On Wednesday 23 Oct 2002 6:09 pm, you wrote:
> You know the founding fathers had a reason for the firearms clause in the
> 2nd amendment. It was not to protect the rights of people to have a gun to
> hunt, it was  not even to protect the right to have a gun to protect
> yourself from criminals (even though these are legitimate uses for guns) it
> was put that so that the populance would have guns  to protect themselves
> from,,,, GOVERNMENT.... OUR FOUNDING FATHERS assumed that a well armed
> populance would overthrow a government that got too oppressive.
>
> Amazing what you learen reading the writing of  the founders, is it any
> surprize that an opressive government either limits what you can read or in
> our case see to it that most people do not learn to read.
>

I'd have thought universal suffrage was the best defense against oppressive
government. Arming the populace seems to me to be an  excellent recipe to
empower extremist groups. I shan't even get onto the negative aspects of
having a written constitution in the first place. ;-)

Cheers

Deri