you disagree with the policies of our current administration, I’m not sure how you can compare it to “totalitarianism” as you do. Pres. Bush was legally elected per the Constitution via the electoral college and terms completed, is stepping down shortly, per law. When in office, the other 2 branches of government maintained their authority — there was no power grab by the Executive branch and certainly a lot of things (inlcuding Supreme Court decisions) did not always go the way Bush may have wished. Further, Bush is not becoming “Prime Minister” so as to wiggle the strings of a new puppet “president” as is the case in Russia right now. He’s moving to the sideline, as did Clinton, Reagan, and many retiring presidents before them. What is the problem? Where’s the totalitarianism? I didn’t like Clinton, but he was legitimately elected twice and left when his term expired. Same deal here.

Straight talk from Sid.

Wow…

The US government was constructed with the the *consent* of its citizens and one of the things that has kept us on our first republic (I think France is now on its Fifth Republic, no?) has been the right of the public to bear arms to protect ourselves against repressive régimes.

When France was rolled over in weeks to a smaller German Army, Americans were building their then-tiny army for the coming struggle. Your gun-controlled country allowed traitors like Pierre Laval & Marshall Petain to assume power and deport Jews and other “undesireables” to Nazi death camps. Such an oppressive government won’t ever gain power here because individuals are self-armed to prevent it. Yes, a kook can go nuts once in a while and kill innocents, but that is the price of liberty. France may hold dear its égalité & fraternité, but they have forsaken liberté…

Straight talk from Sid.

I also see people mentioning a constitutional amendment to do away with the NATURAL RIGHT to keep and bear arms. The 2nd Amendment DID NOT create this right, it was pre-existing and no amendment by any government can make this otherwise, though a tyrannical government might surely try to deny the right… which is sort of the whole point of the 2nd Amendment in the first place.

Molon Labe - From my cold dead hands.

I think the Iraqis have proven that a rag-tag band of people making explosives out of milk cartons can put up a fight against the U.S. military.

“Telling the truth during times of universal deceit will be a revolutionary act.” George Orwell, “1984″

DC violent crimes DROPPED when the guns were returned to the citizens. The highest crime rate was when they were taken away.

A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.

First, it does state that the right to bear arms is a right of the people. That is simply a fact. Why? In order to allow the establishment and maintenance of well-regulated militias, that is to say local, regional, or state-level ad hoc or part-time military units. The principle is ultimately that of the “citizen-solider” - a citizen (the people) have the right to own weapons SPECIFICALLY in order to protect their communities. This means, of course, the government does have the right to regulate weapons (which the Supreme Court unanimously affirmed) and their use, but it does not have the right to ban their ownership by citizens in good standing. And, dare we forget, the security of a free state infers defense against a few principle types of “enemies” - internal tyrants (e.g. our government decides to take away our freedom) and external threats (e.g. another government seeks to attack our state while we are ruled by a legitimate democratic republic). What makes the 2nd Amendment so contentious is that conversations about it tend to degenerate into yelling about rights rather than practical discussions of why it exists and what are the practical rules we can apply to guarantee that this right doesn’t infringe on the rights of other men and women (such as our forbidding of the use of slander, an abuse of our 1st Amendment rights).

As for me, well, I support the Supreme Court’s decision - I think it is pretty close to what the intention of the Founding Fathers was - libertarianism limited only by pragmatic rationalism and a realistic understanding of international and domestic threats.