"Why do you need an AR15?"

[LR1955]

Guys:

What was this all about before it became what it is now?

LR55

[stanc]

How can you define an assault rifle as either offensive or defensive? If I'm using one to clear a compound, then it's an offensive weapon. If using it to keep someone else from getting into my compound, then it's defensive. How it is being used defines this, not any physical characteristic of the weapon itself.

Most (if not all) weapons can be used in either offense or defense. But, rifles are primarily offensive weapons, whereas handguns are mainly defensive.

An AR-15 is by definition not an assault rifle.

True, AR15s commonly available are not technically assault rifles.
However, that's really a distinction without a practical difference.
Military SOP is to use semi-auto fire only; full-auto is rarely used.
A semi-auto AR15 with 30-rd mag is just as effective as an M16 that is fired only semi-auto.
Plus, as was seen in Las Vegas, a semi-auto AR15 can be legally altered to emulate full-auto.

The government does not decide what rights we have or don't have. The constitution and bill of rights have already decided this.

LOL. Who do you think wrote the Constitution and Bill of Rights? Hint: It was members of the government.

[sneaky one]

Chill out guys. It's time to read into what's showing up, upon these bills- ideas. I will never give up Anything. EVER. No chance of felonizing much this go around.

What, we have some deranged kids out there--I blame the parents firstly!! Hide the troll in the basement. Meds. ? Bullying, ? Video games that show no remorse? Nice effing country we live in.

Greed in our country plays a role in this . Decades ago - not many mass shootings. Yet the AR 15 was for sale , think about this . ???

Guns were designed from the start not to go Bang , all by themselves. Trigger activation is the real issue. Who activates the trigger is the problem in these shootings.
And any shooting for hundreds of deer dropped in last century. jokey

And the lack of a trained school staff, or a trained person within the school to stave off as much carnage as possible.

Have an armed person in the school. Or 1 of the tornado proof containers , that all classrooms can get inside ASAP.

There Has to be a better way to protect our kids than planning to take away our hunting version of modern day sporting rifles .

[stanc]

Greed in our country plays a role in this .

How so?

Decades ago - not many mass shootings. Yet the AR 15 was for sale , think about this .

Five decades ago, the Colt SP1 was the only AR15 available, and only about 10,000 had been produced. Today the number of AR15-type rifles is in the millions.

Five decades ago, there were 125 million fewer people in this country than today. The bigger the population, the greater the number of mentally unstable people.

[bj139]

Montana, thank you for posting, especially the quotes which show what the founders were thinking.
Stanc refuses to acknowledge this and so is wrong.

[JASmith]

Montana, thank you for posting, especially the quotes which show what the founders were thinking.
Stanc refuses to acknowledge this and so is wrong.

+1 Right on!

BTW We have been through this drill with STANC so many times that I rarely weigh in because the arguments quickly become repetitive with no convergence.

The problem is that Stan is occasionally right. Very few of us are willing to acknowledge this, however, because the discussions so rarely converge to a consensus.

[biodsl]

Guys:

What was this all about before it became what it is now?

LR55

I started this thread. My point was simply this: I need an AR15 so that me or my heirs can fight tyranny with something resembling a 'military rifle of the day'.

[stanc]

Montana, thank you for posting, especially the quotes which show what the founders were thinking.
Stanc refuses to acknowledge this and so is wrong.

Heh, heh. Where you guys are going wrong is that the quotes of what some of the founders were thinking are not written into either the Constitution or the Bill of Rights.

"The militia exists to overthrow the government." The Constitution does not say so. But, it does say the militia can be used to suppress any who do engage in insurrection.

"The RKBA is meant to apply to individual self defense, as well as collective defense." Then why does the 2A address only collective defense (i.e., arming the militia)?
If the author had wanted weapons for self defense protected, why didn't he follow the examples of the Pennsylvania and Vermont constitutions and explicitly say so?

Pennsylvania (1776) "...the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the state..."
Vermont (1777) "...the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the State..."

[stanc]

I started this thread. My point was simply this: I need an AR15 so that me or my heirs can fight tyranny with something resembling a 'military rifle of the day'.

a. That's a rather weak reason, since there's no tyranny to fight now or in the foreseeable future, and very well may never be.
b. Armed insurrection is illegal, so you're essentially saying you need an AR15 because you plan to engage in criminal activity.

[NugginFutz]

a. That's a rather weak reason, since there's no tyranny to fight now or in the foreseeable future, and very well may never be.
b. Armed insurrection is illegal, so you're essentially saying you need an AR15 because you plan to engage in criminal activity.

Now THAT is an inference.

[StoneHendge]

a. That's a rather weak reason, since there's no tyranny to fight now or in the foreseeable future, and very well may never be.
b. Armed insurrection is illegal, so you're essentially saying you need an AR15 because you plan to engage in criminal activity.

When the top echelons of our nation's law enforcement (FBI / DOJ) demonstrate that they are corrupt to the core, the court system becomes politicized, laws do not seemingly apply to said law enforcement or high ranking political figures, and the politicized court system allows for rampant voter fraud, we are indeed on the verge of Tyranny.

The American Revolution was illegal.

[montana]

Like in the days of our nations founding, people disagreed. Today is no different.

This is my idea of what America should be like. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0PtB-Y8-nsM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLQ7klqYE_4

This is another view of what it should look like. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B947KEuLux0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLGFM4QkxdM

Life is full of choices. I choose to believe the actual thoughts and words that were recorded for posterity by the people who created the Second Amendment, Stan doesn't. It is as simple as that.

There are alternatives to firearms. https://www.facebook.com/alexzedra1/vide...417115987/

[biodsl]

a. That's a rather weak reason, since there's no tyranny to fight now or in the foreseeable future, and very well may never be.

I wouldn't use the word weak. Remote, improbable, yes. But it's not like it's never happened before.

b. Armed insurrection is illegal, so you're essentially saying you need an AR15 because you plan to engage in criminal activity.

That's exactly what I'm saying. We don't know who fired the first shot at Lexington. Let's assume it was a colonist. Was it legal? Was it moral?

[NugginFutz]

With respect to the Constitution and, in this specific instance, the document known as the Bill of Rights, context is absolutely key in understanding the motivations behind these cornerstones of American civilization. I should not need to remind anyone here that the bad taste of King George was fresh in the mouths of framers of our government's Constitution and, later, the enumeration of our rights. They were throwing off the rule of a tyrant and clearly wanted to protect themselves from such forms of government for all time to come.

Within the Bill of Rights, it is noteworthy that the first nine of the ten original articles were explicitly used to carve out the rights of the individual, explicitly protecting them from actions of the Government. Only when we get to article ten do we get to hear about the powers of the Government, and then how they are limited to only what is explicitly assigned to the Government by the Constitution itself.

But how article ten does this is important. It says that "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".

Notice how it clearly references the United States, the states and the people. They are being treated as separate entities, with distinct and separate powers, protections and rights. This is key, in that it supports the understanding of the Article 2's wording, where both the state and the people are mentioned. This is done, and quite deliberately, to delineate these entities as being apart from the Government (United States).

To the point: The 2nd amendment is discussing the importance of the individual state and the rights of the people. Because both are being mentioned within this amendment, each has their own assignment therein: The state, a militia, and the people, its right to bear arms. The Government (United States) is not mentioned here, so a Standing Army is not the reason for this amendment.

It is further noteworthy that Madison, along with the other authors of the Bill of Rights, found it uniquely important to imbue the 2nd amendment with the phrase "shall not be infringed." Without reverting to cliché, it means what it says. It is a right that is not to be altered or ignored.

So, that's my take on the Bill of Rights and why we can act on our perceived "Need for an AR15".

[1075 tech]

..

[grayfox]

Montana, Nuggin and 1075, exactly.
And by the way, the 2A does not create the people's right to keep and bear arms, as mentioned above, it was written to preserve an already existing right. This A (and the Bill of Rights) was paramount to counter and balance against the considerable powers being granted to the Executive branch. These guys had just fought and won a war against a "Chief Executive" who was a King, and from whom (under the King-theories of the day) all rights came, and only those were granted to the citizens which He determined, "in his pleasure", to grant. In contrast -- STARK CONTRAST -- the Declaration and Constitution embodied that rights originated straight from God and flowed directly to the people, they do not, repeat, DO NOT, flow from the Govt to the people.
The Constitution did not have a prayer of being adopted without laying out, in equal standing, certain rights to the people first, and also to the individual States, as separate from and distinct from the federal government.
Our Constitution is all about balances of power, not only among the 3 branches of government, but also among federal, State, and people (individuals). The founders rightly did not trust any single entity to be all-wise, understanding and good... hence a setup of balances to allow one to compensate for or correct the excesses of the other.

[grayfox]

My right to keep and bear a militia-style, military style, arm that I would as an ordinary citizen, bring to battle when called upon by the State against its enemies, is a right straight from God and that's how the framers understood it. In that sense, the AR is precisely the type of armament that the Constitution envisages (for today) as being kept and borne by individual citizens. Just as the musket was in 1797, and as the Winchester 1873 was in the late 1800's, and as a musket-ball-pistol was back then, and a 6-shooter was in cowboy days... and as a 1903 would be for the 19-teens-20's, and M1 Garand or Springfield or 1911-45 would be in the 40's... heck in the year 2525 it might just be a laser-zapper rifle thingy, whatever. But today it is the AR. The individual weapon you can own and carry and bring when called upon, to keep and to bear.

The left and the Libs are "afraid" of the AR because they want to disarm everyone but themselves (Dianne Feinstein carries a pistol!!), they believe the govt defines and grants everyone what rights they might "have", and they are in effect in direct opposition to the very foundations of the Constitution. Let's see, Hitler disarmed German citizens and then murdered millions, Stalin did the same, Pol Pot did in Cambodia, Mussolini (the original author of the left's "together forward" motto by the way!!!) Uganda, and so on ... and it was with those types of people in mind that the Founders wrote the 2A they way they did as a counter measure!
Them's my views and I'm stickin' to 'em.

[montana]

http://jpfo.org/filegen-a-m/deathgc.htm
https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/MURDER.HTM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zN0Xi8no6us
+1 Nuggin, 1075, gray fox
History and human nature never changes, only those who ignore it and those who don't.

[stanc]

That's a rather weak reason, since there's no tyranny to fight now or in the foreseeable future, and very well may never be.

I wouldn't use the word weak. Remote, improbable, yes.

The reason is weak, precisely because the event is improbable. It'd be much better to have a strong reason to justify having an AR15.

But, I think it's a mistake to try to justify owning an AR15 on the basis of "need," because it can't be done. Nobody needs to have an AR15.

"Why do you need an AR15?" is a loaded question. (No pun intended.) It contains the premise that "need" is the basis for determining whether or not one should be allowed to own something. Once you answer it, you automatically validate that premise. I would advise against attempting to answer the question.

But it's not like it's never happened before.

It's never happened before in this country. Unless you want to count an event like the Whiskey Rebellion, which was put down by the very militia that some here claim exists to fight the government.

The Whiskey Rebellion also offers some insight as to the "need" to have an AR15 to fight a hypothetical tyranny: The "Insurgents" in that event had small arms comparable to those of the military, but it didn't make one iota of difference in the outcome. And today's armed forces have weaponry that overmatch what private citizens possess by several orders of magnitude.

Armed insurrection is illegal, so you're essentially saying you need an AR15 because you plan to engage in criminal activity.

That's exactly what I'm saying.

That seems foolish and counterproductive to me. It supports the anti-gun position that people can't be trusted with firearms.

The idea that you need a gun to fight tyranny -- which you agree is remote and improbable -- makes you sound paranoid, and quite probably unstable, the type of person whom even most gun owners say should be prevented from having firearms.

[stanc]

Like in the days of our nations founding, people disagreed. Today is no different.

Yup. On any issue, people are divided between those in favor, those opposed, and those who don't care.

Life is full of choices. I choose to believe the actual thoughts and words that were recorded for posterity by the people who created the Second Amendment

:confused: Only one person created the Second Amendment. http://www.billofrightsinstitute.org/fou...of-rights/