funny comment today, your thoughts?

R

Radiki

New member
Before I say what happened. Please understand that I am not trying to start an Iraq war debate, but I was playing devil's advocate... anyways,

I was having a conversation with a friend who I know from previous conversations believes we can't win in Iraq, thinks Obama will fix everything and thinks the government should handle all problems. Anyways, we were talking about the 2A and he used the argument, that I am sure we all have heard at some point or another, that there would be no way for the people to fight the government since they have all the planes, tanks, etc. so there is no reason anymore for people to have guns. I was about to get into a deep argument trying to take the statement and tear it apart. But it occurred to me that he was contradicting himself. So I said, "If a few armed people can't stop the might of the US Military, then how can a few thousand insurgents be kicking our ass in Iraq with nothing more that some AK-47's and some homemade bombs?"

Now like I said, my beliefs aside, he would have to either retract his previous statements about Iraq or the statement he just made about a few people holding back a military. He just stood there speechless. I think he realized that one of his statements was absurd, if not both, but you could almost see in his eyes, he didn't know which one to defend. I was quite amused. I still haven't gotten a response from him on the subject.

Anyways, has anyone else caught someone in their own argument?
 
I would point out that it is more practical nowadays as crime deterrent or self defense. You are thousands of times more likely to be harmed or killed by a thug than terrorists or the gov't going nuts and attacking us. And the police are not your personal bodyguards so it is up to you. Personal defense and maybe hunting, those have been critical needs for firearms since before the revolution.
 
Let's be honest though, if the United States military really "brought it" those insurgents with IEDs and AK-47's would not stand a chance. And there would be a lot more dead civilians. And it's the risk to civilians keeping the military in check over there.

In the ultimate paranoid SHTF scenario (which i do not buy into), the government would totally turn on the people. In which case they wouldn't care about civilian casualties and it wouldn't matter how many AR15's you owned - you'd be toast just like everyone else.

When Ike ignored the German civilians the allies firebombed Dresden and destroyed over 90% of the city.

When Truman ignored the civilians we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

It's not the insurgents holding us back in Iraq, it's politics. (In good conscience I must add that I am not advocating the killing of innocent civilians.) But again, if the US military was really bringing it with no regard for politics or civilians, the insurgents wouldn't be a problem.

With all due respect, your argument is just as flawed as the other guy's.
 
With all due respect, your argument is just as flawed as the other guy's
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cxg231, you've got to remember, we've already done what we set out to do. We took out a blood thirsty dictator. What we didn't plan on was a bunch of insurgents who really have nothing to do with Iraq coming in to play just trying to prove a point. Being financed by that great mental midget Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, just trying to prove they can beat the great beast America. Anyway, back to the main point,
:D Good job.
 
Let's be honest though, if the United States military really "brought it" those insurgents with IEDs and AK-47's would not stand a chance. And there would be a lot more dead civilians. And it's the risk to civilians keeping the military in check over there.

In the ultimate paranoid SHTF scenario (which i do not buy into), the government would totally turn on the people. In which case they wouldn't care about civilian casualties and it wouldn't matter how many AR15's you owned - you'd be toast just like everyone else.

When Ike ignored the German civilians the allies firebombed Dresden and destroyed over 90% of the city.

When Truman ignored the civilians we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

It's not the insurgents holding us back in Iraq, it's politics. (In good conscience I must add that I am not advocating the killing of innocent civilians.) But again, if the US military was really bringing it with no regard for politics or civilians, the insurgents wouldn't be a problem.

With all due respect, your argument is just as flawed as the other guy's.
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Seems to me that Radiki simply highlighted a glaring contradiction in that guy's thinking more than putting forth a flawed argument. It's most definitely not the case that very poorly armed and trained insurgents(comparatively) are defeating the US military anywhere. They're defeating the public very nicely though.

It's worth noting that short of carpet nuking Iraq, indiscriminate use of firepower will not win the war. Germany was pounded by air raids for over 2 years and it still took ground troops invading Germany to make them give up. More or less the same with Japan, except the 2 atom bombs convinced Hirohito that the US was a) truly capable of destroying Japan and the Japanese and b) willing to finish the proceedings, so why not give up? Maybe the ground troops wouldn't round up every Japanese and put them to death.

I'm pretty sure that a US Gov't run amok setting off airburst nukes over recalcitrant areas in the US will either have nothing left worth governing, or disintegrate in short order. More or less the same with sending squadrons of B-52s packed with hundreds of 2,000 lb bombs to pound rebellious urban areas because a few guys with AR-15s think the gov't is wrong.

ETA: That makes my sig line pretty ironic, doesn't it?
 
Guns are of limited utility in defending against government utility, especially the type of guns we are allowed to have in the US.

If it ever comes to fighting our own government, we would do well to remember the strategy of the insurgents in Iraq, which is basically the same strategy we used during the Revolution against England. Hit and run, guerilla style warfare, augmented today by the use of IED's.

Your semi-auto AR would be best left in the safe.
 
Anyways, we were talking about the 2A and he used the argument, that I am sure we all have heard at some point or another, that there would be no way for the people to fight the government since they have all the planes, tanks, etc. so there is no reason anymore for people to have guns.
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Your friend's interpretation of the 2A is based on the false assumption that the 2A covers only those situations where the populace must protect itself from its own government. But the 2A doesn't say that. It says: "necessary to the security of a free State".

Back when the 2A was adopted, individual states faced a variety of threats to their security, both internally and externally, such as foreign invasions, potential attack by other states, attacks by Indians, and criminal activity within the state. All of these things threatened the internal and external security of each state.

The Founding Fathers wrote the 2A to apply to these threats. And while the specific threats have changed, such as England no longer being an enemy, the need to protect against these threat classes has not. The Founding Fathers understood that specifics change but human nature doesn't, so the 2A covers a variety of threat classes rather than specific threats. Many of the Founding Fathers were lawyers who appreciated the need for flexibility in the law to handle a variety of circumstances.

Your counter to your friend was excellent, but keep (and bear) in mind that his perspective covers only a very narrow slice of the broad 2A spectrum. Liberals seek to limit the 2A to that very narrow slice so as to claim the changing times have made the 2A obsolete, but they are much mistaken, and their argument makes about as much sense as the 1A applying only to political speech contrary to the King of England. Of course, we know that's wrong because the 1A doesn't limit itself in that manner, and similarly the 2A doesn't likewise limit itself either. The 2A is as equally valid today as it was back in the 1700s.
 
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This poor drone is so brainwashed that if Hillary and Obama came to his house and shot his dog, he would blame it on a right-wing conspiracy.
 
Anyways, has anyone else caught someone in their own argument?
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I used the same argument on a guy at GunDebate.com................. it shut him up.

cxg231 Let's be honest though, if the United States military really "brought it" those insurgents with IEDs and AK-47's would not stand a chance. And there would be a lot more dead civilians. And it's the risk to civilians keeping the military in check over there.

In the ultimate paranoid SHTF scenario (which i do not buy into), the government would totally turn on the people. In which case they wouldn't care about civilian casualties and it wouldn't matter how many AR15's you owned - you'd be toast just like everyone else.

When Ike ignored the German civilians the allies firebombed Dresden and destroyed over 90% of the city.

When Truman ignored the civilians we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

It's not the insurgents holding us back in Iraq, it's politics. (In good conscience I must add that I am not advocating the killing of innocent civilians.) But again, if the US military was really bringing it with no regard for politics or civilians, the insurgents wouldn't be a problem.

With all due respect, your argument is just as flawed as the other guy's.
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Do you really think ANY United States Government could use the US Military as club to beat down the civilian population in an all out war? Really? I've heard to many military guys, Officer and Enlisted, refer to their Oath of Enlistment, with its "all enemies, both foreign and domestic" clause when any mention is made of the .gov using them to keep the civilian population in line. IMO, any general attack by the US Military on us targets would result in a 2nd Civil War that would make the first look like a tempest in a teacup. Look at how big the stink was when Fed agencies borrowed Army equip to end the Waco stand-off. That was a lunatic fringe Church group. If the Feds attacked, say..... Montana, the Military would SHATTER.
 
Do you really think ANY United States Government could use the US Military as club to beat down the civilian population in an all out war? Really?
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No of course not, silly. No government has ever turned on its people. The second amendment was placed in the Bill of Rights so we could duck hunt. Our government has never shown any signs of aggression towards its own people. Concentration camps for Japanese US citizens in WWII did not exist and are simply fairy tales. Gun confiscations never occurred during Katrina. Waco and Ruby Ridge are simply urban legends.
 
Guns are of limited utility in defending against government utility, especially the type of guns we are allowed to have in the US.
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If the government is still in place as it is now, you're right. The government such as it currently is, with popular support (or at least not with a populace ready for open rebellion) and an army fully in place and loyal that consider their mission honorable cannot be defeated by civilians with our civilian arms. But then, that's the way it's supposed to be ... as the RKBA was intended as a safeguard against a government that has turned tyrannical and has the vast portion of citizens against it, not one that is of a party we don't like or passing laws we find offensive.

So let me float an aluminum foil hat scenario ...

In a suprise outcome of the 2008 election, the communist party takes over the house, senate, and presidency. It is the result of too many "protest votes" by conservatives and anti-war liberals who thought their vote wouldn't matter or didn't want to vote for the "lesser of two evils."

The new government begins nationalizing industries, commanding the disarmament of all American citizens, and revoking most constitutional rights while invoking martial law for the "painful transitional phase" to a socialist utopia.

Many local police departments refuse to enforce some new policies. Massive protests are rampant. Since the US army is in a constant state of turmoil from all of the arrests of senior officers, and some units are in open mutiny, UN troops are requested to help keep the peace and all but some "select" army units are disbanded.

In the above situation, with large portions of the population ready to fight back and foreign troops in place, those hunting rifles, shotguns, and pistols are suddenly going to be critical. Because you can't dominate a population by riding around in tanks and APC's (as was proven in Iraq and Vietnam); you have to dismount at somepoint to force them to be compliant, and once you do ... well, a 7mm mag can accomplish a headshot from great range.

That is the power of an armed populace in this day and age; not that we middle aged professionals will march out of our suburban cul de sacs and engage an armored division in open battle, but that no military force can supress us without a rather large numerical advantage. And it's difficult to get a numerical advantage on 300 million people.

So the RKBA for civilians isn't meant to overthrow a government with bad financial policies, "normal" corruption, etc.; those are all meant to be handled through a political process.

The RKBA for civilians is meant for the EOTWAWKI scenarios.

While the above is really out there and we are nowhere close to it, if history teaches us anything it's that the world changes in unexpected ways over a period of decades. And since I have children, I have to protect their rights and their children's rights.

And who knows what the US will be like in 40 or 60 years? I believe it will be just fine, but I have studied too much history to be 100% sure of that. We currently have the oldest constitutional government on Earth, which some might argue makes us about due ...
 
Thanks for a good discussion everyone.

Jimbob86 said:
Do you really think ANY United States Government could use the US Military as club to beat down the civilian population in an all out war? Really?
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Just to clarify, I never suggested that I thought that the US government could really turn the US Military against our own people, to wit:

myself from earlier said:
In the ultimate paranoid SHTF scenario (which i do not buy into), the government would totally turn on the people. In which case they wouldn't care about civilian casualties and it wouldn't matter how many AR15's you owned - you'd be toast just like everyone else.
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Just wanted to clear that up. :)
 
I know you didn't intend to turn the discussion to Iraq, but I should point out that this sword is double-edged and works just as well against pro-2nd war supporters.
Adopting the viewpoint that guerilla tactics can fend off the American military at home necessarily concedes the point that it can also be done overseas.
I've used that on this forum on occasion.

Back to the topic at hand...
 
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