....for the whole "tyranny of the government" rationale to make any sense whatsoever. Because as powerful as an AR-15 may be against other civilians, it's still child's play against military weaponry. So in the extreme hypothetical of an actual tyrant running the government and commanding the armed forces (something that we've never, ever been even remotely close to in the 237 years of this nation), without massive military defection or foreign intervention, any civilian militia would be squashed like a bug.

But who, other than the most extreme "survivalists", would ever want to see private citizens be given the right to possess rpgs and heat seeking missiles?

in our state Militias, and so our representatives in Congress created the select Militia of volunteers called the National Guard.

As far as I know that regulated Militia still exists. THAT entity - the organized Militias - was THE force that was to balance tyranny, by reducing the need for a large standing army (which by the way the people also decided they wanted).

We the people chose to limit our role in the regulated Militias despite the 2nd amendment saying they were necessary. Seems contrary to think the people can't also decide to limit the 2nd's restrictions against infringement as it relates to arms, especially unrelated to the original intent of protecting the organized Militias.

This notion that the people are to secure themselves against tyranny via private arms, despite the continued existence of the Militias and without some sort of government regulation or even government interest, is plain ridiculous.

AND CRAZY FARMERS!!!

Impact on Constitution

Thomas Jefferson, who was serving as ambassador to France at the time, refused to be alarmed by Shays' Rebellion. In a letter to a friend, he argued that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing. "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure."[57] In contrast to Jefferson's sentiments George Washington, who had been calling for constitutional reform for many years, wrote in a letter to Henry Lee, "You talk, my good sir, of employing influence to appease the present tumults in Massachusetts. I know not where that influence is to be found, or, if attainable, that it would be a proper remedy for the disorders. Influence is not government. Let us have a government by which our lives, liberties, and properties will be secured, or let us know the worst at once."[58][59]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shays%27_Rebellion


http://www.saf.org/LawReviews/FinkelmanChicago.htm
Madison and his colleagues could not have predicted the Whiskey Rebellion, the Nullification crisis, or the Civil War. But they were shrewd enough to know that the lack of national military power¾and with it the power to disarm those who are in rebellion or might be in rebellion¾would undermine any national state. Having just created a stronger national state in the wake of Shays's Rebellion and similar rebellions in other states,[76] the Federalists in Congress, [Page 211] many of whom had been in the Philadelphia Convention, the state ratifying conventions, or both, took no steps to undermine the ability of the national government to protect itself from enemies without or rebels and traitors within.

If the Second Amendment had responded to the demands of the Pennsylvania minority and similar demands from other Antifederalists, the national government would have been severely, perhaps fatally, weakened from the beginning. Congress would have been unable to regulate the use, ownership, or display of firearms in those places where it has plenary jurisdiction, such as the District of Columbia, the federal territories, or overseas possessions and lands, such as present day Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

At the time of the drafting of the Constitution, "every state had gun control legislation on its books."[77] But, an amendment along the lines of the Pennsylvania Antifederalists' would have prevented such a law in the federal district.[78] It also might have prevented preemptive strikes against pirates, illegal slave traders (after 1808), filibusters preparing for the illegal invasion of Latin American countries,[79] or others gathering weapons for illegal purposes.