A Usenet persona calling itself KMAN wrote:


Gun registries have nothing to do with that. They have no purpose or
effect
other than to provide a mechanism for eventual confiscation. They don't
prevent crime, they don't identify criminals, they don't track the
location
of guns. They merely identify who is the putative "owner" of the gun and
where the gun might likely be located at some point. The ONLY potential
benefit to a gun registry is that it might, in the odd case, allow a
stolen
gun to be returned to its rightful owner. However, it's usually more
efficient and less costly to simply wait for an owner who has had a gun
stolen to report it to the police, whereupon the serial number and
description is entered in the national stolen property database.

It's sophistry to suggest that universal gun registration is intended only
to facilitate the return of stolen guns.

It has the same intended effect as an automobile registry. It's a list. What
more do you want it to do? Dive in front of bullets?!?

I'd like for there to be some legitimate reason to collect and retain the
data beyond providing a tool for confiscation that this list could actually
accomplish. What do you see its purpose as? How does it enhance gun safety?
How does it prevent criminals from illegally obtaining guns? What,
precisely, is its purpose?



How do you imagine it
differs from the registration of cars?

The government has no intention of confiscating cars.

Cars do get taken away from people who aren't supposed to have them, and
I
believe the fact that cars are registered enables this in many cases.

Almost never. Cars in the possession of those who aren't supposed to have
them are seized based on the direct observation of the police that the
occupant is doing something wrong.

Geezus, then I guess we should scrap the idea of registering automobiles
too!

Are you fighting against that at present?

No, because there is no constitutionally prohibition on the infringement of
the right to keep and drive a car. That's not the case with guns. They have
a higher level of protection against government interference.


Gun registries have no purpose other than giving authorities information
on
where to go to gather up gun when they are eventually banned. Nor can you
actually state a legitimate reason for gun registries. At best you can
provide specious analogies.

The purpose of a gun register is to assign a registration number to a gun
and match it up to who the owner is supposed to be.

For what purpose? Why is the government interested in who owns what gun?
What possible difference does it make if I own one gun or twenty, so long as
I do so legally? The answer is that there is no legitimate government
objective to be achieved by registering guns. The only possible reason is to
provide a tool for future confiscation and gun owner harassment, much like
is taking place in Canada, Britain, Australia and elsewhere.

I note that even you cannot explicate a rational reason for collecting this
information. Your argument boils down to "because it's there." Not good
enough.

Can you buy them there like you're "buying a pack of gum?"

There are some minor inconveniences, but if you can handle opening a bank
account, you won't be dettered by the process of getting a gun.

Well, there you go. You were lying, and you've been caught lying and now
you're trying to weasel out of your lie.

ROFL. I was not lying.

Certainly you were. Or, you're just a moron. Which is it?

I had no intent to deceive an obvious genius like
yourself, Scotty, into thinking that the purchase of guns and gum were
identical processes.

Except that precisely what you said: "You can buy a wicked assault weapon
like you are buying a pack of gum." You lie.


It's easy to buy a gun. That was the point of the obvious employment of
humour regarding the gum.

Backpedaling evasion.



Why are assault weapons needed?

It's not a Bill of Needs, it's a Bill of Rights. Besides, "assault
weapons"
are the civilian equivalent of military arms, and as I've said before, one
of the primary purposes of the 2nd Amendment is to ensure that the whole
populace is armed with military-capable arms.

Why are assault weapons needed?

Asked and answered.


I was pointing out that a lot of people have trouble with some basic
tasks
in life, and I'm not comforted by the idea of those same people walking
around with guns making decisions on whether or not to blow someone
else's
brains out.

Your statement is patently false and deliberately defamatory. The fact is
that "a lot of people" don't have problems with daily tasks, only a very
small number do, and if they are truly mentally impaired, they generally
aren't issued CCW permits.

I'm not talking about clinically impaired.

I'm talking about the tens of millions of folks who have trouble driving at
an appropriate speed and maintaining a reasonable level of personal debt
(other examples could follow, but hopefully you get the point.)

I don't want those same people, in the middle of their cell phone
conversation while giving the finger to the driver next to them, making a
decision about blowing someone's head off.

Once again, this is specious claptrap. You presume wrongly that merely
because someone possesses a gun that they will inevitably become berserk
killers. Problem is that you're just wrong. The vast majority of people
would no sooner randomly and for no reason shoot someone than they would
randomly and for no reason deliberately drive their car into a crowd
standing at a bus stop.

Cars get used to commit murder all the time. Much more frequently than
guns.

Evidence to support this bizarre assertion?!!?

Every DUI-caused death is a murder. Every crash caused by deliberate
negligence is a murder. Someone does something they aren't supposed to do,
and somebody else dies. Happens all the time in cars, and lots of people are
convicted and sentenced to prison for murder or manslaughter for killing
someone with a car, many more than are convicted and sentenced to prison for
shooting someone with a gun.


The point is, however,
that merely possessing a tool that can be used to kill does not magically
turn people into raving homicidal maniacs, as much as you might like it to
be so to suit your anti-gun agenda.

An idiot with a gun is a lot more dangerous than an idiot with a jacknife.

Which falsely presumes that the majority of people are idiots.


Your wife has a vagina, which allows
her to turn into a prostitute quite easily.

ACtually, being a prostitute has very little to do with having a vagina.

Statistically speaking, the vast majority of prostitutes are females, but
again you miss the point.

The point was stupid.

Not at all. It just destroyed your argument, and you can't defend yourself,
so you dismiss it.
I hope and pray that I'll never be called upon to draw my gun,
much less shoot someone with it. That doesn't mean that I can't or won't
if
it's necessary to do so. That's the difference between us. You are a moral
coward who wouldn't lift a finger to help someone in need

It doesn't sound like you've ever actually done much to help people in need.

How would you know? You wouldn't, but you'll be insulting anyway just
because you're intellect is not up to the task of arguing rationally.

whereas I'm
willing to put my life on the line, just as Wilson did, to protect those
who
cannot protect themselves.

I'm willing to take daily action to help people rather than engage in grand
delusions about being a gun-toting superhero.

One does not preclude the other.


You really sound like a pathetic loser when you talk about this.

Coming from the likes of you, I take it as high praise.


Not everyone
has to carry a gun in order to be responsible or courageous.

Quite right. Nor is anyone required to do so. What's really reprehensible
is
when you advocate PREVENTING people who wish to do so from doing so. When
you do that, you take direct moral responsibility for their complete
safety,
and if they get hurt because your advocacy supported their disarmament,
their blood is on your hands.

I'll I've asked so far is why it assault weapons are needed.

It's not a Bill of Needs, it's a Bill of Rights, and I've explained it to
you numerous times. You choose to ignore that information.


I don't like gun culture.

Well, they don't like you, so I guess you're even...except that they have
guns and you do not.


I think gun nuts like you are scary freaks.

The only people who need to be scared of me are criminals. If the shoe fits,
wear it.


But I haven't done a thing to try and take away your guns. Unless you happen
to have an assault rifle, in which case I think that's nutty and you don't
need to have one and should not have the option.

Well, that's why you're a Canadian slave-boy and I'm a free American.


The police here
don't feel that their safety is on the line because citizens don't all
carry
weapons around.

What the police feel about is is not relevant.

The police were relevant to you a while ago when you said I was being unfair
by expecting them to do all the gun work for me.

Different issue.


They are public servants, and
if one of the things they have to get used to is that law-abiding citizens
may be armed, so be it.

LOL. Their lives are on the line every day, they carry guns.

Yup.

I think the
fact that they don't think having ordinary citizens like you walking around
waiting to shoot people is a good idea carries more weight with me that your
idiotic ramblings.

Whatever. Wear your chains however you wish.


Fact is that on occasion, armed citizens come to the defense of officers
who
are being attacked and not infrequently save their lives. That's what
Wilson
did just the other day, and he died doing so.

The police here don't want that, and don't feel it makes the community
safer.

They are enamored of their own opinions. Down here, the police work for us,
we don't do obesience to them as our masters and superiors like you do up
there in Canada.


In fact, quite the opposite, their lives are at greater risk
were they carrying out their duties in a gun culture full of gun nuts
like
you.

Nope. They are far safer, in fact. And most line cops down here know that
full well. The major objectors to CCW are police administrators who are
trying to curry favor with anti-gun politicians.

There's no such political action up here, the cops don't want it because
they know it makes the community more dangerous.

Except, of course, that they are wrong. They just don't like the
competition. They want to feel like they, and only they are in charge.


Your tired "cops blood will be running in the gutters if we legalize CCW"
argument is noxiously false. It's simply a lie.

The cops don't want it. I'll go with their view over yours.

Again, that's why you're a Canadian slave and I'm a free American.


I know you'd like to think that¹s what I think, but in reality you are
just
trying to insult me because you have no cogent argument to make. So, I'll
respond in kind, just out of principle: Go **** yourself.

I bet you'd like to pull your gun on me right now eh?

Don't be silly, of course not. You aren't even very annoying much less
dangerous.

Interesting. All because I don't want to walk around with a gun.

No, because you demean and denigrate those law-abiding citizens (like
me...and there are millions like me) who choose to be armed, even when
they
make the ultimate sacrifice trying to protect others.

They may have delusions of grandeur that lead them to believe that is what
they are doing but that thinking is just as nutty as the preacher on the
corner keeping them out of hell.

You really are deranged.

--
Regards,
Scott Weiser

"I love the Internet, I no longer have to depend on
friends, family and co-workers, I can annoy people WORLDWIDE!" TM

© 2005 Scott Weiser