From: colten@cbnewsb.cb.att.com (marc.colten)
Subject: Re: 2nd Ammendment
Summary: Who said they couldn't "carry concealed"
Organization: AT&T
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1992 17:02:11 GMT

In article <1992Nov6.140706.23686@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>, bobd@marune.acs.ohio-state.edu (Bob DeBula) writes:
> In article <1992Nov6.041425.24217@cbfsb.cb.att.com> colten@cbnewsb.cb.att.com (marc.colten) writes:
> >
> >Guns are a lot different from knives.  I can sit a block away with
> >a knife and be considered a mild threat - but a gun makes me a 
> >major threat.  I've had this argument before  "oh then let's ban
> >steak knives" - tell that to the people in Killeen.  If that guy
> >had a steak knife 90% of his victims might be alive.  Guns are
> >a very different matter.
> >
> 
> *Sigh*, if the folks in the restaurant had been able to carry
> concealed, then most probably the incident in Killeen would never
> have been on the national news in the first place. The unreasonable
> restriction of their RKBA kept them from defending themselves
> and others in this situation. This situation was more of
> a defeat for the HCI crowd than the RKBA crowd if you think about
> it a bit. I *know* there are a lot more folks in this forum who can/will
> probably jump on this assertion of yours with additional
> evidence/facts relating to that case. All of this has been rehashed
> here in tpg *numerous* times.
> 

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!  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.

So let's look at Killeen, again. There are no laws restricting the
right of honest, law-abiding citizens to buy weapons.  Or on anyone
else since it is in infringement of our rights to even ask us who
we are, or make us wait while they see if the id we have is real.
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.

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.

> You make the *very* common and faulty assumption that something can
> be eliminated by legislating it away. This didn't work for
> prohibition, isn't working for the war on drugs, and won't
> work (doesn't work in places which have already legislated it
> like DC, NYC, Chicago, etc.) for guns. All it does is create
> a new criminal class from some formerly law abiding citizens
> and make the rest *more* likely to become victims of the
> WOD and the criminal class. You can bet that if it is profitable to 
> bring illegal drugs into the country, it will be just as profitable to bring
> illegal guns into the country. It would also be relatively easy
> to set illegal manufacture of fully automatic submachine guns
> domestically (much like the basement "labs" manufacture LSD,
> PCPs, and the "crack" variant of cocaine).
> 
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.  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".  Should we then argue,
more people are killed in car accidents then by drunk drivers, so let's
make it legal to drive drunk?"  We could continue that idea until you
reach the point where there are no laws since we're all going to die
anyway.

> IMHO more laws are not any kind of solution for much of any
> contemporary problem.

You mean more laws on guns, right?


marc colten

Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns