>which is the fork and which the original ... is a matter of sometimes heated opinion.

I don't care too much about that. I am interested in which is better though.

Which is better?

He wants more than fame, he wants to establish Russia as a global power, again. Problem is, his economy is mostly natural resourced exporting - which means it's pretty weak on manufacturing or services.

Snowden was probably ordering a pizza and his recorded voice was mixed and dubbed into the phone call.

In any case, everything you need to know about Putin's "Open Russia" you can tell from his control of all media.

There's a lot of lip-service being paid to 'zero tolerance'... I haven't seen any actions.

"Zero tolerance" policies only serve to extend bullying. Practically speaking, there is intrinsically a huge amount of leeway granted to teachers and administrators to who is subjected to 'zero tolerance' policies under which circumstances. A black kid is suspended for waving to the camera in a photo. A girl is strip searched and suspended for allegedly sharing over-the-counter medication. A girl takes a razor from another student threatening self-harm and throws it directly in the trash and she gets suspended (and recommended for expulsion) for having a weapon when she reports the incident to the teachers. I guaran-fucking-tee you that if that girl had been rich and white and popular the school would have never tried to punish her. People are punished because they are disliked, punished because they are weak, and then ultimately punished for being punished.

I could list these stories all day long. Zero tolerance is just an excuse for administrators to come up with ridiculous bullshit charges against vulnerable students and then claim that their "hands are tied" to deflect public backlash. The reason the teachers and principle lost their shit during recording incident is because it exposed their complicity with bullying.

I hope this kid learned his lesson. Next time, don't go the teachers, don't go to your parents, go to YouTube. Make that shit go viral. And when they inevitably try to punish you just lie. You don't know who recorded the incident, you don't know where the video came from, you don't know who uploaded it, it probably the kids who have been relentlessly bullying you uploaded it so they could mock you online but you don't know. Stick to your guns no matter what.

I'm sorry kid. I wish I could recommend a course of action that didn't require you to lie. I wish I knew a morally pristine way to protect yourself, but the fact is that there isn't one. That's just the nature of the world you live in.

In your opinion. I clearly disagree, finding more agreement with Breyer's dissent in McDonald v. Chicago (2010) that incorporation under the 14th was inappropriate because it is not a fundamental, individual right.

The Second is the only Amendment in the Bill of Rights that explicitly explains the intent behind the right enumerated there -- that the ownership of firearms is intended for the establishment of well functioning militias. That means the right is limited and not fundamental, and the government should have a free hand to regulate so long as that purpose is not thwarted. To hold otherwise is to regulate the militia clause meaningless. I do not think any phrase in the Constitution should be treated so.

Well, if you're going to completely disregard the Second, then you must at least look to the Tenth, which held that powers not reserved by the federal government belong to the States or to the people. Note that "the States" is capitalized as a formal term in the same way that "State" is in the Second and in the rest of the Constitution. Once again, this points to the explicit, focused intent of the Amendment to address state and local concerns.

Furthermore, its very clear from the rest of the Constitution that the founders intended the States to still have a large role in the life of their citizens. The structure of the Senate is the clearest expression of that intent, giving an entire house of the legislature over to (originally) state-appointed representatives, balanced between the states.

Yes, it is. Any misinterpretation of the constitution is an undermining of its intent and effect, regardless of whether that results in a situation you like or not, and the pure individual right interpretation of the Second Amendment undermines states' rights.

Yes, it was made up of the people, but the whole phrase "well-regulated" is not mere puffery. It means a militia in proper and working order, and it explicitly referenced as "being necessary to the security of a free State." The governments of the states have long been held to have the right to regulate arms within that context, and the federal government has the right to regulate firearms that do not have a purpose in a militia. (See US v. Miller (1939) on regulation of sawed-off shotguns.)

Unless a state passed a law saying that you didn't, by your own statement.

Actually, I view the Second Amendment as a state's right and support the right of the states to regulate arms, seeing at the concept of a militia is directly tied to the state power and not individual power. If a state wants to ban handguns and keep only a professional militia (e.g. the National Guard), that should be their right.

Title II weapons are heavily regulated in ways that handguns cannot be, under current standards. The federal government as the power to regulate them -- even the power to outright ban them. The fact that they have not exercised that power is no proof that they don't. Even DC v. Heller (2008), the case that nailed down the notion that firearm ownership was an individual right, upheld the notion that it only applies to certain types of weapons (referring to US v. Miller (1939).

And that's my point. A strict reading of the Second Amendment in no way forbids the government from preventing private citizens from having ordnance. It only guarantees the right to bear arms, not ordnance.

If you want to see it on a small scale, well ask yourself why the US has been unable to secure Afghanistan or Iraq. They had considerably more forces than your silly "1 aircraft carrier" scenario, it was hardly the whole population fighting, yet after years and years, they have been unable to secure the countries.

Mod parent up.

Anyone who thinks that modern, asymmetrical warfare means trading blows with similar weapon systems hasn't been paying attention to the last DECADE PLUS of our history.

There isn't a Taliban air force yet the Taliban is still around despite our air force bombing them for years.

william bonney would have been proud...

(yeah, simpsons ref.)

Blaming the committee, group or department is a cop out. You should know that by now.

Then what do you say to all the justices that effectively voted to nullify any meaning of the term "well-regulated militia" in the 2nd Amendment?

Not much, if the militia clause is given effect as a state's right instead of an individual one. Then again, there's not much for the citizens to say if a state wanted to define its militia as a purely professional force and outright ban private ownership either under that scenario.

No, in the 18th century there was already a clear separation between man-portable "arms" and larger "ordnance," and all the examples you mention would definitely qualify as ordnance. You *might* be able to make an argument for chemical & biological weapons, but any sane court would by long precedence consider those to be outside of the realm of what a citizen's militia should possess.