Why, oh why, do they CONTINUE to LIE--Murphy, Feinstein, Time Magazine

[Glenn E. Meyer]

The AR-15 can be, and IS used A LOT for hunting. (Hogs, coyotes, fox and other varmints.)

I would point out that hunting is irrelevant to the purpose of the 2nd Amendment. It is a common ploy to say you support the 2nd Amendment as you support sportspeople and you (politician) have gone hunting (which gives you the laughable photo ops of Kerry, Hillary and Romney making up stories of animal killing prowess). Varmints can be controlled without the higher capacity mags which make rampages so easy (recall all the Zumbo and guy from Guns and Ammo denouncing assault rifles as they were hunters).

If you go into the hunting, competition argument - you are falling into a trap. The 2nd Amend. is not about entertainment (Thanks for you take on that, extremely stable genius). In Australia and the UK, the sports argument failed to stop the gun laws.

About the not turning in off the guns which folks chortle about. Well, that's nice except for if there is a ban:

1. You cannot use them for hunting
2. You cannot use them for competition
3. If you use them for self-defense - you may beat the shooting charge but be charged with having the guns. There are cases like that already.
4. There is the risk of discovery when you Ex turns you in. Your kid babbles at school. The firemen find it.
5. Sheriff Andy of Crapberry may not want to execute the law but the state troopers in most states will.

What are you going to do with the hidden gun? Dig it up to fight the Green New Deal or Medicare for all?

All politicians lie - so why the outrage on this one, like any party as moral standing on truthfulness?

I can't list lies without going into politics but being naive on lying is a touch naive. Try to combat them with the truth. All institutions lie.

 

[Aguila Blanca]

Once said by Reagan, and I'm sure many others at different times and places..

"the problem with our opponents is not what they don't know, its that so much of what they do know, is wrong!"

I submit that I don't think in the case of Diana Feinstein or Chris Murphy that it's a case of "so much of what they know is wrong." I think they know very well what the facts are, but they have each hitched their wagon to gun control and they'll tell any lies they need to in order to advance their agenda. I'm absolutely certain that they are lying, not making an honest (if anything about a career politician could ever be "honest") mistake.

 

[JohnKSa]

Stephen Halbrook wrote a very excellent book on the topic.

https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/v...context=wmborj

It's well researched and documented & contains references to quite a bit of information well worth the reading.

While "hunting" per say isn't spelled out in the Bill of Rights, it's clearly something the Founding Fathers had in mind when they penned it.

It's almost certain that the Founding Fathers had hunting in mind when they penned the Bill of Rights, I imagine it would be impossible to write about guns in those times without considering hunting.

But the amendment clearly is not about recreational use of firearms.

More to the point, the constitution is what SCOTUS says it is, and, to my knowledge, their rulings on the topic mention nothing about hunting or recreational use.

Furthermore, I think that a more careful read of Halbrook's writings will reveal that while he does believe that the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right to hunt, he's far less specific about the 2nd amendment itself being penned with that in mind. In fact, his exact quote is: "As a Constitutional Right, the Right to Hunt Must Be Broadly Construed" in other words, trying to point to one specific passage in the constitution and saying "here are the words that say we can hunt" is not really possible.

His argument relies heavily on state constitutions, letters and quotes from people other than the founding fathers, and, it might be noted, requires well over 200 pages--the phrase "second amendment" actually only appears 6 times in the document, and two of those are in the footnotes. His primary argument is more along the lines that the right to hunt was deemed universal in the colonies--as opposed to claiming that the 2nd amendment guaranteed it.

Moreover, as he states clearly in the introduction, he intended his article to: "focus on Virginia’s right to hunt guarantee." and doesn't even really claim that he's focusing on the U.S. Constitution, let alone unpacking a right to hunt from the 2nd amendment.

So while his work does suggest that there is an implied right to hunt "broadly construed" in the U.S. Constitution (an assertion with which I tend to agree) I don't believe it in any way contradicts the assertion that the 2nd amendment is not about hunting.

That said, while I've skimmed through it, I will not claim to have carefully read all 230+ pages. If you have and can point me to a passage where Halbrook claims that the 2nd amendment was specifically intended to protect hunting, please do.

 

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Stressing hunting - advances the cause of assault rifle, higher capacity bans.

Joe Scarborough (blah!!) said something like: I don't need a clip of 30 cop killer bullets to take my son hunting.

Except for possibly spraying at a large group of TX hogs, you can hunting most things with a Ruger No. 1 single shot.

 

[Glenn E. Meyer]

It's a close as we are getting waves of pure political rants.