How come:

1) ...there's a whole bunch of anti-gun posts on this thread, then someone who likes guns - or considers them a necessary evil for responsible citizens as long as the criminals and the government have them - speaks up, and there's a yell of "no more talk about guns, we've done that to death already?" One would almost think it's only right to talk about guns in Mudcat if you have the "right" (well, left, actually) opinion.

2) ...the First Amendment is sacred, absolute, and inviolable but the Second isn't? Who chooses? I blame TV's promotion of violence as normal and customary behavior as much as, or more than, I blame the weapon. (Note: it's been pointed out, perfectly correctly, that when the Bill of Rights was enacted, "arms" meant flintlock muskets and muzzle-loading brass cannon; and argued that those are the only arms that are protected. Okay, at that time "speech" meant face-to-face speech, and "the press" meant paper and ink. No electronic media. So should the government be free to restrict telephone or internet conversations as it wishes?)

Peter (who is rather fond of guns, but is terrified of guns in the hands of criminals, fools, untrained and unsupervised children....and of some police officers who are all three.)