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Every gun nut quotes the following passage from the Constitution:

"A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

This, they argue, means that every American has the right to own virtually any weapon, including assault rifles.

What utter nonsense.

First of all, the founding fathers lived in a world in which "arms" meant swords, bayonets and single shot rifles. They had no notion of the incredibly deadly firepower gun nuts have access to today.

And if, as the gun nuts would have you do, you believe that the Constitution should be interpreted this literally, it should be clear that the founding fathers also felt that slavery should be perpetuated.

What they gloss over is the "well regulated militia" part of the passage above. Any reasonable person would conclude that this passage is about having a military. Because gun nuts are anything but reasonable, they just don't get it.

So, the Constitutionality argument doesn't hold water in any case. Gun control laws make sense to everyone except for paranoid, silly gun nuts.

Learn more about this author, Bruce Pilgrim.
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