| mrstickball said: fmc - AWB (Assault Weapons Ban) Various city-wide handgun/firearm bans They are quite common in the US - to ban all firearms in particular areas. You can argue as you like about the importance of one civil liberty over another, but the fact is, if guns are taken away, then it proves that other things can be taken, and vice versa. The removal of one liberty doesn't mean any less if it's taken away - guns or privacy. And my point about Iraq is that since they have a strong saturation of guns, it does make it easier for insurgents to fight. The same would go for any other country. Let me ask you this: If Bush would have continued to erode rights, how would you plan on fighting him and the government? Write them? Start a hunger strike? It's not like dictators really get dissuaded from such things. Look at Iran. You think that, for all their rioting, it has done any good? The military and police have been able to jail and rape whomever they wish because they know the populace won't fight them. |
I know, that it's a speciality of Arizona, that you can carry assault weapons with you.
The only thing I don't agree with you here is, that I simply don't think, that you could in theory fight the government with weapons, nor do I think you could fully succeed. Why's that?
1.) As mentioned above by others: the army and the secret service(s)
2.) Even more important the cause: do you really think that in modern society groups of one or more common interests could actually gather together and produce a coup d'etat? I'm talking about sweeping away a democratically elected government and retain one nation to be exact. I can't recall any examples (there might be some) in the last century, where the uproar came from the country itself without any military intervention or help from outside.
3. )Following to 2.: As you know, every political view just be it pure existance creates a contra product. Muslim Fundamentalism is an answer to our western culture spreading out in the world, etc. If some people would try to get rid of a government there will always people there as well who fight for the government. May it be either they profit from the governments action or they think it's just doing the right thing. This might lead to a civil war, which is in Iraq one of the mayor problems.
This 3.) point actually might apply to Iran as well. There even more, because how ridiculous it might look for us - the majority (or if they really faked the elections at least many people) think, that the government there is doing a good job(and sorry just by that it's not a dictaturship).
Keep in this special case in mind: If you look at New York, your biggest city voted more than 3:1 for Kerry in 2004 (source: http://www.vote.nyc.ny.us/pdf/results/2004/general/g2004recaps.pdf ) Teheran is the New York of Iran for that matter.
So, again in the highly theoretically case, that people stand up and take their arms to get rid of the government this leads to a civil war. And that's what your founding father surely didn't have in mind. You could go further and think about, what a civil war in the USA would cause worldwide, but that takes it too far^^
Just to make more points directly towards your question - there would have been one point, where the population really would have gathered together and that would have been the point where, he would've changed your system from a democracy into a dictatorship. But I really believe, that your checks and balances still work. You might not agree on everything a government does, but you're always free to promote the opposite in a democracy. That's why Obama won with a slogan called change. If you like that specific change or not - he's without a doubt an answer to the Bush years and therefore, what I wrote in 2.)
I'm going to bed now, but it would be great to have further discussions with you on this matter tomorrow.
