This weekend, Caleb Gordley, 16, was shot and killed in a home that he mistook for his own after sneaking out for a party. The homeowner confronted Gordley on the stairs inside the home and said that the teenager ignored a warning shot. The shooting occurred after the failure of a “Castle Doctrine” law in Virginia’s General Assembly — a law that we have discussed previously on this blog that gives homeowners protections in the use of lethal force with anyone illegally entering their domicile. Ironically, the bill was shot down by gun groups that felt that the common law offered more protection.
Caleb was told that he could not go to the party because his room was not cleaned up. He decided to sneak out and his friends helped him get back in through a window. He had mistaken a similarly constructed home for his own. He had been drinking. The home is owned by Donald West Wilder II.
The scene is all too familiar to critics of Castle Doctrine laws. We have seen a long line of mistaken shootings of neighbors and others who go into the wrong house in developments with similarly constructed homes. There are also cases of standard home and workplace disputes that lead to fatal shootings.
In this case, there is the questioning of whether the first shot was a warning shot or a miss. However, in these circumstances, there is no alternative account to rebut the homeowner and police are left only with the trajectory of the bullet to confirm the account. The strongest case would be a round in the ceiling where there was clearly no attempt to aim at the suspect. When you add that the teen was drunk, the homeowner is unlikely to be charge presuming the forensics do not conflict with his account.
The Castle Doctrine law proposed in Virginia failed due to opposition from gun groups which did not like the requirement of an “overt act” by the intruder to justify a shooting. The gun groups felt that such a requirement is more restrictive than the common act and opposed the requirement that the intruder show aggression or threatening behavior.
Source: Washington Post
Elaine,
I am well aware of Sally Hadden and her theories. I agree there were some slave patrols at the time of the American Revolution. There were not very many of them until near the beginning of the civil war. These patrols typically consisted of a group of a half-dozen or less men who tracked down fleeing slaves. They were drawn from the militia, but how could they not have been? The militias were made up of virtually every person able bodied enough to care for and shoot a firearm. The militias were NOT formed to create slave patrols. Slave patrols were small groups of people who happened to be militiamen.
Thom Hartman wrote an article based on Hadden’s theories. Paul Finkelman, Ph.D., is the President William McKinley Distinguished Professor of Law and Public Policy at Albany Law School. Finkelman saw Hartman’s article and lambasted it. He is a well known historian and legal scholar with many scholarly books and peer-reviewed articles published.
Dr. Finkelman writes:
http://portside.org/2013-01-25/2nd-amendment-passed-protect-slavery-no
Otteray,
I wasn’t looking for an argument. I was just pointing out the fact that the author of the Truth-Out article cited knowledgeable sources. That’s all.
Elaine,
This is not being argumentative, but more one of technology of the time. By the time the Constitution was drafted, the musket was well on its way out. Rifles were being used almost universally by all sides. Highly accurate. A musket is a smooth bore barrel, while a rifle has ‘lands and groove’ to give the bullet spin. Because a musket does not spin the bullet, muskets shoot the equivalent of a knuckleball. You see the effect off spin when a quarterback throws a ball downfield. Spinning utilizes gyroscopic effect to make the bullet (and football) stable in flight.
Major Patrick Ferguson, a Scotsman and possibly one of the smartest men in the British Army, had invented the breech loading rifle.It did not see wide use because manufacturing technology at the time could not build enough of them to supply the Army. Additionally, the first repeating rifle was invented by an Austrian, Bartholomäus Girandoni. His rifle was an air rifle, using air compressed by a pump on the rifle. It was a powerful rifle for the time, and had the advantage of no puff of smoke when fired as well as no loud muzzle report. The Austrian Army used Girandoni’s repeating rifle from 1780 to 1815. Both sides were aware of these evolving technologies.
I am aware of the frequent argument the Founders could not have envisioned repeating rifles, and that guns back then were all muzzle loading muskets. That is simply not true. Inventions were outpacing manufacturing technology, but they had already been invented.
Speaking of rifles being more accurate than muskets, the military sniper would not have been possible without the rifle. An Irish-American soldier in the American Revolution was the first known American sniper. Timothy Murphy climbed up into a tree to make his historical shots. Murphy made the first sniper kill(s) at the Battle of Saratoga in 1777. Timothy Murphy killed Sir Francis Clerke with his first shot. Murphy’s second kill shot was General Simon Fraser. Those shots were at a 300 yard range, the length of three football fields. That would have been impossible with a musket.
As I recall, those shots that killed those two key officers were the turning point of the battle of Saratoga. Which in turn led to the French openely supporting the Revolution. A good shot in time saved us and our country.
Otteray,
In his Truth-out article, the author also cites Slave Patrols: Law and Violence in Virginia and the Carolinas (Harvard Historical Studies), a book written by Sally E. Hadden.
Here are Hadden’s credentials:
http://www.law.fsu.edu/faculty/profiles/hadden/vita.pdf
Excerpt:
EDUCATION
Ph.D. 1993 Harvard University (History)
J.D. 1989 Harvard Law School
M.A. 1985 Harvard University (History)
B.A. 1984 University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (History)
CURRENT EMPLOYMENT
Associate Professor of History and Associate Professor of Law (secondary appointment),
Florida State University
GRANTS
for colonial legal cultures project:
National Endowment for the Humanities/Library Company of Philadelphia postdoctoral
fellowship, 2005-06
Library Company of Philadelphia/Historical Society of Pennsylvania fellowship, 2003-04
New England Regional Consortium Fellowship, 2002
American Philosophical Society, Library Resident Research fellowship, 2001-2002
Mark DeWolfe Howe Fund, Harvard Law School, research grant, 2001
Council on Research and Creativity Grant, Florida State University, 1999-00
W. B. H. Dowse Fellowship, Massachusetts Historical Society, 1998-99
for slave patrol research and related projects:
Archie K. Davis Fellowship, North Caroliniana Society, 1997
Kate B. and Hall J. Peterson Fellow, American Antiquarian Society, 1994
Research Associate, Humanities Institute, University of Toledo, 1993-94
Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation Dissertation Fellowship, 1992-93
Josephine de Kármán Foundation Dissertation Fellowship, 1992-93
American Historical Association, Littleton-Griswold Legal History Research Grant, 1991-92
Virginia Historical Society Research Fellowship, 1991
Charles Warren Center for American History research grant, 1990, 1991
Mark DeWolfe Howe Fund, Harvard Law School, research grant, 1990, 1991
AWARDS
Certificate of Distinction in Teaching, Harvard University, 1991, 1992
Phi Beta Kappa, 1983
Otteray,
It’s true that the article Bouise cites is from a blog. Still, the author of the article cites an article from UC at Davis Law Review.
THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF THE SECOND AMENDMENT
http://www.saf.org/LawReviews/Bogus2.htm
Excerpt:
CONCLUSION
In his article, The Bill of Rights as a Constitution, Akhil Amar argues that the Bill of Rights was “[o]riginally a set of largely structural guarantees applying only against the federal government.”[505] “Like the original Constitution, the original Bill of Rights was webbed with structural ideas,” he writes.[506]”Federalism, separation of powers, bicameralism, representation, amendment ¾ these issues were understood as central to the preservation of liberty.” Though he has not yet fully appreciated it, the Second Amendment provides a striking example of Amar’s thesis. Its parentage is in the English Declaration of Rights of 1689. Although to twentieth century American eyes the right to have arms provision of that document appears at first blush to provide an individual right, the provision is in fact quite a different animal. It is a structural provision. It does not mean that Protestants may have arms, but that Parliament, and not the Crown, has the authority to regulate the matter.
This was the template that Madison, the quintessential structuralist, used when he wrote the Second Amendment, and this was the model in the minds of the members of the First Congress and the state legislatures when they proposed and ratified the Amendment. Like English legislators a century earlier, Madison wrote the Second Amendment to resolve a structural problem. The Constitution had given Congress the power to organize and arm the militia. Focusing on this provision, the anti-Federalists sent a chill down the spine of the South: would Congress, deliberately or through indifference, destabilize the [Page 408] slave system by “disarming” the state militia? Whether Madison personally shared this fear cannot today be known, but there is little doubt that after Richmond this specter plagued many Southerners, including many of Madison’s constituents.
What does the hidden history mean with respect to how the Second Amendment should be interpreted? I do not in this Article take any position with respect to “original intent.” Nevertheless, two items of significance ought to be mentioned. First, the Second Amendment was written to assure the South that the militia ¾ the very same militia described in the main body of the Constitution ¾ could be armed even if Congress elected not to arm them or otherwise attempted to “disarm” them. From our perspective today, this may seem like a small matter since Congress retained exclusive authority to determine the composition of the militia, and, thus, who could enjoy the right to bear arms. However, in the context of the concern and circumstances of the time, it was significant. The Amendment deals with keeping and bearing arms in the militia, subject to federal and state regulation. Therefore, to the extent original intent matters, the hidden history of the Second Amendment strongly supports the collective rights position.
Second, the Second Amendment lives two lives: one in the law and the other in politics, public policy, and popular culture. The hidden history has ramifications in the second realm as well. The Second Amendment takes on an entirely different complexion when instead of being symbolized by a musket in the hands of the minuteman, it is associated with a musket in the hands of the slave holder.
Blouise,
The article you cite is from a blog, and not from a scholarly source. Not to mention that the basic premise of the story is based on speculation and not historical record. One of the most authoritative articles I have found to date comes from a peer-reviewed law journal. Originally published at 28 Val. L. Rev. 1007-1039 (1994), it was republished in the Valparaiso University Law Review.. The author is law Professor David E. Vandercoy.
In his highly documented piece, Professor Vandercoy does not mention slavery or any other such malignant reason to have the right to bear arms. They were concerned about tyranny and having a means to protect themselves. They did not want the militia to be controlled by a central government. The National Guard is now controlled, directed and financed by the Federal government, which takes it out of the realm the Founders envisioned, and into territory they feared. The prefatory statement of the 2nd Amendment is, curiously, the only amendment to have such a preface.
I think where people get hung up is on the one word, “regulated.” We have had a running joke on this blog based on the movie line, “I don’t think that word means what you think it means.” This is one of those cases. Well regulated. The best solution is to look for the definition and common understanding of the word as was used in those days.
As used in and about the year 1690 (source: Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd Edition, 1989). They are:
1) To control or direct by a rule, principle, method, etc.
2) To adjust to some standard or requirement as for amount, degree, etc.
3) To adjust so as to ensure accuracy of operation.
4) To put in good order.
In other words, it means in good working order. The word was applied to a type of clock mechanism known for its accuracy in keeping time. When I was in elementary school, every classroom had a Regulator Clock on the wall. BTW, that is not a brand of clock, but refers to the mechanism. Two Englishmen, Benjamin Vulliamy and James Harrison, invented two versions of the earliest regulators between 1760 and 1780. That was just before the Constitution was drafted and gives some insight into how the Founders viewed and used the word.
The notion was that from the Founder’s point of view, the militia was literally every able bodied person who could keep and maintain a firearm. As somebody once wrote, an armed society tends to be a polite society. The states had a vested interest in the militia being well regulated in the archaic sense, as used in the late 18th century. That meant they should keep their firearms in good working condition and be competent in using them. If the militia were to be mustered (think Paul Revere), they needed to be ready to pick up their weapons without any delay, so they could head out and fact the threat. The slavery matter seems to be a red herring thrown into the argument many decades after the ratification of the Bill of Rights, as a calumny against the 2nd Amendment.
I am not going to copy and paste Professor Vandercoy’s excellent journal article. Here is the link. Note it has a substantial list of references at the end. I liked it so much I not only bookmarked it, I downloaded it as a PDF file and saved in my lecture notes.
http://www.guncite.com/journals/vandhist.html
Blouise,
Then the rationale of the modifying clause giving state’s the implicit rights to maintain militias is at question (although there is the legitimate use of militias instead of standing armies at the time to consider). “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state”. It does not change the basic right conferred by the operative language. “[T]he right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
To say that the 2nd was ratified to preserve slavery though? Is an argument by incomplete comparison (a logical fallacy) in light of the other considerations which applied to legitimate concerns of the North and non-slave owners as well. It’s also cherry picking propaganda from the anti-gun lobby. It does not address the operative language of the 2nd. Slavery was not the reason the 2nd was ratified in toto. Madison himself said “Disarm the people – that is the best and most effective way to enslave them.” Jefferson said, “The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.” Concerns and statements that go to the operative language, not the appeasement of the South in assuring local control of militias instead of Federal control by changing “country” to “state”. This also needs to be considered in the light of 9th (“The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”) and the 10th (“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”). The right enumerated in the operative language is specifically reserved to the people. That the right was rationalized in the 2nd as being necessary for maintaining militias does not change that essential relationship and the clear wording of the operative language would still create the right if everything before the comma was completely omitted.
The Massachusetts Compromise was about a lot more than slavery. It was a fundamental battle about consolidation of power and the extent of Federalism. To narrowly claim it was based on slavery paints an incomplete picture at best.
On the matter of the Second, one might wish to give serious consideration to the purpose behind Madison’s rewording of that Article and the changing of one word, country, to state. That would mean understanding slave patrol militias and the fact that slavery could only exist in the context of a police state (escaped property recovered, property rebelling or planning rebellion or up-risings… property of course being slaves), and the enforcement of that police state was the explicit job of the southern colony’s/state’s militias.
Reassuring the south that the new Constitution they were being asked to ratify would not infringe on the ability of their militias to maintain their slave patrols was the whole purpose behind Madison’s rewording of the Second and changing that one crucial word, country (the word in his original text), to state.
http://truth-out.org/news/item/13890-the-second-amendment-was-ratified-to-preserve-slavery
Bob K.,
Indeed. Until you can enlighten all of humanity to realize and possibly agree that mud wrestling isn’t a legal and necessary option to retain despite the ancillary costs and that the best way to avoid tyranny is engineered (legal) systems combined with keeping sociopaths and psychopaths out of positions of responsibility and power. We may reach that point in our development as a species and I certainly hope we do sooner rather than later. Because as Carl Sagan once said, “The sky calls to us and if we do not destroy ourselves, we will one day venture to the stars.”
OK, I can see that talking about this won’t solve our problem.
Mud-wrestling it is.
I might also provide an addition to Gene’s position with the second amendment as it relates to history.
All one has to do is look at the Third Amendment to get a sense of the intent behind the founding fathers.
No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
Under the Quartering Acts of 1765 the colonists were required to pay for the costs of housing the British soldiers stationed wtihin the colonies and if space was insufficient to provide housing in inns and other public houses. After the Boston Tea Party, the British Parlaiment passed the Quartering Act which forced the colonists to be required to house soldiers in private homes.
The two amendments, the second and the third, stem from the same political conditions that led the founding fathers to provide protection for the citizenry against the tyrrany and offenses to the privacy and liberty of individuals.
So I believe it is clear that the intent of the founding fathers was to protect the rights of the individual given the histories that were mentioned.
BRUNSWICK, Ga. — “A Georgia woman said Friday a teenager trying to rob her at gunpoint asked “Do you want me to kill your baby?” before he fatally shot her 13-month-old son in the head.”
Georgia Baby Dead: 13-Month-Old Antonio Shot By Young Boy In Front Of Mother, Sherry West, Police Say (UPDATE)
AP | By RUSS BYNUM
03/22/2013
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/22/antonio-santiago-west-dead-georgia-baby-killed_n_2931273.html?icid=maing-grid7|main5|dl1|sec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D288037
Police have arrested two teenagers suspected in the shooting death of a baby in a stroller and the wounding of the baby’s mother.
Brunswick Police Chief Tobe Green said Friday that 17-year-old De’Marquis Elkins is charged with first-degree murder as an adult.
The 14-year-old is also charged with murder, but he was not identified because he is a juvenile.
The chief said police were still investigating the motive and searching for a weapon.
The mother, Sherry West, said she was walking near her home Thursday morning with her baby, Antonio, when she was approached by two boys who demanded money. She was shot in the leg and a bullet grazed her ear.
Original Story:
BRUNSWICK, Ga. — A Georgia woman said Friday a teenager trying to rob her at gunpoint asked “Do you want me to kill your baby?” before he fatally shot her 13-month-old son in the head.
( Using Thomas Drake’s words: “Is this the country we want to keep?” )
Bob K.,
I never said all fights are fair, however, that does not change one of the major intentions behind the 2nd – a bulwark against tyranny. Under optimal conditions, our transitions of power are orderly and by in large the arc of ethics has been in the favor of increasing civil liberties and human rights. That arc is formed from a part of a pendulum. What goes up, comes down, only to rise again. This is the nature of political progression throughout history. I’ve said all along we need to address the issues of ever increasing tyranny as peacefully as possible and within the confines of the system our Founders created. I am not, however, so Pollyana-ish in my view of history or so trusting in human nature to say it is time to abandon this last line of defense against state oppression simply because it comes at a cost that is human nature and the potential enemy outguns the populace which on balance greatly outnumbers them.
This guy killed a kid with his gun under bad circumstances. It could have just as easily happened with a knife or a ball bat or a shovel. 2/3 of all gun violence is suicides according to the statistics. 95-98% of that is done with handguns. Even if you wanted to take a half-measure and ban handguns? They are a technology that has been “out of the bag” for so long and they are fairly easy to make with a minimum of machining knowledge and a decent set of tools that you would never get the cat back in the bag. What you would do is create a black market more substantial than the one that already exists for weapons and usher in the conjoined rise in ancillary crimes that black markets inherently foster.
You may think my interpretation of the 2nd is “really bad” but yours is based on wishful thinking. I have history and jurisprudence on my side. You have a desire to make things better for humanity. The two are not always compatible. Guns are too easy to make. Nothing changes that. Even if you were to somehow “un-invent” them, people would still kill others on purpose and by accident. The tools in your garage? Half of them are weapons derivatives. The kitchen? Knifes and mallets kill as surely and with only slightly more difficulty than pulling a trigger. I agree with your principle and your goal of a better world. I wish that the world were such a place that the idea of disarming the people would not only do nothing to deter tyranny but actually encourage it. Hell, just look at how tyranny is on the rise with them. If it does come to the point of revolution? It won’t be like the American Revolution. Not by a long shot. But history is filled with examples of a better armed, larger army falling to a smaller, lesser armed force by better strategy and more responsive tactics.
The urge to ban guns is noble in intent, but unwise in strategy and a practical impossibility in addition to requiring a Constitutional amendment that has no chance of passing under this or any foreseeable political climate in the near future.
A more practical goal to make the world a safer place? Both in scale and complexity?
Get rid of nuclear weapons.
They are hard to make, there are comparatively fewer of them, they inflict damage on a scale so much larger most people cannot truly comprehend the difference, they are indiscriminate, scientific study shows that even a limited nuclear war (less than a dozen simultaneous multi-megaton blasts) would likely screw the atmosphere so badly that our ability to grow food (already strained by global warming and overpopulation) that millions if not billions would die of starvation in the aftermath even if they were nowhere near blast and radiation zones, and we know who all the major holders are.
One must do what one can to better the world. That is the ethical obligation of all people of good will. It should not be misdirected to efforts impractical or doomed to failure or at odds with the realities of human nature and our inherent proclivity for violence as a species. The only way to deal with that last problem is enlightenment. And at the species level, that is a long slow road of winning one mind at a time complicated by the fact that some minds are not winnable by any amount of evidence and persuasion.
Gene,
Yes, one cannot dissolve political bands with a government armed only with their opinions.
By force of arms, one could do that with a government, based thousands of miles away, in the 18th century. Took months to get a response.
One will not do that with a democratic, republican government of your fellow citizens, which you voted for, based in your home country, which has the largest defense budget in the world.
Communications were still pretty slow last time someone tried acting out that fantasy. It took about 5 years or so, but the folks who tried armed insurrection still haven’t recovered, 140 years later.
To think that your guns are for resisting the “tyranny” of your elected government, is fantasy. A very dangerous fantasy, that leads deluded paranoiacs to hoard weapons.
The Constitution is a very specific set of rules with which to govern peaceful, orderly change. It does not contain an amendment allowing citizens to bear arms, so that, if the citizens didn’t like the last democratic vote, the government can be overthrown violently. Those sort of actions are referred to in other sections of the Constitution. They are referred to as “treason,” and “sedition.” We vote in this country. If the vote didn’t go your way, too bad. Try again, maybe.
Response time to armed rebellion (treason), in this century, would depend on how quickly someone dials 911. After that, it’s dependent on police response time, then say, sheriff response time, then the National Guard response time. There will be no rebellion, after that. Those tanks and F-16s bearing down on you, don’t really care whether you think you have the right to shoot at them because of some really bad interpretation of an amendment.
One thing that should be kept in mind is that the right to bear arms was in English common law since the reign of King Henry II in 1181. Both Federalist 46 and the 2nd are written in response to the disarming of Colonials by King George and that the British proclivity for disarming the populace of the commonwealth started just before the American Revolution as a method of both oppressing the Scots and to keep people of the Commonwealth from using weapons against the Brits (who were often viewed as occupiers by members of the Commonwealth) that they had acquired during the Napoleonic Wars. Often the excuse was to “preserve game”, but the British effectively disarmed their peoples effectively contemporaneously to our creating the right to bear arms. The intention of the 2nd applies not only for the purpose of keeping militias armed as standing armies were viewed by the Founders as an anathema to democracy but as a final bulwark against tyranny by the state – also an anathema to democracy. The wording of the 2nd is clear although binary in construction:
“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.”
Watch the comma. The first part of that sentence is not a qualifier, but a rationale. It is a rational based on the then existent reliance upon militias for military actions. It is part of what allows states to maintain National Guards to this day as an implicit right to the states.. However, the right itself as it applies to citizens comes after the comma and it is clear and unambiguous: “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
While I agree with Bob K. that a lot of people in our culture are essentially overly aggressive jackasses with a fixation on getting to kill someone because they think it is fun or manly, the right to keep and bear arms “shall not be infringed”. The jurisprudence since then has crafted exceptions to this right that society deems wise such as disallowing violent felons to own firearms, but in itself, the 2nd is as close to an absolute right you find in the Constitution next to Freedom of Speech and Free Exercise of Religion (which also have rational restraints upon them). However, as we see from recent examples that appear on this blog, the erosion of these rights and the rest of the Bill of Rights is conjoined with the rise of oppression.
The 2nd, despite some of the dire consequences, is both necessary and the last resort bulwark against tyranny. And if the Declaration tells us anything, sometimes “in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.” One cannot do this armed only with their opinions no matter how just they might be.
Well, Anon,
Thanks for that. So refreshing to see the conversation go adolescent and psychotic again, after the adult posts by Gene H. and OS.
Nope. Read 46 again.
How is it possible, since 46 was written before the second amendment, for Madison to attribute what he says in 46, to the second amendment? That’s a rhetorical question, so I’ll answer it: 46 can’t possible apply to the second amendment, any more than it can to the 14th amendment.
If you love fantasizing about murdering kids who walked into the wrong house, I suggest YOU move to Somalia. I’ll stay here, thanks.
Would you care to be a bit less mealy-mouthed, and tell us all just who the fascist fools are?
Who, exactly, is hiding behind gun owners? Are you referring to yourself in lofty terms, as if you are protecting me from your fantasy enemies? If so, thank you so much! Next time I see an imaginary threat, I’ll call you!
I don’t really need you to protect me with your artificial manhood. I already have my own manhood, and it came with the territory. No need for fantasy fetish objects. Thanks, anyway.
You know, you’re right. If the paranoid homeowner hadn’t had a gun, he would’ve still killed the poor lost kid, just by yelling “BANG!” The presence of firearms obviously made no difference. The bullet would’ve still come out of his index finger, and killed the kid.
By the way, what kind of decent human being would fire a gun at an unidentified movement? The kind of human being who needs to be in a mental institution, away from firearms?
Did you forget your meds, today? Just trying to be helpful.
Oky1,
I saved the best for last.
Wow, no flies on you! I am a paid shill, tasked with debunking the fantasies of cracker teabilly rednecks. Speaking of Alex Jones, how’s that working for him?
You seem to have lots of fascinating travel plans for anyone who thinks, or speaks, a different opinion from yours. Did you know, in your trailer-park wisdom, that there are many other amendments, besides the second? For instance, there’s the first amendment, which I believe applies. I provide the text here, since it’s obvious you don’t get out much:
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
Now, I know it says “Congress,” Bubba, but it pretty much applies to everyone else, including deep medieval thinkers such as yourself.
So, all these countries that you’ll pay to send us to? Have you ever been outside of this country, which, for your future reference, is named “The United States of America,” not “America,” or “Merka”? You’re welcome.
You seem to know so much about geography, just asking.
I, and the ABM (? Anti-Ballistic Missile) and some other unnamed folks, are responsible for the plethora of mass-murder weapons in this country? Wow, all that credit for me? You could save some for the gun manufacturers and their surrogate, the NRA, who provide murder weapons to criminals. Save some for yourself, and your drooling, knuckle-dragging, pistol-packin’, good-ol’ boy buddies.
So sorry, Earl-Bob, there’s no way to say what needs said in a nice fluffy feel good way.
Feel better now, my little troglodyte? I certainly do.
Anon,
Thank you for writing your comments above, I just didn’t have time to do the same.
Bob K, if he really believes that way he should move to gun free, more violent England, Mexico, North Korea or Saudi Arabia & take Obama, Micheal Moore, Como, Bloomberg & the rest of their America hating trash with them.
We know the govt is has been hiring people to come on these blogs & post PR crap, maybe Bob K is a paid shill? I don’t know but that’s what one sounds like.
So sorry Bob K, there’s no way to say what needs said in a nice fluffy feel good way.
Bob K, ABM & people pushing their type policies are really the ones responsible for shootings like Sandy Hook, etc..
IE: Alex Jones/ Infowars, etc…
**
Bob K, you are completely and utterly wrong about the 2nd amendment.
Madison in the 46 which was written well before the 2nd left no question that the intention of the 2nd was to have armed citizens capable of taking physical control of the government should they need to do so.
The only lack of sanity is the gun grabbers who seek to revoke the 2nd and remove guns from citizens hands. If you do not like the Bill of Rights, then you simply need to move to another country. There is no polite way of putting this. I have simply lost all tolerance for fascist fools.
It is ironic that the gun grabbers choose to hide behind others who are armed. Reeks of hypocrisy. I am embarrassed to be associated with many Democrats these days. It is repulsive what the party has turned into.
Btw, the kid should not have been moving around in the dark in another persons home. Its a tragedy but in no way should it have been prevented by removing guns from peoples homes.
Feel free to buy a one way ticket to England. **
Bob K, you are completely and utterly wrong about the 2nd amendment.
Madison in the 46 which was written well before the 2nd left no question that the intention of the 2nd was to have armed citizens capable of taking physical control of the government should they need to do so.
The only lack of sanity is the gun grabbers who seek to revoke the 2nd and remove guns from citizens hands. If you do not like the Bill of Rights, then you simply need to move to another country. There is no polite way of putting this. I have simply lost all tolerance for fascist fools.
It is ironic that the gun grabbers choose to hide behind others who are armed. Reeks of hypocrisy. I am embarrassed to be associated with many Democrats these days. It is repulsive what the party has turned into.
Btw, the kid should not have been moving around in the dark in another persons home. Its a tragedy but in no way should it have been prevented by removing guns from peoples homes.
Feel free to buy a one way ticket to England.
Warning shots kill people, too.