Another 2A Screed
In response to this Slate article, I wrote another 2A screed. Nothing new here, for me, but a for-some-reason necessary reiteration of the obvious.
I won't pretend that this comment will change the author's mind. He's stuck in progressive wonderland, where words mean what he wants them to mean. But it may embolden some lurkers.
Unlike much of the slime that oozes out of DC these days, the Constitution was written in plain language. "Shall not be infringed" is the strongest restriction on state power in the entire document. It means exactly that. The state may place no limitations whatsoever on the right of the people to keep and bear arms. That means every single gun control statute ever passed, federal, state, or municipal, is unconstitutional on its face, hence null and void. The National Firearms Act (NFA), the 1968 Gun Control Act (GCA), the 1986 machine gun ban (FOPA, so-called Firearm Owners' Protection Act), the Brady Bill, Feinstein's new "Automatic Gunfire Protection Act", all of them, null and void.
The militia clause means that infringing on the right of the people to keep and bear arms is treason. What else do you call an act that endangers "the security of a free state"? Treason is a capital offense.
But it doesn't even matter. The Bill of Rights does not create any rights. It simply highlights important pre-existing rights, and attempts to remove them from the domain of legislation. A right is supposed to be something that no legislation may impede. But one of the fears of that time has occurred, and many, even those who support particular amendments, see the Bill of Rights as the source of those rights, not merely a high wall telling legislators, in impossible-to-misunderstand-unless-you're-a-lawyer language, "Thou shalt not venture herein."
As a living being, I have a right to defend my life, and the lives of my loved ones, using whichever tools I find useful for that purpose. I have a right to defend my life from aggressors of all stripes; badges and titles make no difference. A gun is the most useful tool invented to date for that defense. If you would deny me access to guns, any guns, you are denying my right to life. How dare you.