Checkin' my home page, I found an interesting little bit of slander; an article by a history prof and huge fan of U.S. v. Miller (1939).

Go here and read his article. He thinks that the new Parker decision is bad law, and that it unjustifiably overturns 70 years of legal doctrine viewing the second amendment protections as a collective right, asserting in stead that it is an individual right. I welcome you to register over at the History News Network and leave a few comments. I did.

I won't belabour you with the whole comment stream. You can look at it and read it for yourself. By the time I got there, several pro gun types (were everywhere) had left critical comments. One defender of the author then chimed in, saying that it's silly to assert that the framers wanted people to be armed so that they would be able to defend themselves against their own government.

He's commenting on a previous commenter's point, that without an armed citizenry, "...there is no counterweight to Federal military might." He responds...

Yes there is. It's called the Congress's power to declare war and fund and raise and army versus the president as commander in chief. Read your Constitution.

The 2nd Amendment is there because Americans had traditionally feared standing armies, meaning the British army. Thus the basis of our national defense was the militia. It has nothing to do with being a counter to the federal government.

And then I chime in...

"Please, the congress WAS the national government in the 1790s when the bill was drafted. The executive was a glorified clerk, and congress was our parliament, and we had just fought a long and very bloody war against a parliament. The people of the states had been able to do that because they were armed. In the light of this, it seems obvious that the founders understood this to be a basic right of any free people. How could they use arms to overthrow a government and then assert that only a branch of government, a national army (made up of state militias), should be allowed to bear arms? They wanted to be able to retain the ability in their local settings, to protect themselves from the possible (they believed probable) misuse of government power, as well as desiring the right to defend themselves in a nation with NO POLICE OR STANDING ARMY. Why is it so hard to understand? People today who own guns, including assault rifles, don't see themselves as a problem. The problem is Liberal lawyers and gun control advocates who read the exact same words ("The right of the people")in the first, second and fourth amendments, and magically decide that in the one case of the second amendment, the words weren't meant to protect the rights of individual people. That's very convenient logic, if your desire is to empower the national government and restrict peoples rights."

So what do you think about all this.? You know I'm a gun nut, but I have an open mind. Can you find a way to convince me that I should turn in my Kalashnikovs? I dare ya. I double dare ya. I tripple dog dare ya.