The Last Resort of the Delusional Rebel

I've always been a bit frightened by conservatives who insist that the 2nd amendment is necessary because the threat of armed revolt is the only thing preserving our liberty. Partly, in that it suggests that their love of guns is based upon a delusional fantasy of them combating our military Wolverine-style (ala Red Dawn, not X-Men). And partly because it suggests that these people are unhinged enough to believe our society is so close to government takeover that we're down to our last line of defense: Armed rebellion. I can feel the black helicopters circling already.

And I'm reminded of this reading Republican Senate candidate Marco Rubio saying "I have a feeling the situation in Iran would be a little different if they had a 2nd amendment like ours." Yeah, because that's the only thing that's stopping that from happening here.

And seriously, if Iran had our 1st, 4th, 5th, and 6th amendments, I don't think they'd be needing that 2nd one right now. And it's the lack of all these other rights that would make the 2nd one useful right now. And so Rubio expresses support for the amendment which could lead to civil war in Iran, while ignoring the ones that would make war unnecessary.

But to conservatives, their shotguns and assault rifles are the only things preserving these other amendments, so the 2nd one is the one for them. And too many of them sound as if they'd actually prefer that the government test their ability to defend themselves; as if the mundaneness of modern life is simply too taxing on their manly sense of duty. They'd rather fight our government than have it work to make their lives better. As I said, frightening.

American conservatives: Protecting American liberty one gun at a time.