Delaware State News 5/8/19: A [Delaware state] Senate committee on Wednesday heard three bills that would ban “assault weapons,” criminalize magazines capable of holding more than 15 rounds and create a permitting process to buy a firearm.
I am so sick of hearing about the need for “common sense” and “rational” gun laws.
We either have a Second Amendment, or we don’t.
Think about the First Amendment for a moment. Do we place “common sense” and “rational” restrictions on free speech? I know some people would like to do so, but that’s a separate discussion. The point is: Most of us don’t apply this silliness about “common sense laws” to the First Amendment. Basically, you’re free to speak and think what you choose, on your time or property, so long as you don’t impose force or fraud on others.
So why can’t you be free to own a weapon of your choosing, with whatever number of rounds you choose, so long as you’re not a known criminal?
Remember: These laws are for law-abiding people. We’re talking about how to impose gun ownership limits on people who never have committed, and will never commit, a violent crime against another. They would never, ever use a weapon against another other than in self-defense, something that law enforcement is not always available to provide.
Banning guns completely, as most gun control advocates want, won’t make any of us safer. So how will these additional restrictions that will only be followed by law-abiding gun owners make any of us safer?
Whenever there’s a horrible crime involving a gun, existing laws related to permits, registration and the like were (by definition) broken. Slapping more restrictions on people who already follow the existing restrictions will do nothing to make us safer.
So why do politicians — in Delaware and elsewhere — continue to slap restrictions on peaceful and civilized gun owners? There can only be one reason. It’s control. Gun control is not about guns. Nor is it about violence. It’s simply about control. It’s just one more way for government authorities and officials to control us. Not to control criminals — but to control everyone. America’s founders understood this point. That’s why the Second Amendment is so high on the list of Bill of Rights — second only to the First Amendment, freedom of speech.
Communists, Nazis, or dictators of all stripes support gun control too. They’re not doing it to protect the innocent from violent harm. They’re doing it to protect themselves from losing power. That’s where we are in Delaware and the United States today. Half of our citizens, it seems, are prepared to give our state and federal government the powers accorded only to dictatorships.
You don’t have to love guns or even own a gun to oppose gun control. You only have to love liberty, freedom, individual rights and sovereignty over your life. If you don’t value these things, then maybe you shouldn’t be living in a free country. Go to Venezuela, Russia or Iran. They will happily shield you from your rights.
When government steps in and says, “You can defend your right to life with this number of bullets, but not with that number of bullets,” it’s no different than government stepping in and saying, “You can criticize this public official, but not that one.” Or, “You can talk about this subject, but you can’t talk about that subject.”
We don’t twist the concepts of “common sense” and rationality against the First Amendment that way, at least not yet. So why should we do it with the Second Amendment?
Wake up, snowflakes. The Bill of Rights is there for a reason. You eschew it at your peril.
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