2nd Amendment Purpose and Limits

I think the purpose of the 2nd amendment is to guarantee that the people have a right to defend themselves, even against a corrupt government if necessary. It's important for this to stay in the constitution so that people easily recognize any attempts to prohibiting them from owning weapons.

The 2nd amendment was written at a time when the weapons a man used to hunt or defend his territory were not much different than the weapons infantrymen carried into battle. Armies had cannons and grenades, but these were not used for police action against citizens.

Today, the weapons available to our military and police are far superior to those we use for self defense and for hunting, their training is excellent, and they have an operational and logistical capability unrivaled anywhere on the planet. What kinds of weapons should civilians have in order to defend against a (hypothetically) corrupt government and military forces with such strengths?

Clearly, it doesn't make sense for citizens to buy and store grenades, machine guns, tanks, cannons, and missiles. The safety and maintenance procedures alone can be a full time job (this is just one reason we have an active duty military force even during times of peace). Even if training on using this equipment were offered to any interested citizen, I would hesitate to be a neighbor to someone who stores bombs in their basement or back yard.

On the other hand, we should not arbitrarily limit the kind of weapons that individuals are allowed to possess. Our rights should not be subject to whims, knee-jerk reactions, or fashion. If we need to limit weapon ownership, it must be in a very deliberate, thoughtful way.

I think the distinction should be made between weapons that are useful against specific individuals and weapons that are "area weapons" or cause an amount of damage that is enough to destroy structures or injure bystanders and not just targeted individuals. So, using this guideline: clubs, knives, swords, pistols, and rifles are all weapons that are easy to target to specific individuals and in the hands of a reasonable operator are unlikely to cause harm to someone other than the intended target or to cause great collateral damage. So I'm intentionally discounting any occurrence of someone flailing a sword wildly in a crowd or shooting wildly into a crowd. However, grenades, rocket launchers, machine guns, and tanks are all area weapons and have a potential to cause great collateral damage and should be restricted to military use.

The police should be restricted to individual weapons the same as are authorized for individual citizens. If a criminal is using area weapons or explosives then the police must call the national guard for assistance. In this event, the national guard should not hesitate to kill the criminal if necessary to stop the violence. As soon as the violence as ended the national guard mission is over and the police resume their investigation.

If the deceased criminals had any possessions these may be used to repay some damages but unfortunately it's common for violent criminals not to own much. In this case the community should band together to support its victims, and be comforted by the fact that taxpayers are not paying any money to clothe, feed, and house (in prison) criminals who used advanced weapons to hurt others.