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It is, but sadly it's also not unexpected given the current constitution of the Supreme Court.Originally posted by Dave2002 View Post -
The zombie arm of the Trump administration strikes again. It's almost as if appointing highly politicised judges with immense power for life might not be such a great idea...Comment
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Yet on this occasion the ban which has now been overturned was actually brought in under DT's period. The Supreme Court seems hopelessly out of touch with reality or anything like common sense.Originally posted by Retune View Post
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The problem is the Originalist Doctrine, highly prevalent among current Justices. If the Founding Fathers in their coonskin caps, many with slaves doing their labor for them, who in the Opinion of the Originalists would not have approved of a new law, then that law cannot stand.Comment
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Thanks for the comment, which seems in line with my prevous comment about "being out of touch". There is probably no point in trying to explain to some and such people that they mostly likely wouldn't like living in the conditions of several centuries ago, and indeed many of them would already be past their expected "sell by" date, having died by the age of 40-50. Also that what gives them the right and authority to determine how others who have embraced more modern living should conduct their lives.Originally posted by richardfinegold View PostComment
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It's noticeable that the vote was 6-3, 6 conservatives against 3 liberals. As I understand the legal principle (which cancels out the use of discretion or 'pure common sense' in verdicts) they accepted the argument that bump stocks are 'accessories' not machine guns - which are generally illegal, and as the law stands at the moment there are no grounds for banning accessories. If they ought to be banned it was for Congress to change the law. That seems to make (legal) sense, but the division between conservatives and liberals tends to call that into question.Originally posted by Dave2002 View PostIt isn't given us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world.Comment
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I've long endeavoured to figure out this clichéd right wing notion of devolving choice onto the individual or family.household where everything comes down to "choice" and has to be decided there rather than by the "nanny state". If we have this idealised image of "the community" to be fostered, summed up in the cliché about taking a community to bring up a child, then logically it should follow that "the household" or "the family" should not be made the final arbiter of what is to be foisted on the rest of us, but simply human solidarity as was practised during WW2. Contrarily however, "It's the parents' fault" when said child turns up for Year 1 at school without potty training or becomes a knife-carrying neighbourhood gang member at the age of 13. The contradiction seems blatant to me: it is the basic assumptions of those who want government to heap everything onto the individual and their brood that should be questioned, and would be were we living within rationally organised societies.Originally posted by french frank View Post
My theory is that doing it this way is just one alibi for companies selling their goods to target the protective self-interest engendered by isolating decision-making behind front doors in the misleading name of "freedom of choice", and right wing governments and those who support them can then blame them instead of themselves for abusing the "freedom" thrust upon them for all society's ills. This has been made the cardinal principle of consumer society, and you don't have to look far to see what effects it is now having on the planet.Comment
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The Second Amendment-the right to have a gun- was directly related to the fact that the original USA did not want a large standing army and was relying upon militias in the case of external or internal threat. We have had a large standing army since the end of the Civil War so the original need has long passed..Originally posted by Dave2002 View Post
The mechanism that the Founding Fathers devised for being able to update the Constitution was to have new Amendments passed. Therefore we need the Political Will to limit firearms.Comment
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Good explanation - which I had not appreciated before. Though how a modern automatic gun can equate to a gun used centuries ago is beyond my comprehension.Originally posted by richardfinegold View Post
For some of us this kind of thing is really scary -
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....these 'bump stocks' work in a way that avoids the rational explaination of the Act brought in to completely suppress the 'machine gun' use. How many bullets fired by one pulling of the trigger....the bump stock is designed to fire more than one bullet per one triggering....the first firing creates a force (recoil) engages (by - every action creates an equal and opposite reaction) a pump. A modification to the breach uses this pump to fire off as many as 400 bullets per minute via large interchangeable magazines - but only one triggering....Thus it gets around the law....but the 6 that voted to allow the bump stock did so on ideologically/ and use of language/and the power of the 'message sent'....it has nothing to do with common sense.... , while they say go to the Congress for change, they know there is a partisan block on such an act succeedingbong chingComment
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