From: viking@iastate.edu (Dan Sorenson)
Subject: Re: 2nd Ammendment
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames IA
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 1992 07:04:19 GMT

colten@cbnewsb.cb.att.com (marc.colten) writes:

>In the first place who said they couldn't "carry concealed" - they
>could apply for licenses and get the guns.  Hell, they sell them
>in department stores here in Georgia!  

	They sell them in department stores here in Iowa too.  I have no
misdemeanor or felony convictions, not even a speeding ticket, and I was
denied a permit to carry concealed.  Why?  Because I couldn't provide a
"reason" that was acceptable to the country sheriff.  He's out of a job,
now, thanks to the recent elections.

>I've never argued for a total
>ban on guns, just a reasonable policy, and I'm arguing against people
>who say that because the RKBA is mentioned in the 2nd amendment that
>no laws limiting them can be passed.

	Legally, no laws infringing upon the right to keep and bear
arms can be passed and upheld.  As for never arguing for a total ban
on guns, your reasonable policy may seem very unreasonable to others.
Sarah Brady once said she was only out to restrict handguns, and is
now out for rifles, shotguns, and indeed all firearms she doesn't like.
Give ya a hint -- she doesn't like any of them.

>So maybe 50% of the people in the restaurant in Killeen were sitting
>there comfortably with .38's on them.  And the guy walks in with
>a semi-automatic rifle.  Do you agree that a nut would be more likely to
>do just that - go for the big weapon.  So what would the people do -
>make it routine to carry semi-automatic's and then the guy walks in
>with a fully automatic Uzi or Mac-10.

	As if either is inherently more capable of bring down a person.
Spewing lead is not the hot ticket towards killing somebody.  Spewing
lead into a target is the hot ticket.  If 50% of the people in the
restaurant had .38's on them, I'd bet one very ventilated Uzi-wielding
ex-murderer, a few dead, a few more wounded.  That's a lot better
than the death toll history gives us.

>This is what I'm trying to argue against - some kind of arms race
>on our streets where you can have any weapon you want, but can't
>send your kid to the burger king without an armed escort - lunchtime
>in Beirut.

	As if the arms race is a product of what the people are holding.
If that were the case, the "weapon of choice" for burgulars in New York
would be the .22 pocket pistol.  It's not.  It's a .38 revolver or 9mm
semi-auto most likely, if it has to be a firearm.  Your plan is fine if
you can get the criminals to go along with it.  I'm pessimistic.

>And yet we have laws against murder - even though we can't "legislate
>it away".  You also make the faulty argument that since something is
>going to happen anyway - we shouldn't control it.

	Read that again.  We can't control murder by law, by your own
admission, and yet gun laws will somehow work?


>  I've heard so
>many arguments like "More people are killed by drunk drivers then by
>guns, so let's eliminate the laws on gun".

	You missed it.  It should properly read, "More people are killed
by drunk drivers than by guns, so why the strict laws on gun ownership
while drunk driving gets so little enforcement with similar punishment?
It makes no sense."  We're arguing that the problem is minute compared
to others being ignored, and that the laws passed that are intended to
prevent abuse cannot do so and are useless in that measure.

< Dan Sorenson, DoD #1066 z1dan@exnet.iastate.edu viking@iastate.edu >
<  ISU only censors what I read, not what I say.  Don't blame them.  >
<  "This isn't an answer, it's a pagan dance around a midnight fire  >
<   written in intellectual runes." -- Rich Young                    >