A Farewell to Arms

I grew up in a state where students routinely miss class in the fall to go hunting. As such, I am not entirely unsympathetic to those who want to own rifles so they can kill an occasional deer (although I wonder how many deer there are left to kill since they keep getting hit by cars or starve as more McMansions come up).

I also come from a state renowned and reviled for the Michigan Militia. To this group I am far less sympathetic. What do they need their guns for? They certainly aren't killing deer in their fatigues. Are they waiting for the Canadians to invade? Honestly, haven't they watched South Park? And even if those dastardly Canadians did manage to cross the border, we have a National Guard (they can't all be in Iraq), which I am sure are more capable of defending our country than a rag-tag group of guys running through the woods playing a grown-up version of G.I. Joe?

The 2nd Amendment has been controversial since I can remember (which is basically middle school government class). After all what does it all really mean?

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.

Supposing that it does mean people can own and keep guns for their own person protection. Why do people need concealed weapons? Personally, I don't feel protected knowing someone has a pistol tucked into his cowboy boots. (Granted the cowboy boots alone make me really uncomfortable.) And what do people need machine guns for? They were not designed to protect people? They were meant to kill people aefficientlyly as possible (no reloads makes that easy).

To those politicians who vote down bills banning automatic weapon ownership, I want to know why! Under today's laws, convicted criminals can legally own automatic weapons. All that talk about how "guns don't kill people, people kill people" smacks or NRA propaganda (I wanted to use a bad word, but restrained myself) . But ignoring it for the moment, how can anyone justify putting such devices of mass destruction (I like to call them D.M.D though some might dare call them W.M.D and they exist right here in America!) in the hands of people known to be violent? Perhaps we already know where our next war will be fought.