(1) The T.P. thing happened in the mid 70s on the heels of "The Great Gasoline Shortage" with long lines at the pumps,etc. I lived in
Northern Virginia and worked in Washington, DC at the time. My point was suppose the system of food delivery most urban folks rely on was seriously disrupted.
    (2) (You evidently don't care for Mr Jefferson's owning slaves. Neither do I. But that doesn't make his ideas automatically wrong. BTW, in both the declaration of independence and the constitution itself, he attempted to prohibit slaverey.) I most definitely disagree with the notion that those framers of the constitution are irrelevant to the modern world. Good point about hunting for meat, though, definitely food for thought. (The pun is accidental.) Nevertheless, I still reserve the right and the tools to provide food for myself and my family.
    Every time a gun-control law is passed, the anti-gun people say "that's one more step." Toward what? In my experience, and according to their stated views, the "gun-control" advocates make no distinction between types of firearms, and their ultimate goal is the elimination of any sort of privately owned firearm, including BB guns and flintlock muskets.
    (3) (Tom Jefferson is not my "buddy." He was already a middle aged man when I was born.) The Afghanis did a pretty fair job of halting the Russians and all their high-tech war equipment for many years, and I have first-hand experience with the "primitive" Viet Cong facing the "modern" American army.
    (4)Its been said that given the choice, the vast majority of people would choose tyranny over anarchy. (As a law abiding Muslim, walking around an airport with an UZI would certainly speed up the strip search business.) The erosion of civil liberties is a creeping disease spread by those in power who wish to stay in power, be they liberal or conservative. The end result of that is a tyrannical, dictatorial government. But I expect that wouldn't happen here without a fight - that's what the 2nd ammendment is about.
    (5) The police have guns to protect themselves from the bad guys. Has nothing to do with rates of apprehension. Even though I don't go out of my way to mix with the bad guys, unlike the police, my reasoning is the same. I think there's a double standard there.
    How about my question of having only the police and the army armed?

O'Meara

ps is this getting too complicated for a mudcat thread?