“Like cars, guns should be registered from the time they’re manufactured to the time they’re destroyed, so there’s a continuous chain of ownership. Anyone who owns a gun should be required to have liability insurance, so if they injure or kill somebody, the victim or the victim’s family will receive monetary damages. Every state in the country should require gun owners to pass a competence test – just like drivers do – and get a shooter’s license before they can carry or use a gun. This is just common sense.” It’s Time for Shooter’s Insurance [via truth-out.org]
While we’re at it, how about we make it a law that you have to get a license to speak? Or write an opinion? Words have caused more death than any weapon by far, either intentionally or unintentionally.
Also, First! I’ve always wanted to do that.
I’d reply but I’m waiting for my permit to have an opinion to pass! 🙂 Well said.
States should also require “competence tests” before allowing people to
– vote
– hold public office
– reproduce
– immigrate to this country
– express their opinion
– etc.
This is just common sense.
Just for the record, people who move here and become citizens generally have much better awareness of how this country and our government work than people who were born here. They have to pass a test on it to gain citizenship, and we don’t.
Well, we should — although that would require amending the Constitution.
Robert Heinlein was on the right track with Starship Troopers.
As a veteran I agree. But do we really want guys like me making all the rules?
There’s really only one rule necessary: Do no harm.
Service guarantees citizenship!
Here’s something I don’t say everyday:
Couldn’t agree more with Anonymous!
As a professional driver with almost 1,000,000 mile under me I have to point out that, IMO, the state “competency” test for drivers are for crap. If this is a sample of what would be applied to gun owners I think we should pass.
Oh, and by the way, there’s that whole “…shall not be infringed.” thing to deal with as far as RKBA.
Yep. And the fact remains that the right to own and drive cars is not Constitutionally protected.
Are you kidding? The right to own property is not constitutional? Do you have to register your coffee maker? Your child’s tricycle? Do the Amish have licenses and registrations? What of the right to liberty, travel by the conventional means of the time? Excepting for purposes of commerce, their is no power to regulate such movement. Try again.
Paul,
Show me where in the constitution is gives you the right to keep and drive a car. There is no constitutional right to own a car or operate it.
You truly have no concept of what the constitution is, do you? It is not a list of things that people are permitted to do, it is a list of things government is empowered to do….so you show me where it grants government a right to restrict ownership of common modes of travel, or to travel freely, or to use that common mode of travel upon roads paid for and maintained with tax monies. Hint…..it isn’t there.
This may come as a shocker to you but a long time ago when I was in college I made an “A” for a final grade in my Constitutional Law course. Doesnt make me an expert onb the constitution but I do have a good grasp of it.
Driving a car is a privilege and not a right. You need to educate yourself on the difference
Maybe your teacher needs fired, since they obviously taught you nothing. You want to look in the constitution to find a property right? You have made clear that you have little if any understanding of the constitution. You keep wrongly asserting that driving is a privilege, when it is only a privilege when done for commerce. I have met persons who utilize their right to travel via automobile, I have had conversations with LEO’s who learned first-hand that such a right exists. I guess you are right, all of this is just illusion, even though it is supported by the law….even if you don’t understand that. Don’t feel bad, a lot of people smugly assert that they know things that they have no clue about in reality.
Go back to school and find out the difference. I can justify anything and claim its a right.
I have plenty of school, thank you. Take your own advice. The courts have ruled as well. What, you don’t believe your lying eyes?
Well, he’s not wrong. You don’t have to register a car or have a license to drive it, but once you’re on public property (ie roads), you’re required to have those things. The personal property itself is not regulated.
No, you are not required to have those things. That is the point. People think they must, but it is not required. Rarely do people actually do so, because of the hassles that accompany the assertion of this right, to travel, but people do exercise this right, and it is legal.
Your right to travel is different than your privilege to drive. You want to travel then walk.
Sorry, but the courts, and real time experiences of those who choose to utilize automobiles to utilize their right to travel, contradicts your assertion. The right to travel is via the conventional mode of transport of the time. Carriage, whether horse driven, or horseless, is quite appropriate.
It sure seems the use of automobiles is mentioned specifically….hmmm? And property.
“The right of the citizen to travel upon the public highways and to transport his property thereon, either by carriage or by automobile, is not a mere privilege which a city may prohibit or permit at will, but a common law right which he has under the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Thompson v. Smith, 154 SE 579.
“The right to travel is a part of the liberty of which the citizen cannot be deprived without due process of law under the Fifth Amendment.” Kent v. Dulles, 357 US 116, 125.
“The right to travel is a well-established common right that does not owe its existence to the federal government. It is recognized by the courts as a natural right.” Schactman v. Dulles 96 App DC 287, 225 F2d 938, at 941.
“The state cannot diminish rights of the people.” Hertado v. California, 110 US 516
Digging rieally deep into inference to find something that isn’t there arent you .
I am not digging at all, just showing relevant data that destroys your false preconceptions.
Thank you DBM! Finally someone gets it right….
Or build a quadcopter that can lift yourself. 😉
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L75ESD9PBOw
I don’t have a right to drive across your front yard without your permission. Since roads are community property, I see licensing as an effort to mitigate the tragedy of the commons.
There is a big difference between your yard and the public roadway. No valid comparison can be made. The common property as paid for by all, is available for use for legitimate purposes, such as travel, to all equally. Licensing is a way of mitigating the extra expenses generated by those engaging in commerce using the public roads. Personal travel is not commerce. Also, in a republic, the individual’s rights cannot be compromised by the tyranny of the majority. A right cannot be taken away from one because of the actions of another, so the inability of some to handle their vehicle does not allow the government to make everyone lose the right to travel as a result. People have to be convinced to voluntarily surrender their right, relegating it to being a privilege. Then they will rally to defend it as being such.
You can see things any way you like, you can’t support your opinion constitutionally. Big difference.
You don’t have the right to drive. PERIOD. You can reach and infer all you want for a right that DOES NOT EXIST.
And any time you drive you are engaging in commerce of some kind if you want to get technical.
And the rights of a single individual does not trump the rights of the many. And your rights do not supersede my rights.
Man, you are really pushing to show how little you know. In the world of licensed drivers….those engaged in commerce have to get “commercial” licenses. Maybe you could look up what engaging in commerce is, too late I guess. Me running up to the store for bread, or going sightseeing, or even travelling to work, is not engaging in commerce. I am not making any money from operation of the vehicle. Because of that, no license is required to operate the vehicle. It was even that way back in the horse and carriage days, I am sorry if your head can’t accept simple realities, but nothing I can do to help you get past your severe cognitive dissonance.
Lastly, the rights of the individual are supreme and inalienable in a republic. I thought you studied the constitution? In a democracy, the many can alienate the rights of the few. We are not a democracy. The more you state, the less you show for knowledge.
Go back to school. “Period”. I have shown here a plethora of cases that make quite clear that the right, even specifically related to operation of an automobile exists. You can wish it away all you want, but it doesn’t change facts. Bummer.
Oh really? What do cars run on? Gasoline. Diesel. The gas station you refill at does not pull the oil up from the depths underneath it, nor is it a refinery. IT COMES FROM ANOTHER STATE, in just about every case. That can be interpreted as “interstate commerce”.
I await your ornery, argumentative, smarty-pants reply. Which will come no matter what I or anyone else does. Again and again and again. Try putting a sock in it for awhile.
That is beyond stretching the imagination. Even if I do buy gasoline, I am the consumer, not the one engaging in the sale of goods. In your world I would need to be an FFL to buy a gun? Licensing applies to those using vehicles to make money, as in taxi drivers, teamsters, etc. If you really needed that explained to you, I feel sorry for you.
Feel sorry for yourself. Your need to feel “right” on each and every issue is sad.
I think he’s a closet statist playing the “commerce clause” card.
Stick it, Grise.
Sorry Paul but you are exchanging money for a goods or service which is commerce. You like to invent new meanings for words don’t you. You must be a democrat.
And which state line did the gasoline have to cross to get from the underground tank into your car’s tank? Which state line did you have to cross to give the clerk your cash?
Don’t gimme that “interstate commerce” crap as an excuse to violate the Constitution. I really hate people who try to find ways to weasel out from under the Constitutional limits on their illegal immoral attempts to deny Free Will.
Stopping to buy gas? Thats commerce. Grocery shopping is commerce etc etc etc. We all can play the silly game you seem to want to play.
BTW Please enlighten us on YOUR definition of a Right and a Privilege
We live in a Representative Republic. Individuals have Rights but those Rights have limits. Your Right to swing your fist ends at the tip of my nose. If an individuals Right trumps everyone elses Rights you dont have a Republic or Democracy you have Anarchy.
There is no such thing as a “right to drive”; you are quite correct. Nor can you ride your Ol’ Paint on the side of the interstate. I don’t think you can even legally WALK on the side of interstates or major highways, which is a boon to longevity. Although you do have the freedom to travel, walking is pretty much circumscribed by major highways and private property. I’m pretty sure if you had a pair of wings, however, you could flap them in whichever direction you so chose.
So technically, the driver’s permit has in fact LIMITED our freedom of travel. If you want to get right down to it.
Where is a sock when you need one? Lots of opinions, few facts….other than those I provided. I was asked for proof, I supplied it, you guys are the ones just running your yaps.
We agree on everything but the last sentence. Licensing someone doesn’t limit a persons ability to travel, it just slightly limits ones traveling mode options.
Which will stop criminal behavior how? This is just more infringement on law abiding citizens; criminals won’t comply.
Baa baaaaa.
Would it be harassment if I started writing or calling into these folks and bleating at them?
No. But first, you’ll need your license to operate a phone.
Who cares?
They’ve completely missed the point of a Constitutional Right and a common privilage. There’s nothing to see here and debating with a statist is the very definition of insanity. This is how they think, nothing will change that, ever. So let them try and amend the Constitution and be done with it.
How about a law that makes you register your religion if you have one? How about making those who arent religious be outlawed? More death has come over one group forcing another set of beliefs on another than any weapon. These anti gun zealots need to piss off. Fix the lame laws that are letting the criminals off with little more than a wrist slap and leave me alone.
Please don’t “Outlaw” me! I’M an atheist! OH NOES!
Unless I missed it somehow, note that the author’s name of that article is not mentioned.
The ability to own a fire arm is a right, the ability to drive is a privilege. People frequently fail to understand this.
Driving is a right. Just because it is currently being infringed upon does not make it less of a right. The only people who call it a privilege are government bootlickers.
Just an fyi, you’re coming across as ignorant more than the hard ass or cool guy I think you were going for.
Knowing the truth is ignorant? I always thought it was just the opposite. Well, SOMEONE is ignorant here. How they can “bear” it, I do not know.
In reality, there are a hardy few who refuse to buy into the allocation of driving to being a privilege, and they do indeed drive unlicensed vehicles, with no driver’s license, and it is perfectly legal.
I hate to agree with CM on anything. And yes the whole bootlicker thing is just childish. But, we have the right to travel unimpeded. In the old days it was by foot, horse or boat. Now it’s by car. Unimpeded travel is a right, not a privilege.
Yeah, whatever credibility I ascribe to a given comment is generally cut by about half as soon as I see the word bootlicker.
That said, I can see both sides of the “driving is a right” thing, but it’s not an argument you’re ever going to win. Society as a whole has accepted the public roads > insurance > license > vehicle registration continuum, and short of the complete breakdown of society, that system isn’t going anywhere. I understand the theory that the government shouldn’t require you to have insurance to drive on public roads right up to the point that I get hit by some broke asshole in a shitty car with no insurance. Which I have. Then I’m out of pocket, whether through cash up front, or a deductible and increased insurance rates, for his lack of responsibility. And I can’t sue him for it, because he doesn’t have anything to take. So I’m sorry, but registering your car and having insurance on it is a cost we pay for living in a civilized society.
The whole argument muddies the water and takes us off point here, anyway. Car insurance and registration has absolutely nothing to do with, nothing in common with, attempting the same thing on firearms.
You are correct in that people have “accepted” this as reality, though it is not legally required. Dealing with uninsured people in crappy cars hitting you is the price you pay for living in a civil society, not requiring insurance. You still can sue him, you just may not ever collect on your victory. The same legal system protects big spenders who lose their butts in foolhardy business ventures, and the little people who lost money from that have little recourse either. The price you pay for living in a civil society. Rights are rights…once you start denigrating one, you have lost any basis for defending others.
Paul, do you drive without a license or insurance?
No, I do not, nor did I ever make such a claim. As one who has a loan on a vehicle, I am required by the bank to have it registered and insured, which also requires me to be a licensed driver. That has nothing to do with the state, and everything to do with the terms of the loan and the insurer, But thanks for playing.
I was talking about the language more than the sentiment.
Whether Uncle Sam thinks it’s a right or not, if any laws or regulations were made against transportation, the soccer moms would rise up in retaliation.
And I’ll tell you what, after 911 I will never underestimate soccer moms again. The average American soccer mom would have gone at a Taliban with a meat cleaver without hesitation for the first two months after that.
Just goes to show that situations make the person.
Matt, good point on insurance. Wonder if we could raise taxes on fuel to offset the cost of insuring all cars on all public roads? Somebody better with stats and math could weigh in on that. As you say, we’re a civilised society, taxes are part and parcel with that.
Paul, you should get a car that you can afford to own free and clear, then you could practice what you preach. I’m surprised that a “free man” like you would submit to the “slavery” of debt, it just seems hypocritical.
There is nothing hypocritical about relating the truth about a subject. If such were so, only gun owners should be allowed to relate facts about the 2A, or perhaps only those who own priceless antiques could be considered knowledgeable about them? The hypocrisy would be yours, searching for false allusions to color the truth.
By the way, I never preached that anyone should give up their ways, only that they have done so voluntarily, ceding the right of their own volition. Comprehension still means something.
I’ve investigated more than 1,100 traffic collisions. I can say with statistical certainty that negligent driving causes more than 98% of the collisions I have investigated. I can also say that the at-fault rate of an unlicensed driver is more than double that of a licensed driver.
Think for a moment about the morons who cause crashes that snarl the freeway traffic in your neck of the woods. Consider that there might be an idiot behind you when fate requires a fast brake application. I certainly consider how a driver with a medically suspended license went into a coma and struck my patrol car. I had to be cut out by firefighters before my trip to the ER. I was lucky to survive.
Driving that occurs when private property is operated on public roads requires a degree of regulation. On private property, do what you want.
I do despise the DMV, but also admire their incompetence. It is obvious that the inefficiency of the DMV makes is evidence that we invite government control of our lives at our own peril. Still, negligent driving causes crashes, and must be addressed. A single lane of freeway can handle 10,000 cars in an hour. The blockage of a single lane on a two-lane freeway reduces traffic flow by approximately 90%. That is a great loss man hours and productivity. Also, the reduction of traffic flow places individuals with medical issues at an even greater peril.
The presence of police on the roads is a deterrence (albeit an imperfect one) against negligent driving. That includes all manner of malfunctions from being unlicensed, DUI, hit and run, reckless driving, and a host of moving violations likely to cause crashes. I do not support any sort of photo enforcement because it invites a police state, but I do believe that patrol and intelligent collision investigation are ultimately a service to the responsible driver. Police aren’t perfect, and need to be held accountable, but I believe that they necessary on today’s roads. I also believe that licensing and training are necessary for a driver to travel in a responsible and orderly manner.
I’ve said it before that firearms are private property, and are usually operated on private property. The government has no right to regulate firearms on private property unless a crime or negligence occurs. I also take issue with the government regulating gun ownership on public property under the guise of safety when it is clearly evident that gun free zones allow armed psychos to play out their sick fantasies without effective opposition. School shootings are tragic examples.
The relationship between driving and shooting is limited at best.
You cannot revoke a right of the people for the reasons of convenience. That is the cowardly, easy, unconstitutional way out. Government loves solutions like that, especially if it involves taking more control over the populace. Plus, it is easier than coming up with real solutions.
That is why we have “hate speech” laws (unconstitutional), gun laws (unconstitutional), driver’s licenses (unconstitutional), etc……all such easy ways to address issues….take the people’s right away.
I have a right to travel, except on other people’s property. The road is the “property” of “the people,” which gives us the tragedy of the commons. I think mandatory licenses and insurance are an attempt to mitigate that tragedy somewhat, but I still rankle at being punished for not having insurance when I was clearly the injured party in a crash that was entirely the other guy’s fault. (I got rear-ended yielding at the ‘yield’ sign at the end of the exit ramp.)
But, yeah, throwing cars into our efforts to protect the 2nd Amendment from The Evil One is a red herring.
By the way, did I mention that there is no acceptable debate when we’re talking about a God-given right?
If we regulate guns like cars: There are no background checks for sales. Can be bought without registering for use on private property. Can be sold to anyone at any age. You only need a licence and insurance on public roads. Can modify extensively for off road use however you like with no restrictions.
Repeal all other laws concerning firearms and I may consider it.
This is the correct reply. I’m so tired of these statist idiots not realizing that these “items” they want passed, if they were analogous to car ownership, would only apply to taking the firearm on public property.
And to a large extent, that’s already the case with most CCW/CHP systems. There is a competency test/training class involved, local LE issues an ID which must be carried on the person.
Now, that said, I still oppose CHP permitting, because it’s a relic of a right we USED to have. Constitutional Carry is what we need to be pushing for, nationwide.
Like you said modify for off-road use. Gun equivalent of mail ordering a suppressor or a select fire switch. Just like I mail ordered my aftermarket suspension lift on my first truck.
You can buy a car in any state in the country, whether you live there or not. The dealer only cares if your check is good or not.
There is no requirement to register a car. If you want to drive on public streets, sure, otherwise… no.
Doh! Tommy beat me to it…
There is no requirement to register your car to operate it on public streets. We have just been doing it for so long we have been conditioned to thinking it is so. Only commercial vehicles need to be declared to the state. The courts have made clear (to those who check it out) that the right to travel by the conventional method of the times is an inherent right.
If those making these gun/car comparisons knew what they were talking about , they would STFU.
What court? Please prove your statement.
http://justiceprose.8m.com/carl/carl41.html
http://freedom-school.com/travel/no-law-requires-you-to-record-pledge-your-private-automobile.pdf
http://righttotravel.us/blog/?p=10
Is that enough? There us a lot more…if you LOOK. I know, easier to say “prove it” than to do a 30 second search for yourself, right?
http://www.savingtosuitorsclub.net/showthread.php?307-Court-Cases-supporting-Right-to-Travel
Paul is just spouting sovereign citizen BS. It doesn’t work that way in the real world, only in their fantasy world of “straw men” and “maritime law”.
So you have researched this? Know people who have done this? Know LEO’s who have encountered persons doing this and been dumbfounded when it was true? OK….your experience is counter to mine. Or are you the one full of it?
Barron v Burnside – 121 US 186
Boone v Clark – 214 SW 607
Buchanan v Warley – 245 US 60, 74
Chicago Motor Coach v Chicago – 169 NE 22
Cummins v Jones – 155 P. 171
Deibel v Dreiss – 50 NE 2d 1000 (1943)
Ferrante Equipment Co v Foley Machinery Co – NJ 213 A.2d 208, 211, 49 NJ 432
Gardner v City of Brunswick – 28 SE 2d 135
Hadfield v Lundin – 98 Wn 657; 168 P. 516
Hale v Henkel – 201 US 43
Hoke v Henderson – 15 NC 15, 25 AM Dec.677
In re Hong Wah – 82 Fed 623
Kent v Dulles – 357 US 116, 125
Ligare v Chicago – 28 NE 934
McKevitt et al v. Golden Age Breweries Inc – 126 P.2d 1077 (1942)
Miranda v Arizona – 384 US 436, 491 (1966)
Murdock v Pannsylvania – 319 US 105
O’Conner v. City of Moscow – 69 Idaho 37
Packard v Banton – 44 SCt 257, 264 US 140
Parish of Morehouse v Brigham – 6 S 257
Parish v Thurston – 87 Ind 437 (1882)
People v Nothaus – 147 Colo 210
Robertson v Dept of Public Works – 180 Wash 133 at 139
Rogers Construction Co v Hill, Or – 384 P.2d 219, 222, 235 Or 352
Spann v City of Dallas – 235 SW 513
State v City of Spokane – 109 Wn 360; 186 P. 864
State v Johnson – 243 P.1073
Thompson v Smith (Chief of Police) – 154 SE 579, 580
Weirich v State – 140 Sis 98
Wells v Zenz – 236 P. 485
Western Turf Assn. v Greenberg – 204 US 359
Williams v Fears – 343 US 270, 274
It isn’t “sovereign citizen” stuff, it is persons who know and expect governments to abide their rights. POTG could learn something from them.
I did my 30 seconds of research and found at least four places where you could have copied and pasted that list from. Have you done any of your own research on this topic? I read the actual text of the supreme court decision in Barron v. Burnside and the case did not stand or fall on the right to travel (although the defendant was driving a train locomotive at the time of his arrest, ooh, a commercial vehicle) but on a state government trying to preempt federal courts in a matter involving interstate commerce.
If 30 seconds and a brief overview of one case that supports, but not enough in your opinion, the premise, is all that it takes you to allow your rights to be revoked, you must live a sad life.
Paul,
Let us know when you’re ready to join the 20th (not 21st) century in the United States and stop living in fantasy land. Or better yet let us know when your supreme court case is coming up for driving without registration.
I have posted the relevant data, and even numerous court cases supporting the right to travel. Apparently since you cannot disprove such being true, you choose to attempt ridicule instead of intellect. Yes I have met persons who do drive unregistered, uninsured vehicles without a driver’s license. They have never been convicted of any offense for doing so, though they have been inconvenienced all too often. I have also met LEO’s who have been dumbfounded when they thought they had a juicy arrest and were informed to let the person carry on. I guess this is all just fantasy, right?
Contempt prior to investigation, look it up. In the meantime, the person here lacking intellect and integrity is you. It does not take a scotus ruling to reinforce the existence of a right.
Maybe you should stick to riding elephants.
The idea of “shooter’s insurance” doesn’t really sound like a bad one to me, so long as it’s voluntary. I pay say 10 bucks a month and if I ever get involved in a DGU, the insurance company pays for my lawyer.
I have this- http://www.ccwsafe.com. $150 bucks a year for my wife and I. They cover any use of force, not just dgu’s (for instance, if you pick up a handy rock and crack a guy’s head open in self defense, they cover it).
I have this also, called Texas Law Shield, it covers any and ALL legal fees involved with me LEGALLY using my gun in a DGU. Mine is 50 bucks a year for TX (maybe less been a while since I paid it 🙂 ) and 35 for coverage in surrounding states i.e. Louisiana.
This is exactly right. The only insurance I would consider is a lawyer on retainer, assuming it was my choice and not some state mandatory bullshit.
Writers and editors at The Daily Take are racist!
🙂 …use the libs tactics against them. Fight falsity with falsity.
“so if they injure or kill somebody”
By definition, law-abiding gun owners don’t injure and kill people. I can imagine somebody with this view responding by saying that if a criminal steals my gun and injures or kills somebody, I should be held liable. However, their comparison to driving falls apart at that point. I’m not aware of a precedent for that kind of thinking. It’s really about hate and about punishment of law-abiding gun owners because the civilian disarmament group have been trained to love the criminal, ignore victims, and hate law-abiding gun owners.
” I can imagine somebody with this view responding by saying that if a criminal steals my gun and injures or kills somebody, I should be held liable.”
Yes, they will say that. I’ve had that discussion before with someone who supported “safe storage” laws. They actually believed that if someone broke into my house, broke into my safe, and stole my guns, that I’m the one who’s liable.
Given that we’re making car analogies here, imagine if your car was stolen out of your garage, used to run drugs across the border, and you were charged as an accessory because you didn’t secure your vehicle.
Even if we had that kind of liability chain, the insurance idea wouldn’t even work.
Look carefully at your auto insurance policy. Mine says “We do not provide Liability Coverage for any person … who intentionally causes ‘bodily injury” or ‘property damage.” In other words, if someone uses my car to intentionally kill another, the insurance company isn’t liable.
Every year, tens of thousands of people killed in vehicle collisions, but almost none of these deaths are intentional. Firearms are the opposite, tens of thousands are killed with firearms, but nearly all of these deaths are intentional (including suicide).
Thus, even if we could get every criminal and mentally unstable person to buy firearm insurance (who the heck would sell it to them?) the insurance company would rarely be liable.
Next time you’re in one of those discussions where someone wants to hold gun owners responsible for being the unsuspecting target of a crime, switch the analogy.
Gun owners want their stuff stolen just about as much as the average woman wants to be raped. Should we then make women buy rape insurance?
“Should we then make women buy rape insurance?”
Of course not. Nobody should be forced to to anything. As for “rape insurance,” that’s another fringe benefit of the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, if you know what I mean:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyXY_y1TZfY
Rape insurance comes in many calibers.
Oooh! Good one.
These statists love their “Comprehensive Reform” and their “Grand Bargains.” Well. How about with our rights?
Let them propose to tack on ALL of these same provisions to the exercise of all of the other enumerated rights. Let’s see how gung ho pro-infringement they still are.
Voting, free speech, freedom of religion, you name it. Prove with proficiency testing that you know what you’re talking about before shooting you mouth off or practicing your religion. Prove you know the issues and each proposed policy’s impact before being allowed to vote. And oh yes, I demand a surety bond up front payable to me when your selected candidate turns out to be a rat faced liar. “You can keep your insurance….”, my rear end.
My favorite would be officeholders themselves. Full background checks and anything that would run afoul of NICS would also keep you out of office. Half those pothead/cokehead/drunks and mental head cases in office now would be summarily dismissed.
Careful, some of them want just that… no rights. They would say, “Rights are racist and protect the ruling class”. Further, “Private property is theft of the poor”.
Know who you are dealing with. Don’t help them write their agenda.
Why “engage” these people anywhere but the ballot box? Destroy their delusions, break their spirits, and then bask in their metro-sexual tears. You know, like we did for all of last year.
Wow! That’s a great idea that the Framers of the Constitution were too stupid to think of. He should get to work immediately on amending the Constitution. Until then – F*** Off!
Let’s take it a step further. Pass an IQ test, background check and have the government comb through your bank records before you’re allowed to have children. I think that would save us all some money and keep prisons a little more vacant if we started at the source of the problem.
In the op-ed, the guy cites a Bloomberg stat (shocking!), where gun deaths are expected to overtake car fatalities. Why are they comparing car accidents to all gun deaths (violent crime, accidents, suicides) is beyond me, since that’s not apples to apples at all. The vast majority of gun deaths are caused by the criminal element. Something tells me they will not care much about this “gun owner’s insurance,” even if it was required by law. This sort of legal requirement would do nothing to reduce crime, and there would be no payouts to victims, since criminals would not have this ridiculous insurance. And this insurance would put even more restrictions on regular citizens and further reduce legal gun ownership. Yeah, that’s some brilliant thinking there….and by brilliant I mean incredibly stupid.
Wrong.
A majority — not a vast majority — of gun deaths are caused by people intentionally shooting themselves to death.
Yet the self-anointed advocates of Choice™ lump suicides with with “gun violence” in order to advance their agenda.
My bad. I was thinking of criminals committing gun crime vs. law abiding citizens and DGUs and I got ahead of myself there.
How can anyone reconcile being “pro choice” to kill an innocent baby in the womb and yet be opposed to the choice to abort yourself at a later date?
When you have an agenda and the ends justify the means.
I want to address something from the article…
“But owning a car is actually more difficult than owning a gun. Before you can legally drive on your own, you have to pass a test and get a driver’s license. And if you own a car and want to drive it around, you have to register it with your local department of motor vehicles. You also have to insure yourself and your car.”
1. The author confuses “owning” and “driving”. You can be too young to drive, but still own a car. You can also have a license to drive and not own a car. You can also not have a license but still be legally allowed to drive on your own private property. Ownership and usage are NOT the same.
2. As for registration, as long as you do not drive on public roads, you do not have to register the car. It can sit on your property and be used on your property without registration or insurance. By that logic, I should be allowed to own a new full auto MP5 or any gun I want, I just can not take it out and shoot it on public land.
No. Just no. Not one. More. Inch.
Um cars can be bought off the lot cash with no ID, there is no such thing as tracking of a car from manufacture through all owners. I can buy a used car, take it to my land, and nobody except the seller would ever know if I just legally used it there and never registered it for use on public roads. Also whereas most people trying to unload a used car will be so ecstatic that some moron is willing to dump money into their rust bucket they jump at it, most private gun sellers are leery as the dickens about who they sell to. Whether purchasing “officially” or not, it is harder to buy a gun than a car in the US, period.
As often as these guys bring up insurance, I’ve yet to hear any insurance company championing the idea. With as cutthroat an industry as that is, for them not to wade in at all tells you just how toxic and unlikely something like that really is.
Ignore the source. The writer is nothing but your standard, every day statist. I’d have to read more of his stuff to determine whether he is a socialist or a fascist, which I won’t do because I’m more interesting in another nice cup of tea than what he thinks. One of his articles actually has a title, “For Economic Stability, Follow the French.” Heavens, but you just can’t make this stuff up.
He is a “fighter for the oppressed”, or so he thinks. If I was across from him in a bar, here’s the way to reply to his bullshit about gun control:
“You aren’t fighting for the oppressed, you are just a poser, a coffee-house progressive. By Marx’s whiskers, you are just another oppressor of the poor and the working man. And there you are, quacking on about gun control when history clearly shows that the only people affected by this are the poor. Rich people can always get protection for themselves, their property, and their families. It’s the poor people who suffer the effects of crime and violence, not the rich. And besides that, you’re a racist. Because nobody suffers most from the inability to protect themselves from crime more than poor black people. Read your history, you fake progressive, because the genesis of all gun control in America was Jim Crow laws, passed to keep the black man under the heel of white privilege.”
Nothing makes a socialist or fascist stutter faster than accusing them of being a very poor one.
We should treat guns and cars the same. Neither should be tracked by the government.
With that reasoning mentioned in the above article, we should make all drivers suffer with unfair laws to hinder their ability to drive just because a few drunk drivers that go out driving while drunk and kill people, like my two cousins getting killed by a drink driver 8am on a Sunday morning years ago.
Yup, all cars must come with a breathalyzer and tracking device 🙂
I think that is the law in France now?
There should be a tax on stupid.
These people would be too broke to speak and the national debt could be paid off in a year.
Truth-out fell off the left end of the map long ago. As of the last time I looked a couple years ago, they were nothing more than an advertising tool to draw in the lunatic fringe, much the same as similar sites that serve the beyond-rightwing.
“much the same as similar sites that serve the beyond-rightwing.”
but they provide useful products like magnetic water filters, gold and silver coins, freeze-dried food and emergency supplies, and American flag-themed products made in china!
Let’s just make it illegal to kill people. Dude steals a hammer from my truck and goes all head-smashy on someone, should the hammer be registered to me? Let’s microstamp and register arrows, bbs, pellets… Common sense! Derp.
don’t give them any ideas with the bbs. isn’t it new jersey that requires registration for air rifles?
anti gun people always say how potg should go through training before you can own a gun, like how you have to take tests before you can drive. i don’t know if you guys remember your license test, but all i remember was just a 10 minute drive along the block and pulling up along the curb. the testing required to get a drivers license would be the equivalent to seeing if a gun owner can take a mag out and put it back in without shooting someone.
they will try anything to make it harder to own a gun:(
I suppose it probably depends on when and where you took the test.
How about voters insurance to provide compensation to the rest of the country for voters poor choices…..
Gotta say, the pro 2A comment army is CRUSHING it over at Truth-Out. Maybe clink on over and add your voice. I’m sure it’s depressing as hell to those anti-gun types to see all these pro-gun comments.
Then again, maybe articles like this are a strategy for generating clicks.
Hmmm. On second thought, best to stay away. Why make them 1/7000th of a cent by visiting their page?
Wait, what?
“We have tens of millions of people across the country who support the Second Amendment and who will go out and listen to the NRA and vote the way the NRA tells them to,” said Andrew Arulanandam, director of public affairs for the National Rifle Association.
That disconcerting NRA quote and info about MAIG/Shannon Watts, et al, in this USA Today piece.
I must be an anomaly, here I am an NRA life member and yet I freely criticize their actions when they conflict with my own opinions, and I let them know it. I also think for myself and nobody but me decides who I vote for. Granted, NRA interviews and expose’s on candidates may influence my opinion, but so can interviews in any newspaper or media source.
Or maybe, I am like most NRA members.
You’re doing it right. Did you see what James Yeager said about the NRA in one of his videos? I quoted it in the Digest last night.
I’m actually a bit surprised to see you quoting James Yeager, Matt.
He’s extremely full of himself, and he can be a jerk about it (both of which could be said about me), but on this, he’s not wrong.
You shouldnt vote how anyone tells you, period. That sort of thinking nullifies the whole point of free elections, personal choice and freedom. As an NRA member and someone who plans on becoming a life member, its hard to agree with anything someone says 100% (at least for me) because I feel like my views are the equivalent of a political Unicorn most of the time. Your membership and financial contribution mean you should care because you ideally want to be correctly represented.
@Anonymous “Even a broken clock is right twice a day.” Even when youve heard that clock say some shit that would normally get a clock dismantled 😀
But slow ones never catch up.
I’m a member, too. I just thought you guys would find it interesting that their representative states that we will all ‘vote the way they tell us to”.
More BS regulation on the law abiding citizen while the criminal laughs and keeps
committing crimes with illegal guns. What a great solution that is. Most likely that will be the reality with laws like this. Just look at Chicago,LA,NY,Baltimore,ETC,ETC. Do these people know that the criminal is not shaking in their boots because of their laws?!
They know what they’re doing, friend. They know that their proposals/measures have nothing to do with criminals, but with the entire (law-abiding) populace.
I can’t wrap my mind around the insurance requirement…
Insurance only covers unintentional acts, so who gets the pay out for “accidental shootings”, and under what circumstances do they get paid?
Yes! You have identified the absolute fallacy of the call for liability insurance on gun owners. You are right–as a general proposition, insurance DOES NOT (by policy language) AND CANNOT (as a matter of law and/or by statute) indemnify for intentionally wrongful conduct. So if you shoot someone, intending to shoot that person, not just an “AD,” your liability coverage will not pay ANYTHING to the injured victim. So for all those 8 or 10,000 people murdered each year by firearms, THERE WILL BE NO INSURANCE COVERAGE AVAILABLE even if insurance is mandatory. Further, criminals will not be buying insurance, any more than they register their (stolen) weapons, so again, there will be no insurance policy covering the loss. Finally, except for the limited exception of “safe storage laws” and injuries to minors, a gun owner is NOT LIABLE for crimes committed by the thief who stole his gun, just as a car owner is not liable for the accidents caused by the car thief.; Last but not least, even when liability insurance provides coverage for accidentally/negligently inflicted injuries, the fact of the matter is that there are very few such accidents reported each year (if I recall correctly, less than a thousand). So what we’d end up with is hundreds of millions of lawful gun owners paying multimillions of dollars in premiums for a few injuries per year, many of which will be covered anyway by homeowner’s liability coverage or an umbrella.
If these idiots would just talk to an insurance company or an insurance coverage attorney, they would realize the utter stupidity of these proposals.
Much use in the quoted para above of the word “should”. When over-used “should” is an indicator of someone who lacks maturity and expresses their intolerance of other people’s right to live differently.
Let me play with the use of the word “should”: People should pay for the budgets of police, fire department, social service use, etc based on the use of the proportional use by residents living in their same zip code. Therefore, people living in high-crime housing neighborhoods should pay more for those services than people living in low crime areas regardless of income.
While were at it we should have to start providing proof of alcohol insurance before buying a bottle of whatever. Ya know just in case one were to get drunk and drive, or beat up there spouse or child…makes sence to me. After all, its for our own good right ?
Which explains why page 18 of Moving America Forward (the 2012 Democrat Party Platform) states that:
Yet the same people who favor such massive infringements on rights freak out over the thought of briefly flashing your ID before you vote so that they know you’re not voting multiple times.
And yet voting is not an uninfringeable right, the constitution and amendments merely enumerate some reasons by which voting rights cannot be infringed. Nowhere in it does it state you cannot be required to identify oneself.
And just like with cars, when you have someone who uses a gun illegally, they’re they ones who don’t have insurance. So the victims won’t get paid by the criminal…again…still.
So the registration would protect people like the wonderful drivers licensing system does now…..? Like keeping all the jerks driving past me doing 75 in a 55? How about the 2 old men that have rear ended me while I was sitting at a stop sign who couldn’t even notice they were holding my insurance card upside down because they were so blind and/or confused. What about the multiple times old people drive through stores because they thought their car was in reverse?
Despite the idea of driving being a right. Completely incompetent people are getting licenses to drive every day, killing people every day, yet they are so blind as to believe these laws will do anything to reduce the already ‘relatively’ small number of gun deaths per year.
“Despite the idea of driving being a right. Completely incompetent people are getting licenses to drive every day, killing people every day, yet they are so blind as to believe these laws will do anything to reduce the already ‘relatively’ small number of gun deaths per year.”
This PERFECTLY describes the stoned high school kid who hit me in the knee, breaking it in three places, while I was crossing AT A CROSSWALK, WITH A GREEN LIGHT. He looked right, right at me, then looked left, and pulled out, to get into traffic, while I was crossing at the crosswalk.
My stupid lawyer had the nerve to suggest *I* might have been held responsible. Lazy, incompetent JERK. I’m affected for life, my knees are a wreck on account of him hitting me, and I got less than $15,000 for my troubles….
MY fault? Was I supposed to stand there until midnight (it was about 5:00 in the afternoon), until there was no traffic?
It does bring to mind the story of the man who died defending his right of way. I’m sorry for your injuries but, as I’m sure you now know, being “right” doesn’t protect you from injury or absolve you of the need to practice caution and self-preservation.
CAUTION? So I’m supposed to stand there for HOURS, until there’s no traffic? Please, sir, can you tell me what a green light at a crosswalk is FOR?
I think all states could easily afford a compensation fund for all “accidental” shootings. If you eliminate criminal enterprise use of firearms and suicide, there isnt that much to cover.
Now if we could hammer the criminals using firearms, even if they are “children” and eliminate suicide as a personal choice not to be interfered with by society, guns wouldn’t be enough of an issue except for elites controlling the masses, which would reinforce the true purpose of the 2A.
Course with racial quota school discipline coming i have no hope of common sense being involved…
This guy really doesn’t know what he’s proposing, like most anti-gun folks. It would be hilarious if it happened… he would shit a brick.
But of course what he MEANS is that guns should have all the restrictions and regulations as cars, plus a bunch extra because they’re guns. Which just shows the intellectual dishonesty of his argument.
And there it is again: someone stating that a person who is shot is automatically a “victim” who deserves (or whose family deserves) a big payday.
In the mind of a gun prohibitionist, use of deadly force in self-defense is never justifiable.
It’s much worse than that. They regard self-defense as an actual crime!
Why would I need insurance to own a gun in rural America? I don’t have to have a registered insured vehicle on my property either. This is not common sense. Common sense is a relative term. What is common sense to suburban gun free hoplophobes is not common sense to us. To really judge what is right and what should be done is to look at the issue philosophically (using logic) rather than sense. Many people have already done this (like John Locke) and philosophically, freedom and the lack of gun control, is the better lifestyle, better means, and better solution to crime today.
So much stupid in a single fifth-columnist paragraph.
You can buy cars all day long with no sort of background check or licensing. You just can’t legally drive them on public roads without a license, but that legality bit doesn’t stop many people.
Aww, BS! That’s just a thinly-disguised way to shake taxpayers down for more money. It’s been tried before, and exposed for what it is. EPIC FAIL!
What about poor people who can’t afford insurance? Is the gov’t going to subsidize them?
Good thing I wasn’t drinking anything when I read this “…weapons of war like the Ruger semi-automatic handgun…”
Hahahaha
And yet, with all those “common sense” regulations on cars they still kill more people every year than firearms. AMAZING!!!
More libtard (democrat) “Big Gov” evil.
Comments are closed.