A few years ago I heard a Christian say that the most stupid thing he ever heard was, "When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns." He was a dolt, of course, but his thought processes, if he had any, were corrupted by sentiment and emotional fluff. I tried to explain that it meant that the outlaws will never give up their guns, so when citizens give theirs up only the outlaws will have them. He couldnt, or wouldn't, understand something so simple. The framers of the Constitution didn't have any illusions about human nature, or the nature of governments running on sentimentality, so they secured the right of every lawabiding citizen to have a weapon, because only armed citizens can secure the liberty of the state. There are bad guys, you know, and if you leave all the guns with them, they will rule your block.

Rich Lowry on Gun Control & Toys on National Review Online: "Unfortunately, [Brooklyn Democratic Congressman Ed] Towns, the scourge of toy guns, is not some outrider. Similar proposals are bubbling up in state legislatures, and it's impossible to buy a decent toy gun from Toys 'R' Us. Too bad. As Chesterton wrote earlier this century about a different toy and its attraction: 'The toy sword is the abstraction and emanation of the heroic, apart from all its horrible accidents. It is the soul of the sword, that will never be stained with blood.' The toy-gun banners will never understand that — or the souls of boys."