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Opinion: Carrying weapons a human right

Politicians and their allies who want you unable to defend yourself from violent attackers are at it again.

They are pushing for more anti-gun rules. I don’t say “laws” because they can’t be laws -- the U.S. Constitution makes all such rules illegal. You can’t have an illegal law. Even the Supreme Court has admitted this, although they apparently try to play both sides.

Even those supposedly on the side of liberty fall into the trap of using the enemies’ words, sometimes calling standard semi-automatic rifles “assault rifles.”

They aren’t. An assault rifle is capable of firing automatically; it continues to fire bullets with only one pull of the trigger until the trigger is released or the ammunition runs out. An assault rifle is a machine gun -- which, by the way, is something everyone has a natural right to own and to carry, in spite of what politicians claim.

A semi-automatic rifle shoots only one bullet with each trigger pull, no matter how fast or hard you pull the trigger.

At least assault rifles are real, unlike “assault weapons.” Those don’t exist except in the minds of anti-liberty activists. The term can be traced back to 1988 when anti-gun activist Josh Sugarmann wrote that this term should be used because it would confuse people who were clueless about firearms and would increase public support for anti-gun rules. It was a calculated lie from the start.

Well-meaning people argue over which weapons the Second Amendment covers, and by doing so demonstrate they’ve missed the point. The Second Amendment doesn’t “cover” any weapons -- not just firearms, either -- because the entire purpose of the Bill of Rights is to tell the people what government is not allowed to do. Making up rules about weapons is one of those explicitly prohibited things.

It doesn’t make exceptions if you believe something is “too dangerous” or unpopular.

Proposing an anti-gun rule and pretending it is law is a serious crime. It should be treated as such ... and would be if more people understood what is going on.

The good news is no matter what rules the political criminals impose, the natural human right to own and to carry whatever types of weapon they choose, everywhere they go, without asking permission from government, will forever remain unchanged. It doesn’t hinge on constitutions or politicians’ opinions and it never will.

Farwell’s Kent McManigal champions liberty. Contact him at:

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