Uh huh. According to the US DHS there are estimated to be almost 14 million legal non-citizen permanent residents in the USA. https://www.dhs.gov/immigration-statistics/population-estimates/LPR If accused of a serious crime do they have a right to a jury trial?
it's going to be yet a deeper circle of hell here when I have to listen to those bozos in Jackson crow about how it was THEY who were the great heroes who finally slew Roe.
Alan Keyes used to say "if the government is entitled to take ANY of your money, they are theoretically entitled to take ALL of it" (which is not untrue) Similarly, it doesn't matter how MANY are killed for possession - if they can do it AT all, they can theoretically do it TO all." So the point stands.
As loath as the "But the Founders!" crowd is to admit it, the practical real world reality is that "rights" are whatever the collective society decides to designate as rights. All this "God given" mumbo jumbo doesn't matter because people can't agree about anything concerning said being. Now, one can certainly argue that some given right - say freedom of religion or freedom from discrimination - is transcendent, but even if it is, that knowledge is useless if your society doesn't choose to codify it (i.e., feel free to see how far "Freedom of Religion" gets you in Saudi Arabia, or China)
Well, I'm bringing in a hypothetical to gain insight on your position on abortion here and now. It seems to be important to your position that a fetus is reliant on the mother's body for survival. I am testing that by asking if you would be against abortion if the fetus were not reliant. If you'd still be in favor of abortion, then the reliance is a distraction. My Electricity & Magnetism professor would call this hypothetical approach "massaging the problem". Einstein would call it gedanken. It is an entirely legitimate scientific technique. I am supposing a future society that cares enough to pay for the operation and set up adoption etc. afterwards. But that, as you would say, is a philosophical matter behind the scientific/technological advances required. I am also suggesting (now and in an earlier reply) that we should remove the barrier of affordability by having a proper safety net for babies and impoverished mothers. Are you against murder? Can you give a straight answer to that? If you are against murder (a philosophical position), is it because you don't think people should have the ability to arbitrarily end another person's life? If so, then if a given fetus has the properties of a person, you should be against ending that fetus's life for any reason equal to a reason you would be against ending the life of a person who's already been born. That's what I'm asking you. What sets a "person" apart from a "non-person" for you, such that you apply a different set of ethics/morals to a "person" than you would to, say, a dog or a computer? Sapience? Intelligence? Humanity? Capability of writing editorials? What? If there's some part of your understanding of "fetus" that precludes "someone in there" then please say it explicitly. Collins: "A fetus is an animal or human being in its later stages of development before it is born." Merriam-Webster: " an unborn or unhatched vertebrate especially after attaining the basic structural plan of its kind specifically : a developing human from usually two months after conception to birth" What are you seeing in there that I'm not? Okay, if it doesn't matter if there's a soul or not, then that fetus clearly becomes a human being in all important physical aspects before birth, and rules regarding e.g. murder should start to apply at some point before birth. And then you'd be okay with restricting abortions? HALLELUJAH SOMEBODY ON THIS BOARD GETS IT! Er, sorry for the interruption, got excited. Carry on. Doesn't have to be a soul. Whatever set of emergent property/ies that you think separates us from other animals, such that a human life/soul has more "value" than a non-human life/soul. Is that set sufficiently present before birth? I suspect it probably is. I think killing people unnecessarily is bad. That's all it should take, for me. It would be nice if they did, wouldn't it? I don't know. What has this to do with me being against killing a viable fetus? I'm not against abortion when the fetus isn't viable. I guess I didn't mention that already. Sorry. No, the thousands of years of domestication, plus the individual fact of ownership, plus my big ol' smart brain that understands the dangers of the world far better than they ever can, says I have stewardship over my dogs, and I will take it seriously. And maybe in the future, when veterinary science is advanced, there will be no practical reason to euthanize dogs for e.g. a case of cancer, because cancer is no longer a death sentence for the dog, nor is treatment burdensomely expensive for the owner. Seriously, so many pets get put down not because treatment is $$$$$, but because the owner is poor and can't afford a few hundred dollars And stewardship, to keep the air clear, is about taking good care of what you're entrusted with. It's not a blank check to do whatever you feel like doing.
It's literally called a right in the same document that refers to the right to bear arms. Why am I not surprised you can't comprehend that?
You are conflating the Continental Army, which von Stueben oversaw the training of, with regional and local militias, which he didn't. The Swamp Fox had success in guerilla warfare, but over and over again the militia broke in the mainline of battle. This is why Washington despised them. Later on they actually even made battle plans counting on that to entrap british forces that would pursue the routed militias. This romanticization of the militia has no place in real history. Funny then that you didn't know that the 6th amendment was a right in the Constitution for courtroom trials. And no, not every country went through warfare to gain their rights. Anyone who says so is just repeating blind propaganda. Dogma. India of course is the obvious example, but so did Costa Rica, almost all of the former Warsaw Pact nations, Suriname, Macedonia. You need organization, but there have been numerous cases where political pressure have allowed countries to gain independence from oppressors or create new states from others. Keep an eye on Scotland as what probably will be yet another example coming up. Which explains why the South is a free and independent state, right? They had the right to bear arms, and quite frankly were better at using them. The NRA was created to rectify that gap for Northern states, and led by Union generals in its first days. Dogma. Dogma. And blind unquestioning dogma. Yet the 1st US congress passed a law stating that all able bodied men MUST purchase guns, ammo, and a knapsack in order to serve in the militia, which was also mandatory. 2nd Militia Act of 1792. Guess they didn't get the memo that rights can't be obligations. Did I mention your dogma needs work?
They always like to argue that the 2nd Amendment protects people and rights more than the others. Fucking please--the 4th-6th Amendments have protected exponentially more people than the 2nd Amendment. There isn't even any question about it, we have centuries of evidence. @Lanzman argues from a place of obvious delusion and ignorance of reality.
So you keep asserting. But plenty of other countries have basically the same freedoms that are granted by the other amendments, with much stronger gun control laws. So your bumper-sticker aphorism doesn't seem to be backed up by facts.
Tell that to the French resistance circa 1940s or the American colonies circadian 1776 or any other resistance/revolution of the past.
The rights enumerated by some of the other amendments have existed for a long time without the rights enumerated by the 2nd Amendment (including many other modern, better functioning democracies which do not have the same rights enumerated by the 2nd Amendment). I would like to see what evidence you have for your statement.
You speak of war, not government. War is not a right enumerated to the people. When has anyone ever used the 2nd Amendment to defend their freedom of speech? Right to a jury trial?
Especially since the current understanding of the 2nd Amendment -- that an individual generally has the right to own firearms for self-defense -- is a relatively modern thing.
Indeed. That interpretation has only existed for about a half century (give or take). Kinda funny that proponents of that interpretation came around at about the same time that a bunch of states started putting up Confederate statues, 50-100 years after the Civil War ended...............
At the same time, it should be pointed out that the existence of the 2nd Amendment, even in its current context, has done exactly fuck all to protect such rights as the right to not be convicted of a crime you didn't commit, the right to not be gunned down by the cops when innocent of any apparent crime and posing no threat (and specifically in at least one case, when responsibly exercising your 2nd Amendment rights), your right to an attorney when facing serious criminal charges, your right to not be discriminated against because of your race, religion, gender, etc. In many cases, those rights are compromised on the regular despite the existence of the 2nd Amendment. In most, the rights were created and maintained by legislation and the courts, and have nothing to do with being kept in place for fear of an uprising of people armed with guns.
Interesting take. But legally, that interpretation of the 2nd amendment has only existed in the US as a whole for 13 years, since Heller.
To clarify, I believe that interpretation started being pushed in the last 50 years, no? It wasn't the actual SCOTUS interpretation until recently.
How does this happen without resulting to bearing arms? And don't tell me the second amendment didn't exist at the time. When the government over steps and starts violating our rights, eventually the guns are going to come out. Tell me another way to secure a free state because I can't think of one.
You don't have Trump wanabe's in waiting in your government that could easily dupe enough of your population to grant them enough power to make them Prime Minister? You're either extremely naive or extremely trusting in your politicians. Either one is extremely disturbing and I thought you were smarter than that. Thanks.
Both of these successful revolutions required the intervention of large standing militaries of other nations to be successful. And the political assumptions of military might in 1776 have absolutely nothing to do with modern realities. These days a soldier might not even need to get out of his chair to blow up a company of insurgents.
That doesn't mean they don't exist. How many free states are out there that don't have the second amendment? All but one, right? They have militaries, but that's not what the 2nd amendment means, is it?
And how did they do that, did they politely ask the British to go away and they complied or did it require bearing arms?
The only Trump comparable we have is Maxime Bernier of the People’s Choice Party and he couldn’t even hold his own riding in the last election you dimwit Also Canadians just aren’t as stupid as Americans are. I’m sorry but it’s science
