From: rstevew@deeptht.armory.com (Richard Steven Walz)
Newsgroups: alt.censorship,alt.sex
Subject: Re: Surprise. You've made the evening news again.
Date: 25 Jul 92 09:18:05 GMT
Organization: The Armory

In article <1992Jul19.080536.17377@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu> tkirby@nyx.cs.du.edu (Thomas Kirby) writes:
>
>     I for one, while acknowledging that there are laws that are set
>against certain types of pornography in some places, do encourage any and
>all kinds of rebellion against such laws.  We do have a First Amendment
>right to freedom of speech, and government free of religious interference.
>If the Supreme Court refuses to protect our rights, then we must act to
>protect those rights for ourselves.  In doing so, we are enforcing the
>highest law of the United States of America, the Constitution.
> 
>     Had to get that one off my chest ;-).
---------------------------------
And another amendment in the Bill of Rights is like unto it and
necessary to it. The right to KEEP *AND* BEAR arms shall not be
abridged. And any fool who thinks that the militia is the national
guard, look it up in the original Webster's. The militia is the
people, armed to repel attack or serve in the defense of liberty.
It is informal and elects it's own officers. This harkens back to the
way we won our independence, namely the phrase from the Declaration:
"And when a government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the
right of the people to alter or abolish it,...". Now tell me how to
keep the pen mightier than the sword if you are summarily shot or sent
to labor camps and fed pig slop. I think that the deliberate inclusion
of the wording both to "keep" and also to "bear" arms is indicative of
a strong intent that the populous remain armed.

Listen my children and you shall hear,
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere.
Twas the eighteenth of April, '75,
Hardly a man is still alive,
Who remembers that famous day and year.

He said to his friend, "If the British march",
"By land or sea from the town tonight,"
"Hang a lantern in the lofty arch,"
"Of North Church Tower, as a signal light."

"One if by land, and two if by sea,"
"And I on the opposite shore will be,"
"Ready to ride and spread the alarm,"
"To every middlesex, village and farm,"
"For the country folk to be up, and to ARM!!"

Our founding fathers and the first Americans conceived of a nation
where people were armed and could stand against any tyranny.
Only in countries where the people cannot afford arms or have no
education in liberty are people killed by death squads or are
pulled off the streets to fight in the front lines like in South
Vietnam or like in Iraq. It also went on in Korea and many other
dictatorships. We might think that our leaders are asses, and we might
be right, but we can say it and make it stick, and the only reason why
we can is because more guns are held privately in the US than are held
by all North American armies combined. I don't think that it is pure
luck or any type of providence or special good sense that has kept us
from tyranny. It is simply personal firepower and the will to use it.
The networks which would like to run this country would like you to
believe that people who own guns are bumbling fools who would shoot
their foot off if they ever had to use one. They would like you to
believe that they commonly leave them laying around loaded for their
children to play with. If that were true we would have children
shooting their brothers by the thousands each day. There are such
things as trigger guard locks, which I have tested on my pistol and
was unable without the key to remove, even using tools in my shop.
Most gun owners have these on all their weapons now. When my child was
young, I instructed him not to touch a gun and to come and get me if
he even thinks he sees one. This is common knowledge in prairie
country. I left my gun, unloaded and trigger guard locked setting in
plain sight on the table to see what he would do, and he always came
and got me and made me put it away. He learned early what a gun can
do. He saw animals slaughtered with rifles and pistols and at age
eight was allowed to try various of the family arsenal. He saw a 30.06
tear through a three inch tree and into the one behind it. He fired a
semi-automatic rifle with myself behind him and he was impressed to
silence by what it could do to the body of a chicken that had died
naturally. He fired a ten gauge shotgun and got knocked on his butt by
the recoil. He learned to shoot a bow and only violated range rules
once by not pointing an undrawn bow with arrow downrange only. He was
restricted from the range for two weeks! He never forgot where to
point a weapon again. He learned how to clear revolvers and automatics
and the difference that kills so many kids, the extra round left in
the chamber of an automatic that has been cocked. He learned NOT to
tell anyone where the guns in the house were stored, on threat of
being grounded FOREVER! He learned, in other words, a similar set of
things that other kids have to learn in the larger cities to get
around safely on transit systems and avoid getting hit by cars and
such. He learned safety. Some kids learn to use transit systems and
avoid neighborhoods and behaviors, and some learn to use power tools
and the safe use of weapons. I held up my pistol one day after he had
seen the film on Hiroshima in sixth grade, and I asked him, "What is
this?", and he said, "Your pistol." And I said, "No, it's Hiroshima,
one trigger pull at a time!" That was to remind him that guns were
condensed death ready to spring out. He thought a moment, and then he
nodded. I don't favor gang wars or neighborhood drive-by's. We had one
here in my town two blocks from here the other night. But you don't
get rid of it by disarming a people. The guns go with the money that
drugs bring if they are illegal. If drugs were legal, there would be
far fewer guns in young desparate hands fighting over or for drugs.
I have been moved by the sentiment in my neighborhood since the other
night, and it is one of confusion. We have never had that sort of
thing happen here before. But it didn't happen because of guns. It
happened because of drugs, that is, their illegality and expense and
the times we're in economically. Crime is up and landlords want to
raise rents again. I think that the most sensible place a neighborhood
might point its guns to stop the death of youth and the pointless
lives and the economic suffering is at the landlords, and just say NO!
- R. Steven Walz
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