Re: Guns in the hands of stupid people
"Citizens don't have a right own nuclear bomb, or a nerve gas, or even multiple psycho-active substances, so why should owning any sort of lethal weapon be regarded as a "right"?"
Care to state just where in the law (especially the Constitution) such weapons are prohibited to private parties?
"...chooses to ignore the first half of the second amendment..."
Let's read that amendment in its entirety, then:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
According to the usage of the word in 1790 (the time this was written), something that was "regulated" was maintained, organized, prepared, etc. IOW, by your own logic, those words support the NRA in the need to keep the militia prepared for any eventuality. As for the "individual" thing, recall that a militia can be a militia of one AND their intention was that every able-bodied adult male (about 18 to 45) were to be in some militia. Also, they are ANTI-military; that's why they wanted the militias to be the backbone of American defense.
Lastly, consider the overriding tone of the Bill of Rights. The main theme was to protect the citizen by limiting the government. About the only time the Bill of Rights limits citizens directly is in the 7th Amendment, and that's because it covers civil disputes: a necessarily citizen-vs-citizen thing. Seen that way, the Second Amendment is empowering the citizen by limiting the government's ability to disarm it.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
