Will We Follow the Rat-musicians for A New Gun Control Law? -- 12/09/1999
The Second British Invasion -- 3/21/00
The main premise, which the Founders put into the foundation of the Constitution
was that people will pursue their self-interests, and no "paper-barrier" (like a
law, or a bill of rights, or even a constitution) would be a sufficient check on
those self-seeking individuals, unless their interests would match and a major
interest that defines the ruling majority would emerge.
And what is the major interest of ours? What is that glue that unites the
majority of us into a great society? Isn't it a self-preservation? And if it is
so, then, is the hand-gun not the "great equalizer" that can equate the power of
the biggest man and the smallest woman, and preserve the latter from the former?
If this is true, then why do we so often check upon our ability to protect
ourselves? And from whom or from what? From the muggers? From the Russian
bureaucrats? From own bureaucrats? Or from the guns and cigarettes?
That is the question and that is probably from where all that whining and
screaming about "gun and drug violence" is derived as if the guns or drugs are
animated and can go around shouting us by themselves or can sit down and light
and inhale themselves. Those of us who seek self-preservation in the absence of
guns and drugs are either absentminded or just playing stupid. The third
possibility is that they are very shrewd and know precisely what they are doing
when they are black-mailing the "free" manufacturers of the "free" world.
I cannot help the first category of the people -- I am not a doctor. The third
category does not need my advice -- they think they know precisely where the
cheese is, and they follow their perverted interest like those rats that
followed the magic flute-player to their own extermination; so, my advice would
be considered only as another obstacle for them. Therefore, I can facilitate the
hard labor of learning only for those who are playing stupid or lazy-minded.
Leaving the question "from what should we protect ourselves?" to the nuts and
rats, I will try to answer the question, "from whom should we protect
ourselves?"
There were two main problems that the Founders solved so gloriously: 1) how the
bureaucrats could control and keep order between the commoners and among
themselves and 2) how the commoners could control the bureaucrats.
How could the bureaucrats control the commoners and themselves? The
self-interest that leads people to unite in the groups by an interest and strive
for a monopoly or the majority rule in this particular interest, if properly
harnessed by the appropriate constitutional (organizational) arrangement, would
provide a source of unity and stability of an open society, that would have a
plenty of different groups with competing interests which are the guarantee of
liberty for all. This harnessing was to be accomplished by dividing the branches
of any organization (including the federal bureaucracy) among many bureaucrats
and by giving them the necessary means and personal motives to resist
encroachments of others upon their domain. Thus self-interest could prevent one
group, one organization, from gathering all the political and economical power
into its hands.
By dividing power between the state bureaucracy and the federal bureaucracy, one
level of government can be a check upon the other. One group may come to
dominate a government (or its part or a corporation) at one time, and a
different group may dominate it at another time. The pulling and hauling among
these groups would prevent any group from dominating all of the bureaucracy.
How could the commoners control the bureaucrats? The proper way to keep the
bureaucrats in check while still leaving them strong enough to perform their
essential duty (to keep order between the self-seeking commoners) is to allow
the self-interest of any individual to check upon the self-interest of another
individual or organization. The real problem is how can an individual control an
organization (that is considerably stronger than he or she) without "keeping and
bearing Arms?"
The citizens who possess the Arms can physically assert their Rights, and not
only complain to the bureaucrats about a violation of their rights by those same
bureaucrats. The difference between those citizens who possess the arms and
those who only possess the right for the arms is the same difference as the
difference between practice and theory. An armed citizen can exercise his/her
rights, while a disarmed commoner can only moan and whine into the vest of a
bureaucrat.
Gun control advocates usually emphasize the first part of the 2nd Amendment - "A
well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State..." -
which tells us only about a right of the state bureaucrats to resist the
encroachments of the federal bureaucrats upon their local domain. However, the
second part - "...the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be
infringed" - tells us that our right to resist the unlawful actions of anybody,
either a bureaucrat or another commoner, "shall not be infringed" neither by
that bureaucrat nor by that commoner.
Failing to divert our attention from the second part of the 2nd Amendment, the
gun control advocates go on to argue about scholastic interpretations of
"defensive and offensive (assault) weapons;" but, and on this ground, their il-logic
failed to overcome the common sense, which tells us that even a fork or a frying
pan can be an assault weapon under certain circumstances.
The liberals usually do not buy the argument of the ex-Nazis, that the latter
were only the instrument and had to execute the Jews in order not to be executed
themselves. These liberals would cry foul, with the lather around their mouths,
about the "free will" and "responsibility for the deeds of any adult and sane
individual". However, when the same liberals stumble about the gun control
issue, their right hand wouldn't know what their left hand is doing. The
liberals usually forget about their previous rationale and would try to saddle
their ir-rational horse. If those German Jews wouldn't have listened to the
liberals back then and wouldn't have exchanged their guns for toys, they would
probably be alive today. But there is no reason for us to jump on the liberal
band-wagon, which is going nowhere but Tartar.
Retrospectively, from British history, the right to bear arms was widely
accepted in the 18th century and having been recognized in the British common
law since before the Norman Conquest in 1066. Not only were the Brits allowed to
possess arms, they were required to do so because Britain depended on the
citizen's militia for its defense. Then, in 1328, when the threat from outside
was diminished, Parliament placed limits on the right. The early restrictions
were very innocent, like the prohibition to carry weapons in public, but,
gradually, the bureaucrats had restricted gun ownership to themselves,
leaving the commoners unarmed. The Stuart kings further limited gun ownership,
allowing only their supporters to possess weapons. And you know what kind of
oppressions then followed.
The Founders conceived the armed citizenry as a necessary bar against tyranny
from without, as well as from within; they saw the right to keep and bear arms
as the material basis, on which the ideological basis (free speech) of the free
citizenry can be founded for the centuries to come. On the contrary, the first
decree of the Russian communistic bureaucrats was a decree about disarmament of
the citizens. Any person, in whose possession was found an unlicensed fire-arm
was to be punished by imprisonment or exile to Siberia for 10 to 20 years. There
was no requirement for a warrant, and a slight suspicion of such possession was
enough to ruin a commoner's life. Then, as you may know, came Orwell's 1984.
Statistics is a stubborn thing, and according to it, for the past two centuries
the Americans lost 1.5 million people, because they had the guns; for the 80
years of the communistic regime, the Russians lost 50 million -- 12 million on
the battlefields and the rest in the GULAG, because the Russian commoners had no
guns to curb own bureaucrats. In the 20th century, the world lost 30 million on
the battlefields and 150 million to their own bureaucrats.
To have... or not to have a gun, you decide, and that will be your price of the
ticket to Freedom, but know that the bureaucrats and their Rat-musicians always
try to sell it to the highest bidder, and those commoners who have the guns are
always the customers and those who have not -- are always the commodities (what
slaves are).
12/09/1999
The Brits and the rest of the European liberals have long planned how to take
over the world. The implementation of their imperialistic plan consists of three
stages: 1) to take control over Europe; 2) to take control over North America;
and 3) to take control over the rest of the world. Each of these stages consists
of three phases, which can intertwine and go along with each other: a) to repeal
the constitutional right of the minority to carry arms in order to protect their
rights against the possible abuses of the majority; b) to take control over the
firearms industry; and c) to disarm all of the citizens, except the bureaucrats.
By the year 1996, the European liberals were largely in control over the vast
majority of European countries and could fearlessly transfer the gist of their
efforts onto American soil, where they have had their own fifth column since the
1930's.
From the times of FDR, the Democratic establishment has been jealously
eyeballing gun owners and the Second Amendment right of Americans as the main
obstacle to their total control over the country. In April of 1999, the
Democratic establishment and the Clinton-Gore administration identified
explicitly their archenemy as "another culture in our country that … has gotten
confused about its objectives, (the) huge hunting and sport shooting culture in
America." Thereafter, they openly declared war on American gun owners.
In March of 2000, the Democratic establishment tasted the first fruit of their
efforts, when Smith & Wesson, Inc. (S&W) became the first in the firearms
industry that surrendered to their mercy. The British-based Corporation, TOMKINS
PLC, is the owner of S&W, and it would like to sell its American subsidiary to
the highest bidder because the executives at Tomkins PLC expect that America
will soon follow the European lead.
The subjects of the Britain crown have no Second Amendment right and are barred
from owning handguns and many long guns, which might protect them from the
potential abuses of the bureaucracy. The same story applies to the vast majority
of other European counties, in which the liberal establishment is firmly ruling
over its subjects, without giving them any guarantee against their own potential
abuses of power. Consequently, the executives at Tomkins PLC guess that to be a
government supplier of handguns would hardly be a profitable business,
therefore, S&W should be sold wholesale to the highest bidder as soon as
possible. Meanwhile, the executives of S&W retail our Second Amendment right to
the Democratic establishment.
On March 17, the CEO of S&W, Ed Schultz signed chicken-heartedly an agreement
with the Departments of the Treasury and Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to
put gun locks on their firearms in exchange for which the latter dropped their
frivolous lawsuits against the company. Although Schultz likes to say that he is
not "willing to be a pawn in a political chess game," by signing this sweeping
compact with the liberal bureaucrats, Schultz has become precisely that. His
British employers manipulated him into executing a "settlement" with the
Clinton-Gore administration that is unjust and unfair to the American public and
to democracy all around the globe.
The very next day after the settlement, the Secretary of HUD, Andrew Cuomo and
the liberal mayors of Atlanta, Detroit and Miami promised to Schultz to twist
their procurement policies and purchase only S&W's guns. Yet the agreement
dispenses with only a third of the municipal lawsuits, and binds only two
federal agencies and two state attorney generals from filing future frivolous
suits. The remaining city suits were not affected by this agreement. Moreover,
other state and federal agencies can continue to use the frivolous lawsuits as a
giant vacuum cleaner, with which they can suck out without retaliation the rest
of freedoms of the firearms industry, including Smith & Wesson. Schultz's action
appalled some members of the gun industry and perplexed others. The latter,
though knowing that the appeasement strategy is doomed to failure, are bluntly
consider joining the capitulation of the Brits.
When the liberal bureaucrats dry out the firearms industry by extorting and
bribing the separate agreements from each company, then they will easily repeal
the Second Amendment from the American Constitution. Thereafter, they can
transfer their attention to the third phase of the second stage of their assault
on democracy – the complete disarmament of American public.
The Republican lawmakers and law-abiding citizens should be outraged at this
British invasion into our legislative process. However, the liberal media
silences the voices of the conscious patriots. That is why the Democrats have
been singing and dancing on the White House lawn lately.
The liberals are cheerful because the Brits not only gave away their own rights,
but are also trying to influence the rights of licensed American gun dealers and
law-abiding gun owners. Of course, making a smoke screen, the liberal media has
been locking on formalities -- gun locks and serial numbers. However, the
essence of the problem – the right of the citizens to bear arms -- was, as
usual, unreported; and that will have a direct impact! on everyone from the gun
maker to the consumer. Moreover, as usual for the liberal gun control schemes,
only the criminals will remain unaffected.
Details of the agreement that affect law-abiding citizens include rationing gun
sales, mandatory testing and bureaucratic mandates of capricious changes to gun
design. The Brits have also pledged to control certain behaviors of licensed gun
dealers, which they cannot enforce. It is more likely than not that the
Clinton-Gore administration will not enforce the nation's tough federal gun laws
after this agreement, as it did not enforce them before. Nor does this agreement
prevent the bulk of existing frivolous lawsuits or threats of such from other
state and federal agencies. It means that the liberals will continue their
tactics of demanding more gun control laws while not enforcing them. Moreover,
when violence with firearms, instigated by them, will continue, they can say
that the laws do not work and it is necessary to get rid of them, all together,
including the Second Amendment. Then, because the abstract laws do not work, the
slogan will become: we must get rid off all the actual guns. Right, except those
of bureaucracy. The previous thought will be gossiping surreptitiously in the
liberal inner circles.
Meanwhile, distributors and dealers, who want to continue to sell the products
of S&W, will be forced to agree to a wish list of the liberal
gun-prohibitionists. The agreement that the liberal bureaucrats extorted from
S&W requires the latter to impose some prohibitions on themselves, sellers, and
buyers of S&W guns. S&W should thereafter enforce those prohibitions on its own.
Among such prohibitions to the buyers are:
No more than one handgun can be bought in a 14-day
period.
No firearm purchases allowed without passing an unspecified safety test
(inspection).
No firearm purchases allowed without meeting an arbitrary accuracy standard for
a self-defense handgun. With a view to severely hamper the production and
distribution of such guns.
People are prohibited, if under age 18, from even walking into the firearm
section of a sporting goods store unless accompanied by a parent or guardian.
Among the prohibitions to the sellers are:
No selling legal semi-automatic rifles, commonplace
ammunition magazines and firearms that do not meet the difficult standards
established by the liberal bureaucrats.
No selling firearms at any gun show where any legal private sale is conducted.
Distributors would be required to distribute
anti-gun propaganda with every firearm they sell. Such leaflets should be by
form -- in large boldface type, and by content -- that hundreds of children die
each year from firearm accidents. The White House spin-doctors would again
forget to inform the public that their statistical figures include the 16-18
year old juveniles who were killed in gang violence.
Distributors also would be required to carry $1 million in liability insurance
and to perform tasks that should be handled by law-enforcement, because the
liberal bureaucrats wish to receive salary from the people’s pocket. However,
they think that someone else should do their job of enforcing existing laws.
Any manufacturer, who would agree with the liberal bureaucrats and would cave in
under their pressure, would be prohibited from marketing firearms in a way that
appeals to young shooters and hunters. You tell me what way has no appeal to the
youngsters.
Any firearm manufacturer would be required to commit 1% of his annual revenues
to an anti-gun propaganda campaign. He also must support legislative efforts to
develop "smart" gun technology, and the so-called ballistic fingerprinting of
every firearm. All guns would have to meet certain unscientifically defined
design standards for handguns sold to civilians. Guns sold to the police and
army bureaucrats would be exempted from those standards. Such discrimination
betrays the true intent of the liberals -- not to make firearms safer or better,
but to impose capricious standards on the producers and sellers and set up the
phase for national firearm registration. The latter will be a prelude to the
elimination of all firearm sales to private citizens, their complete
disarmament, and the total tyranny of bureaucrats.
The true intent of the liberal bureaucrats can be traced through the deeds of
the Clinton administration, which have failed for eight years to prosecute the
violators of existing gun laws. For instance, a former Black Panther leader once
known as H. Rap Brown and now known as Al-Amin was not prosecuted for a gun
offense in 1995. In that year, Al-Amin was carrying an unlicensed handgun; he
was arrested in Atlanta after a man accused him in an attempted shooting. The
latter later recanted his accusations and all charges against Al-Amin were
dropped. Although Mr. Al-Amin violated the federal laws and the Clinton
administration could have locked him up in a federal penitentiary for ten years,
the federal bureaucrats refused to prosecute him.
The last week, Ricky Kinchen, a deputy sheriff in Fulton County, Georgia, and
another officer were gunned down when they tried to arrest Mr. Al-Amin for
another violation. The leaders of National Rifle Association (NRA) see a strong
correlation between a failure of the Clinton administration to enforce existing
gun laws and the premature death of one of the officers and the harsh wounds of
another.
The president and vice president of the NRA accused the Clinton-Gore
administration of neglecting their duties and the having blood of innocent men
and women on their hands. The press secretary of the White House was adamantly
denying that the administration has been negligent in enforcing gun laws. The
press secretary said that nobody believes that, "the president and vice
president are responsible for murders," and it is a "sick rhetoric" to accuse
them in such repugnant deeds. Concerning the fact that the administration
refused to prosecute Mr. Al-Amin for unlawful possession of a firearm, the press
secretary of White! House said that, "You probably need to talk to local
authorities [because] the vast majority of [such] prosecutions are done at the
state and local levels."
It is widely known that the local and state authorities do not prosecute a large
portion of such cases because of a lack of financial means for lengthy
litigations. Therefore, the locals tend to look to the federal authorities and,
if the latter would not pursue the matter, the former would drop it too. Because
the federal government is equipped better financially, it could and should
prosecute these cases, but it largely does not.
Therefore, the president of NRA, Mr. Heston, said on ABC's "This Week" that,
"Rap Brown would be in jail and that sheriff would still be alive… if the
Clinton administration had done its job properly."
Rebutting the NRA’s accusations, the White House spin doctor, Bruce Reed said
that federal prosecution of gun crime has risen 16 percent since Mr. Clinton
took office in 1993. However, the vice president of the NRA, Mr. LaPierre said
that federal prosecution of gun crime has dropped 50 percent since the Bush
administration.
A law professor of Yale University, John Lot, thinks that both men (Reed and
LaPierre) are correct. However, Mr. Reed failed to mention that federal
prosecution of gun crime has risen 16 percent for only the first two years of
the rule of the Clinton administration. For the following six years, it has
dropped more than 60 percent.
Taking into consideration the above mentioned facts, the Chairman of Senate
Judiciary Committee, a Republican from Utah, Orrin Hatch said he might strip gun
provisions from a juvenile-justice bill that has been stalled in the Senate for
months. The Clinton administration wants that this bill to include a 72-hour
waiting period for firearm purchases at gun shows. However, the Republican and
NRA leaders believe that 24 hours would be a sufficient time for a background
checking.
The National Rifle Association believes that a meaningful solution to present
problems in prosecuting the gun crimes should go along with the implementation
of the next measures:
Insist that schools be as safe as airports, with
gun-free schools and zero tolerance for violators of the Gun-Free School Zones
Act. Of 6,000 students caught at school with guns in the past 2 years, only 13
were federally prosecuted.
Adopt and fund Project Exile nationally, a zero-tolerance policy tested and
proven to immediately cut crime and save lives because every violent felon
caught with a gun goes to jail for 5 years, period. Provide $50 million for the
necessary investigators and prosecutors to implement Project Exile nationwide,
plus $25 million to build awareness of it.
Fund the Eddie Eagle® safety program, the most effective gun accident prevention
program in existence, for every elementary classroom in America. It has already
reached 11 million children, and gun accident rates are the lowest in history.
Restore full and permanent funding for the National Instant Check System. And
when a felon tries to buy a gun, prosecute him. None have been prosecuted in the
past 3 years.
Close the Hinckley loophole by making records of people adjudicated mentally
incompetent available to the National Instant Check System. Insanity like John
Hinckley's would not prevent a gun purchase today, because most mental records
are invisible to the system.
Stop ignoring lawbreakers who illegally provide guns to juveniles. Only 11 were
federally prosecuted in the past 2 years. Arrest them and lock them up.
Stop releasing juvenile criminals caught with guns. Only 11 were federally
prosecuted in the past 2 years.
Bar all juveniles convicted of violent felonies from owning guns for life.
Hold adults responsible for willfully and recklessly allowing access to
firearms.
Keep criminal records of violent juveniles open indefinitely, not expunged at 18
in the middle of a crime spree.
Stop ignoring easy access to firearms by convicted felons through straw
purchasers. Only 37 were federally prosecuted in the past 2 years.
Admit that Right To Carry works. Properly permitted citizens who pass the
background checks and training courses not only deserve that right but are a
proven deterrent to crime. Abuse is nonexistent. Though very few actually choose
to carry a gun, criminals do not know which few they are.
We believe in absolute adherence to the law at gun shows and will consider
instant checks there when, and only when, this Administration stops demanding
new gun taxes and stops illegally compiling and retaining the records of
millions of lawful gun buyers.
We support and encourage the distribution and use of safety locks, trigger
locks, gun safes or any voluntary means necessary and appropriate to keep
firearms away from, or inoperable by, those who shouldn't have them.
We oppose waiting periods because they constitute prior restraint upon the
law-abiding citizens. We oppose specified magazine capacities because the
behavior of criminals is not influenced by what the law says the law-abiding
citizens may carry that many bullets, magazines, guns, bombs or anything else.
We oppose one-gun-a-month schemes because once there is authority to say one,
there will eventually be authority to say none. Most importantly, none of these
proposals has any proven relationship to the criminal misuse of firearms.
The NRA has invested tens of millions of dollars
teaching childhood accident prevention, promoting firearm safety, educating
hunters, training police instructors, and funding the startup of Project Exile
around the country. This is far more than the federal government, the media
community, or other citizens' groups combined. The National Rifle Association
believes that more firearm legislation, which is passed with no intention of
enforcing it, is a dangerous fraud perpetrated upon the safety of the American
people.
All of the above mentioned measures that the NRA suggests to resolve gun crime
problems sound good and reasonable. However, they will likely fall on the deaf
ears of those Americans who believe such liberal propagandists as Chuck Schumer
and Barney Frank. The latter argue that guns are no better than cars, and
therefore, must be licensed and inspected as cars.
The liberals consider this argument the paramount of their logic. It is a pity,
but the Republicans could not offer, so far, a reasonable rebuttal to that
argument. Consequently, in public debates, the Republicans tend to evade direct
confrontation on this topic, thus losing the ground under their feet on the
entire Second Amendment issue.
The fallacy of the liberal association of guns with cars can be seen not from
the small frame of the Second Amendment, but from the big picture of the entire
Bill of Rights and Constitution. The Bill of Rights was created as a small list
of the most essential rights of any minority. Using these essential rights, a
minority can curb the potential abuses of the majority while still leaving the
latter strong enough to implement its main interest – to keep order between
citizens so that the society can survive.
In that end, guns are essential to society’s survival, and cars are not. That is
why the Framers of our Constitution did not mention any four-wheel vehicle as a
must have mean to preserve society. That is why all governmental inspections of
private guns and their licensing are unjust and unfair. Besides, licensing the
guns implies that the majority (with its bureaucracy) permits to minority to
have guns, but the minority already has such a license by the Second Amendment.
Why do we need a license upon a license? What is next, a license upon a license
upon a license? Therefore, the comparison of guns with cars is bogus and serves
no other purpose as to destroy the American society for the sake of the Global
Empire of the Liberals.
There already are 20,000 federal gun laws and regulations on the books. If those
laws have not made you feel safe by now, why do you think 20,001 laws will be
enough? Or is it just a placebo that bring you a temporal relieve from your
fear, which will certainly return tomorrow?
Instead of patching the archaic construction of gun control regulations, the
commoners should recognize that the multitude of them is the primary cause of
the current level of violence. This multitude of regulations, which can be
understood only a few highly paid lawyers, have made us and our children much
less safe -- by disarming law-abiding citizens and encouraging armed criminals
to take advantage of us. By definition, law-breakers do not obey laws. Hardened
criminals do whatever is necessary to evade identification and arrest. So, they
do not buy or register guns that can be traced; they simply steal them.
Therefore, the gun control laws do not apply to criminals or stop gun violence,
but they definitely multiply our bureaucracy and taxes. They simply make it much
harder for innocent people to defend themselves, thus encouraging criminals to
take advantage of us. Consequently, the commoners should level the ground,
repeal all those twisted and unnecessary super-structures of law, and return to
the fundamental principle of the 2nd Amendment.
Once more let's take a brief look at how the various kinds of gun control laws
jeopardize your safety.
Waiting period means that a woman being stalked will have to remain
defenseless for a few extra days. Can you guarantee her that she will be alive
and unhurt till the waiting period is over?
Background check for buyer should take no more time than the check of
his-her credit card, because no criminal wanted by law enforcement agencies is
going to buy a gun in a way that requires a background check, either through
credit or rap sheet reports. A criminal will rather steal a gun. So, the only
result of a buyer's background check (longer than the credit card check) is
inconvenience for law-abiding citizens.
Registration of hand-gun would achieve nothing positive, because
criminals won't register their guns. Only law-abiding citizens will register
their guns. So, if a registered gun, stolen from its owner in Los Angeles would
help a criminal to murder a woman in New York, how this information will hell
the police to catch that murderer? Your common sense should tell you that the
only reasonable scenario, where the registration will work, is the transitional
period from republican freedoms to monarchical tyranny. Only in this case
scenario, gun registration will help the bureaucrats to confiscate the means of
defense of the middle-class against armed to the teeth would-be tyrants.
Licensing of gun possession do not help find the predator, since
criminals do not lawfully buy guns. Such a licensing is simply a surreptitious
invasion of commoners' privacy by the bureaucrats.
Safety locks might prevent a child from accidentally firing a gun.
However, they also can slow you down when you need a gun in a hurry to defend
yourself. Imagine a woman attacked by a rapist in an elevator. Will you
guarantee her that she will manage to unlock her gun just in time? Do you
honestly believe that her assailant will have safely locked gun too?
Requiring guns to be locked up and kept out of reach of children means
direct invasion of your privacy, because such a requirement should be enforced
somehow. But the question is -- how? There are already other thousands of laws
about parental responsibility that cannot be enforced. Will the police invade
our houses periodically to verify that our guns are in safety boxes? If such
"inspections" make you puke, then, what is the point of such a law?
Banning some types of guns, as "assault" weapons or mortars, might seem
reasonable. The majority of the commoners do not need such weapons. However,
during most riots, the police have been outnumbered and have stayed away of
looting and vandalizing gangs. The Los Angeles Korean shop-keepers know it too
well, when the life savings of thousands of them were looted and more than 50 of
them paid the ultimate price. Suppose you are a small business owner and you
have little or no insurance because your store is in a poor and dangerous
section of town. How will you defend the store against a crowd of looters? With
a kitchen knife or a purse pistol? Or with an "assault" weapon?
If the commoners will limit themselves in the choice of weaponry, criminals will
still have them -- even if they have to smuggle them into America from Russia or
China. So, attempts to limit gun ownership will only increase the dependency of
commoners on the political bureaucrats, rather than to reduce crime. Then, what
is the point in self disarming?
The only effective crime policy is trying to have as few laws regulating the
ownership of guns as possible (because multiple laws on a subject are always
confusing) and prosecuting vigorously anyone who intrudes on a person's life or
property -- with or without arms (because even legs might be a weapon).
Disarmed citizens encourage crime and violence. Armed citizens prevent some
citizens to turn into criminals.
3/21/00
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Victor J. Serge created this page and revised it on 04/13/03