Gun Deaths Now the Third Leading Cause of Death in American Children

As it connects bearing arms to forming militias, clearly those usable by militias are what is protected.

Too late. The Supreme Court years ago ruled that the "right to bear arms" was an INDIVIDUAL right and not dependent on involvement, formation of, or support of a militia.

The right is indeed individual and independent of service in the militia, but because the 2nd refers to armed citizens forming militias, arms that a militia would use are protected.

You could make that argument about virtually any type of weapon and as technology progresses the possible types of weapons expands.

As some have said in the past, going down the "weapons a militia" would use is a very dangerous road. Basically you would be arguing that individual possession of military grade hardware would be a protected right.

There are all sorts of man portable military grade weapons that would be protected. Machine guns, man portable surface to air missiles (Stingers for example), man portable antitank missiles (LAWs or RPGs for example).

If this was the case there would be a compensatory radically upgrading of weapons available to local law enforcement in the United States.

None of that is good.

As far as small arms go, I would be arguing exactly that. Rifles, shotguns, pistols, swords, knives, etc.

As must be repeated every time this line of reasoning comes up, there is a difference between small arms--personal, bearable weapons wielded by a single individual--and ordnance.

See post 216 paragraph 2 again.

Actually, there's some truth to that. Not suicide by gun, but in general, suicidal people often do decide in the blink of an eye to kill themselves after a rash of bad days or some trigger than those closest to them may not even know about.

I hesitate to call those who constantly make posts about killing themselves attention whores, but those folks--while in need of help--are usually not at the action phase yet. They *want* to be stopped.Me, I've struggled with suicidal thoughts many times since I was 16. I seriously thought about offing myself junior year of high school and if not for being brainwashed about going th hell for it, I might have. I gave CO alteration to jumping off the flight deck of the Fitzgerald more than once.

Sometimes all it takes is some little thing to stop you from going through with it...a phone call, an obligation to a pet, wanting to find out what happens on a TV show. I've seen all of these as reasons people made a split decision not to kill themselves, because no one kills themselves to be dead, but to end whatever pain they feel to be insurmountable.

In case anyone thinks my concerns about Universal Background Checks are groundless...

This is why I said that UBCs would have to be treated solely as an opportunity for the state to intervene, NOT as an approval. If the state is unable to uphold its role in the background check, the transaction should not be halted. If the state doesn't have the resources to perform the checks, then it waives the requirement that checks be done.

This potential shutdown is attributable to the usual state government budget idiocy, but it's every bit as detrimental to peoples' exercise of their rights as if it were deliberate.

Someone should be taking the state government to federal court RIGHT NOW to force them to keep the system funded. Any interruption is unacceptable.

At my absolute worst, the thought that only just barely kept my pieces glued together was the thought that my death would make some bastard somewhere happy, so I resolved to live out of bloodyminded spite and vengeance.

And hey, you got to see Sokar become worm food, so there's that!

As far as small arms go, I would be arguing exactly that. Rifles, shotguns, pistols, swords, knives, etc. - Paladin

sounds about right. Even in the military an example would be "our helicopter is taking small arms fire!" (I hate when that happens) would imply any shoulder-fired portable gun toted by the average soldier.
RPG's for example would be a whole different level of "oh shit" and require a different response. So yeah, any weapon the average citizen can tote around for basic and reasonable self defense would meet the definition IMO. I think a bible days leather sling would be pretty kick-ass, or even the jawbone of a donkey (one bible dude killed like 5,000 of the enemy) with one in a single battle! Damn they had a VFW with guys swilling beer and telling bullshit war-stories even back then! Glad somebody was there to write it down!

My goal is to live long enough to become a burden to others.

IIRC, "militia" is usually light infantry. SOMEtimes cavalry, but because cavalry has always been expensive, not very often.

But.

The modern equivalent to cavalry are helicopters and tanks/armored vehicles. But yes, even in "citizen armies" it was the wealthy and elite who could afford to risk their own horses in battle. Horses generally being too valuable an asset (for farming) to risk them getting killed.

I've read (don't know this for certain) that a firearm of the 50 caliber size can actually stop any known regular military land or air vehicle except for a main battle tank. If you have enough of them and can hit the target. Now I know hitting a jet coming in at high speed would be difficult at best and I don't know how something that sized would do against a heavily armored attack helicopter or ground attack aircraft like the A-10.

the issue with helicopters is even if you can't "shoot down" a hovering helicopter with small arms you can shoot up everybody & everything inside it. Obviously the longer you hover, the more dangerous it is, but length of time in a danger zone applies to everything we do in life. Funny when I was in the army we had these old, old training booklets that had all kinds of theoretical ideas that would rarely pan out. One of these tactics was how to shoot down an enemy jet with nothing but small arms like m-16's. The idea is that everyone aims at the same agreed-upon spot (leading the fast moving jet of course) and empties all their ammo at the same time. Too bad mythbusters couldn't do something on this, but safety might be an issue!

There are light cavalry units that operate only in Humvees. A friend of mine commands a National Guard squadron with that mission.

And .50 BMG would be hard pressed to penetrate Bradley, Paladin (), or any other US armored vehicle except maybe a Stryker and even then it would probably take a sabot round or something beyond regular AP ammo

My folks do some work on/in Strykers - yeah good luck taking those out!

OMG, shootER's "Paladin" thing has me laughing so hard I can't breathe!!

Having seen a .50 BMG in action, I can assure you it will most definitely penetrate Paladin.

Here it is:

Do you have any actual instances of this happening? I admit it might be difficult to prove, as would a suicide that was prevented by a 3 day cooling off period.

Philosophically, if you're convinced a 3 day cooling off period would prevent some suicides, why not a 14 day or a 30 day or a 90 day cooling off period to prevent even more?

If a speculative reason is sufficient to deny someone their rights for a time of X, then it can as easily be 10X or 100X.

What principle limits how long this period can be?

Law of diminishing returns. 72 hours is the greatest return for the least period of time. I made that up, but if someone is apt to do something rash, like get an abortion, a cooling off period is advisable.

Last time I checked, there was a limit as to when a woman could get an abortion. If she's in week 11 or 12, those are days she can't afford, quote literally in some cases.

What evidence is there that the 72 hours is optimal?

But if it's earlier than that, a waiting period is okay?

What about requiring an ultrasound, so the woman can see what she's terminating?

Don't you find it ironic that obtaining a weapon shouldn't require a waiting period, but obtaining an abortion should (at least according to our conservative friends?

I made it up. Read my post.

Magazine article I read several years ago. The victim was a female college student being stalked by a male student (or maybe a non-student, can't recall that detail).
There was a second case I read of, also a college woman, who bought a gun, but was told by campus authorities she'd be expelled if she brought a gun on campus. IIRC, She complied and ended up raped.
Again, print magazine articles years ago.

Yes, I know. And so did every lawmaker who ever instituted such a thing. We've had 15 day and 10 day waits here in California, and there was a national 5 day wait...these can't all be "optimal." In fact, they seem rather...arbitrary.

And saying the limit is based on "diminishing returns" doesn't cut it because that involves a value judgment wherein you decide X more days of waiting period is not worth Y more prevented suicides.

Certainly you would agree that there's no justification for a waiting period on a person buying a gun who already owns one, yes?

Not me! Scrape the little bastard out.
Back in the late 70s, my wife was surprised to discover, in conversation with three of her female friends, that she was the only one in the group that had NOT had an abortion. Two of the girls had it done as soon as the pregnancy was discovered. One of the girls was an irresponsible little twit who was indeed using them as birth control - I think she'd had at least three by her early 20s. She finally let one come to term because her doctor said one more abortion would probably make her unable to conceive. That baby is now in her 30s and a momma too.

Right? What's the point?
Maybe they figure you decided to go on a shooting rampage, but the guns you already have are just so old and out of style. You just MUST have a new one to go with your outfit!