maestro pistolero
New member
With advance permission from Antipitas, I would like to re-open this thread with a caveat: The comments must be specifically related to criteria under which weapons should be deemed dangerous, and unusual.
There were some excellent responses in the first thread, and some off topic commentary that led to thread lock. Frankly, I share some of the blame with an insightful comment about making potato chips with a tater gun. It would be particularly interesting for any lurking legal eagles to jump on board here. Is the the simple argument I make here compelling, logical, and arguable in court?
For convenient reference, here is the opening salvo:
There were some excellent responses in the first thread, and some off topic commentary that led to thread lock. Frankly, I share some of the blame with an insightful comment about making potato chips with a tater gun. It would be particularly interesting for any lurking legal eagles to jump on board here. Is the the simple argument I make here compelling, logical, and arguable in court?
For convenient reference, here is the opening salvo:
The phrase 'dangerous and unusual weapons' ought to be generally interpreted as weapons that rise above the efficacy of small arms. Dangerous and unusual means grenades, mortars, RPG's. etc. on up the dangerous scale.
Here's why I think this to be true.
Dangerous and unusual cannot generally include small arms, because in reality, any one of them is nearly as dangerous as the next. A head shot from any small arm, in any caliber, is predictably lethal. Hit a major artery with a .22 long rifle and it's a life threatening matter. For the distinction 'dangerous and unusual weapons' to be meaningful, the threshold for dangerous and unusual must rise significantly above the basic level of danger present in any small arm.
We don't need to classify our handguns, pistols, and shotguns beyond the category of small arms. One possible exception could be F/A, although I'm not convinced that F/A small arms ought not be covered under some set of criteria. In other words allowable, but with a higher degree of training, etc.
Perhaps we ought to be prepared to acknowledge, that F/A could rise to the top of the permissible list in terms of performance, and may require a higher level of scrutiny as to who is not disqualified from keeping them, how they are stored, what level of training and background check may be required. But banning F/A totally, so that no-one can have them under ANY circumstances, falls outside of 2A, because it eliminates their use for the security purpose of the amendment. (Which Nordyke re-invigorated in dicta)
Terrorists on our soil would almost certainly not concern themselves with an F/A ban, putting the citizenry at a disadvantage. The purpose and effectiveness of 2A, in that scenario, would be undermined by an outright F/A ban.
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