ok, this is a gunuine question, I would like to try to understand this, and I promise not to argue or point out if I disagree with your position.

some body on one of the gun threads wrote about wanting to "excersize" his second ammendment rights - sort of carrying a gun to protect the right to carry a gun, I guess. does that extend to other rights? should we all excersize our right to free speech by standing in public and saying a lot of stupid hateful things? is that equally patriotic? what about abortion? there seems to be a right to have abortion, I don't think that abortion is a good thing, but I am glad that there is a right to access of legal abortions. should I get an abortion every few years, to excersize the constitutional right?

on AAAC, there seems to be a feeling that the very act of having a huge number of citizens carrying guns in the US makes the US safe from everything. honestly, this seems to me to be magical thinking - I can't see any rational thought behind this at all. sort of like believing that if we pray that the rains will come, as far as I can see. can anybody explain this to me (and, not by explaining how 100,000 middle aged untrained men with pearl handled 45's are going to stop a column of tanks, that is not rational reasoning, I mean the concept that the very existance of firearms makes the world a better place)

thank you