On Wed, Nov 12, 2008 at 6:33 AM, Scott Stroz <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I find it interesting that liberals will defend the 1st amendment until they > are blue in the face, but are willing to throw the next one out the window. >
There are two major reasons I see for this. One is that the first amendment is a lot more clearly written than the second. As I'm sure you know, the Supreme Court just had its very first case that directly addressed whether the 2nd amendment applied to individual gun ownership or group ownership (a well regulated militia). That's a long to be debate about the plain text meaning of a part of the constitution. I'm not sure that the most recent decision really settled the matter, but its a start. The second reason is that guns kill people and words don't. I can defend the right of of white supremacists to spout of hateful rhetoric and be sure that the words, odious as they are, aren't going to physically damage anyone I love. There are well established exceptions to the first amendment for speech that directly incites violence, so arguing for all other sorts of unpopular speech is safe if at times nauseating. The margin of error when dealing with guns is not as great as when dealing with words. Words don't accidentally go off in freak accidents, they don't get found and used by kids because parents forgot to lock them up, etc. I'm still a supporter of the 2nd amendment and particularly the right of individuals to bear arms. But yeah, the positive effect and potentially harmful effects of the 1st and 2nd amendments? No contest, the 1st amendment means a heck of a lot more to our society. Judah ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:280011 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
