In all honesty, perhaps America could opt for tighter gun control, i'll be damned if I know how but if you put funding into it it may be possible. I'm not talking legal firearms, i'm talking the illegal trade. Still, like I said, f*** knows how to go about imposing tighter restrictions. I'll leave that to someone brighter or in a better position to make that decision than me and, if the US taxpayers don't want to then it's their decision. Britain has its own system, which also works.

In short, if you have an increased number of guns legally produced in the US then it means Bob down the road has easier access to pawning off the guns illegally. Am I in any way slighting the American way of life or the constitution? No. America has its own way of life, payed for an supported by the democratic majority. So does the UK. The same would apply to drugs, regardless of the fact that it is not significant the so conversation. So when Pro says 'I don't understand this mentality', well, he's not part of this country, I don't expect him to. I'm sure the making replica samurai swords illegal will reduce the number of replica samurai sword related fatalities (which I am sure is exceptionally high - ??) - you could probably count the annual number of fatalities on two hands, maybe even one hand.

Also, the people bearing arms doesn't mean they will strike fear into the government, or be able to overcome the government in civil war. Lets be honest, the government will exist so long as the majority support it. As soon as they lose that overwhelming majority support then they are gone. Even if a minority was kitted out like Stallone in a Rambo movie it wouldn't change the government, so long as the majority of people still supported them. Who in the government except the most stalwart idealists will remain true to a cause when all their friends and family disagree with them? It takes decades of indoctrination to force your opinions on people. I agree that the government should fear the people though or at least be respectful of the people.

The most unsettling thing about recent Government (i'm not sure about the US, i'll speak for the UK here) is that regardless of a very large anti-Iraq war sentiment, they (and by 'they' I mean Tony Blair) ignored the protests and went straight ahead and did it. I certainly remember a very vocal opposition to the war in this country. But that is a completely different issue. I thought i'd throw it in because of your earlier comment about Iraq being a clusterf***. It was certainly touch and go for them.