My attitude towards those 100,000 people is one of concern, but not so much that I feel the need to give up my right to defend myself. You throw out these stats, young people, women, and you cry bitter liberal tears. How many of those "young people" are in drug gangs? How many of those 100,000 were committing crimes themselves when they were shot and killed. Obviously there are some, and obviously there are some innocent bystanders. How many MORE people would have died had people not been able to defend themselves with deadly force in kind? You act like these people are all going to be alive today if guns were legislated away. Some would, for sure, but some wouldn't.

"I want to remove "tool" used to threaten me to begin with."

You're never going to remove the tool. Guns exist, people have them, governments have them. To undo what has been invented is impossible. To say that you're going to ban the manufacture of them, and only give them to police and the military is very very dangerous.

@ Putin, you're trying so hard to protect everyone, you care so much about those people that die due to guns, that you're forgetting about the people that were SAVED due to a gun, and you're being glib about them, saying that such things never happen.

Yeah, I get it that gun toters think that 100,000 people is a price worth paying because they think they're all urban gangsters who like to kill each other.

"How many MORE people would have died had people not been able to defend themselves with deadly force in kind?"

I'm sick of repeating the fact that self-defense occurs far less often than accidental gun death and/or murder. No amount of sloganeering changes that.

Mr. Moskowitz, did you manage to read this far:

"Neither the text of the Amendment nor the arguments advanced by its proponents evidenced the slightest interest in limiting any legislature’s authority to regulate private civilian uses of firearms. Specifically, there is no indication that the Framers of the Amendment intended to enshrine the common-law right of self-defense in the Constitution."

Just to hammer home the point.

"In 1934, Congress enacted the National Firearms Act, the first major federal firearms law.1 Upholding a conviction under that Act, this Court held that, “[i]n the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a ‘shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length’ at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument.” Miller, 307 U. S., at 178. The view of the Amendment we took in Miller—that it protects the right to keep and bear arms for certain military purposes, but that it does not curtail the Legislature’s power to regulate the nonmilitary use and ownership of weapons—is both the most natural reading of the Amendment’s text and the interpretation most faithful to the history of its adoption.

Since our decision in Miller, hundreds of judges have relied on the view of the Amendment we endorsed there;2 we ourselves affirmed it in 1980. See Lewis v. United States, 445 U. S. 55 , n. 8 (1980).3 No new evidence has surfaced since 1980 supporting the view that the Amendment was intended to curtail the power of Congress to regulate civilian use or misuse of weapons."

you're sick of repeating it, but you're not thinking about the people that owe their lives to the presence of a gun. If it were your wife/child/sibling/etc. and there was only 1 such self-defense incident and it happened to be them, wouldn't you be grateful? You call me glib about those people, but I think a lot of those people are going to be killed whether there is a ban on guns or not. You mock the right of self-defense, you mock the duty of a father to his wife and children. That duty is very real, and very ancient. I am not a cowboy, nor an urban gangster, I don't want to shoot anyone and an handle my weapons with the respect they're due. But make no mistake about it, if I need to I will do my damnedest to keep someone from hurting my wife and children. Can you say the same?

All you want is the killing to stop, and for that I respect you. But, you're method is to infringe upon other peoples' right, and that is against everything that our Republic stands for.

"If it were your wife/child/sibling/etc. and there was only 1 such self-defense incident and it happened to be them, wouldn't you be grateful?"

And what if I die because some asshole legally got a gun and decided to shoot me in the back. Should I be "'grateful" then?
And how many tens of thousands of people die because of easy access to guns? Should they be "grateful"?

Yes, and again Justice Stevens is not debating the existence of an individual right to bear arms. He's talking about the scope of that right.

*Bear arms* meaning use arms for military purposes. He over and over again demonstrates that there is no personal civilian right to use weapons. Right underneath where you quote, he says the following: "The Second Amendment plainly does not protect the right to use a gun to rob a bank; it is equally clear that it does encompass the right to use weapons for certain military purposes. Whether it also protects the right to possess and use guns for nonmilitary purposes like hunting and personal self-defense is the question presented by this case. The text of the Amendment, its history, and our decision in United States v. Miller, 307 U. S. 174 (1939) , provide a clear answer to that question."

The answer to that question being no, there is no "right" to use weapons for nonmilitary purposes.

No you shouldn't be grateful. But you're claiming that if the US would just ban firearms all together than your nightmare scenario wouldn't happen and that is a patently false assumption. Further, it is an assumption upon which your entire argument is based. How many tens of thousands of people don't die because of easy access to guns? You say not very many, and I say if it is ANY then it is significant. You're claiming that the life of one that is shot and killed if more important than the life of one that is saved by a gun. How can you make that judgment?

So unless each and every single person is somehow a military reservist or militia member , the idea that the Constitution enshrines a personal right to own weapons is bogus. The 2nd Amendment ceased to be relevant when we began relying on a standing army rather than militias for common defense. The whole reason why the 2nd amendment was implemented was because Standing Armies were deemed to be a threat to liberty and that the militias would be disbanded.

You're saving the lives of a handful who might be saved by personal firearm use outweighs the many tens of thousands who are shot accidentally or murdered because of personal firearm use. How can you make *that* judgment?

I hope you tell your family that you political views and your sadness for the thousands of people killed by guns each year won't allow you to defend them should they need it.

I can make that judgment because it's the RIGHT to defend oneself and one's family that is at issue here, not the number of people killed. People have an inherent right to defend themselves, and a gun is a tool by which to express that right.

I hope you tell your family killed that your political views and your need for personal gun use for recreation is why guns are in the hands of millions of people who might kill them. I guess you're going to have to lock them in a closet if you think you alone can protect them from harm.

Once again, you're bleeding heart wants to enact policy to protect people from evils of gun use at the expense of the right of people to defend themselves. Sounds like how we should all give up our rights because there are terrorist wanting to do us harm and the government needs more legal leeway to catch them. Bring on the Ben Franklin quote!

What good is the "right" to self-defense if you're dead?

It's the bleeding heart liberals who oppose the invasive laws against privacy and warrantless searches. You manly conservatives are the ones who think we shouldn't worry so long as we're not terrorists.

"Bring on the Ben Franklin quote!"

Ben Franklin can lecture about security from the safety of his Parisian brothel.

Stop with the hyperbole Putin. You act like everyone in the nation is dying from gun violence, and that every time someone goes outside they're getting shot.

"What good is the "right" to self-defense if you're dead?"

That is right there with, "What do I have to fear from the government, they can search me without a warrant, etc., I'm not doing anything wrong."

you're arguments are becoming more and more pathetic as we go. I respect you stance, and you ability to quote court cases etc. But to sit there and tell me that my right to defend myself and my family is no good because I am going to be dead from gun violence is asinine. You go give up all your rights, which I am sure you would, to make sure everyone is safe. That is perhaps the most Anti-American stance once can take.

I am neither a liberal nor a conservative thank you very much...so don't paint me with those broad strokes. I am pleased that those on the left are in opposition to those draconian laws. My right to defend myself is unalienable, it comes from the creator, and cannot be taken away.

One shot, one kill. If everyone had a gun and was trained there would be less collateral damage and fewer trials for those who initiate gun violence.

I am all for the removal of guns from our society, if it is a true removal of ALL guns, not just the legal guns, and the guns of the private citizen. That will never happen, therefore, its banning guns outright is impossible.

"Stop with the hyperbole Putin. "

Says the one who thinks the only thing protecting us from government tyranny is our access to guns, and the one thinks guns are being used for "self-defense" all the time.

"That is perhaps the most Anti-American stance once can take."

Your appeals to nationalism work about as well as your appeals to masculinity with me. I once again point out that the people who declared "America" as a country had a much more restrictive view of license & liberty than you do. Thomas Jefferson sued anybody who disagreed with him with seditious libel laws. He personally launched a politically motivated judicial witchhunt against his nemesis Aaron Burr.

I take offense when liberals want me to give up rights to protect others, and when conservatives want me to do the same to protect me from others. The right-left paradigm is in full effect, both sides are essentially the same, they just go about things in a different manner.

I'm in favor of more chlorine being used in the gene pool.

Guns are being used all the time in self-defense. A gun doesn't have to be drawn or shot to be a tool of self-defense. Gun ownership has a huge deterrent effect upon would be assailants and criminals. Unfortunately, the opposite effect is seen when the would be assailants and criminals are confident that the people are unarmed -- i.e., easy prey.

"If everyone had a gun and was trained there would be less collateral damage and fewer trials for those who initiate gun violence."

The Swiss system has worked so well they had a referendum to change it.

http://www.24heures.ch/actu/suisse/armes-feu-coeur-drames-familiaux-2010-02-08

Let me ask you this Putin, do you think the pendulum that is the United States government has swung in the direction of tyranny or freedom?