From: sch@unx.sas.com (Steve Holzworth)
Subject: Re: A Coffee-House Conversation with an Imaginary Nadja (Was Re: Eva Clayton bio)
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 22:50:53 GMT
Organization: SAS Institute Inc.

noraa@cbnewsk.cb.att.com (aaron.l.hoffmeyer) writes:

>In article <1992Nov10.215919.27758@jetsun.weitek.COM> nadja@jetsun.weitek.COM (Nadja Adolf) writes:
>>Do yourself a favor and read about the second amendment - an initial
>>draft that did limit firearms to organized militias was rejected
>>by the founders. And the solution to the 'firepower' question is
>>to permit the ownership of more sophisticated firearms.

>"Ok, I'll Bite.  Weren't these the same *enlightened* founders that made
>sure that their defined rights still enabled them to be slave owners?
>Aren't these the same folks who really didn't want women involved in the
>process of running the country--at all?"

>"Why, yes, Aaron, they are."

>"Well then, if they were intellectually wrong about those things,
>couldn't it be possible that they were also intellectually wrong about
>the second amendment and its vague meaning (which you think is so
>precise)?"

Maybe they were also wrong about the freedom of speech, freedom from illegal
search/seizure, etc.

>"Why, yes, it is."

>"Uh-huh.  Now some folks in this country think this country would be a
>better place to live if everyone of us carried around our own little
>snub-nosed pistols, small and cute little assault rifles, cuddly
>bazookas and even personal nuclear devices (PNDs), but that seems like
>it might be a grand and sweeping interpretation of the second amendment,

I don't know ANYONE that would REQUIRE people to be armed. You are using
an invalid Reductio Ad Absurdum argument. The founders also didn't envision 
TV, or Xerox (tm) machines, or computers, or faxes, or radio... perhaps 
freedom of the press and freedom of speech shouldn't apply to any media unknown
at the time of the Constitution's writing. The topics above, slavery, women
in office, have been resolved by the Supreme Court by the process of
BROADENING the definition of legal citizens (id est - a more "sweeping"
definition thereof).

>something the founding fathers did not intend at all.  Now, shoot me if
>I'm wrong, but if there were no handguns and no assault rifles anywhere,
>absolutely anywhere, in this country, how many deaths would we have from
>shootings?"
i
And if cells didn't occasionally go berserk, how many deaths would we
have from cancer?

Exactly how are you going to make all these weapons vanish from the face
of the country, and never reappear, particularly w.r.t. the criminal
element? I assume you'd enact a ban on ownership/possesion of same. That'll
stop 'em for sure (just like the assorted drug laws stop illegal drugs).

If you COULD magically make ALL firearms disappear, I WOULD take you
up on it, immediately. I would gladly forgo my sporting usage of 
firearms in exchange for that. Of course, neither you, nor any other 
group or entity can EVER make that happen, so why even pretend?

>"Well, if all the guns were gone, nobody could be killed with one."

>"Uh-huh."

If pigs had wings....

>"But what about the government taking away all our individual rights,
>stealing our homes, our property, stealing our children, rapists in the
>streets, cracked-up wackos breaking into our homes and killing us just
>to get our pocket-change?"

>"Good question."

So, what's your answer?

>Aaron L. Hoffmeyer
>TR@CBNEA.ATT.COM 
--
Steve Holzworth
sch@unx.sas.com
x6872
SAS Institute - Open Systems R & D
Cary, N.C.
Newsgroups: soc.culture.african.american