flynn23 wrote:
Although I do have serious reservations about the TYPES of weapons owned. You can collect WW2 rifles or even historic machine guns, but there's no reason why someone should have an operational M2 or an AK47, both of which I know of several people who possess.

Is that for you to decide? Let's say you live alone in a rural area, with no immediate neighbors, and four or five armed thugs decide to invade your home. You might be better served by an H&K USP, an StG44, a SIG 510-4, etc. than a six shot revolver in .38 Special. Each of us should be able to decide which weapons are appropriate for our specific circumstances. I live in an apartment, so semi-automatic pistols in .45ACP and short-barreled 12 gauge shotguns make more sense for me, because they're unlikely to penetrate walls, but very likely to stop a criminal in his tracks. While I do own plenty of other military-style and hunting firearms, they wouldn't be good first choices for defense of my apartment, or for defending myself on the street. Were I to buy a house in an isolated area, I might have different requirements, which might include fully automatic fire.

Not that our discussion of self-defense is irrelevant, but people seem to forget that personal self-defense isn't the primary reason that we need the Second Amendment. We have both the First and Second Amendments to ensure that We The People remain in charge of this nation, by remaining in charge of our government. If we, as individual citizens, lose the right to free speech and the right to arm ourselves, all other rights become illusions, and we lose everything.

RE: Guns for Safety? Dream On, Scalia. - washingtonpost.com