Sept PF and Sept-Oct LD

I found a position piece from the NRA in a quick lookup for the September PF topic. I loved this: they used the phrase “assault weapons,” i.e., they enclosed the words in quotes, a sort of typographical sneer if you will, and certainly the kind of usage I love to see in political debate. It’s the same as calling an estate tax a death tax. If we want to ban assault weapons, no quotes, we want to ban dangerous weapons that have no reasonable purpose but to kill innocent people, preferably in great quantities. If we want to ban so-called “assault weapons,” on the other hand, we are abridging our constitutional right to protect ourselves and our families.

What a crock.

Anyhow, I love the idea of arguing gun rights. It is probably the most complex constitutional issue that people generally ever get their heads around these days, aside from the belief that somehow the Founders thought we should all be good Christians and that this is somehow written into the document, except that the latter is patently untrue while the former, i.e., the right to bear arms, is, if you’ll pardon the expression, debatable.

There are specifics that one needs to study. The Federal Assault Weapons Ban is specifically referenced, so first of all, what exactly is it and why was it enacted? Of course, from my LD background, I’m always first and foremost interested in the why should we or why shouldn’t we, the inherent moral and ethical issues. But of course there are also the real world analyses: what happens if we do, what happens if we don’t. Good stuff. I’m not sure how it will play out in rounds, but for most folks around here, it’s a one-shot at the Pups and then we move on.

On the LD side of things, I like the study of due process, but I’m not terribly convinced that there’s a good argument to follow due process in some crimes and not others, depending on either the crime or the accused. I mean, if the US stands for anything, it stands for justice, and there is no justice without due process, but what do I know? So for me, LD is an easy vote for the aff, but then again, I won’t judge a single round, so no one has to worry that I’m prejudiced. At the point where we can pick up any scary looking non-citizens off the street and toss them in the pokey and throw away the key without a warrant (literally and LDy), we might as well be some totalitarian hellhole like, oh, Canada for instance. But as I say, the study of this topic will be good for the brains of the assembled multitudes, especially novices. I like seeing an educational topic in that Sept-Oct slot. There’s nothing about this that would shake my faith in the Modest Novice, of course, but we’ve all seen worse. Plenty worse.