From:	Robert Watkins robert.watkins@******.com
Subject:	Value and so on....
Date:	Fri, 16 Jul 1999 09:43:11 +1000

Lloyd Vance writes:
> "Those who would give up Freedom for Security deserve neither."
> --Benjamin Franklin

Benjamin Franklin lived in an era where a group of milita armed with rifles
could do a fairly decent job of holding out against a military force. Even
then, that wasn't true (the military force would just bring up the
artillery), but it was certainly more true than today.

The _correct_ way to preserve Freedom and Security is not to arm the
individual. It is to create a non-political body to defend the society as a
whole, both from internal and external threats, and arm that to the hilt.
That is why armies and police forces should not be politicised in any way,
shape, or form.

> I cannot justify banning guns. I belong to the frame of mind
> that whenever
> someone has the opportunity to abuse power, they will. I don't think that
> (in the US) we were given the right to bear arms for hunting. I
> don't care
> if Bambi lives or dies, but I do want to be armed for personal defense.
> The most important of these is defending yourself against your own
> government. I am not a member of one of these militia groups. I do not
> think the government is going to come after me any time soon. But I would
> like to have some kind of chance if they ever do. That is why we have the
> right.

If you preserve the right to bear arms so that a citizens milita has a
decent chance of overthrowing an oppressive government (which is the sole
point of that particular part of the US constitution), you are really
pissing in the wind these days with the right to carry a gun. You should be
out there arguing for the right to carry anti-tank and anti-aircraft
weaponry, because that's what you're going to need.

The idea that you can overthrow an oppressive government with personal
weaponry is just laughable. Utterly and totally laughable. Can anyone here
name a successful insurgent group that only had access to rifles?

> Besides. Who would invade a country where the general populace
> could kill you? Makes things more secure for us that way, too.

Lots of people would. What you do is you send the soldiers in, backed up
with overwhelming force, round up the citizens everywhere you go, loot the
houses for weapons and valuables, and deal with the various resistance
groups by committing atrocities such as shooting random citizens in reprisal
for resistance attacks. The militia groups with their rifles can't really do
much more than annoy, and eventually the spirit of the people gets crushed.

"Make hunting a sporting event. Arm the deer."

--
.sig deleted to conserve electrons. robert.watkins@******.com