Future freedoms

I always smile when folks who do not quite qualify as Supreme Court justices begin to selectively dissect our Constitution, imposing their personal interpretation of what different amendments really mean. Such rigorous academic exercises seem to be limited almost exclusively to our Constitution’s Second Amendment.

The Dec. 28 letter “Bear these arms” espoused the belief that, because the framers of our Constitution could not possibly have envisioned “assault weapons and high-capacity magazines” back in 1791, these weapons should clearly be banned. Nice logic, so let’s continue down this path. Following this line of reasoning, I assume the letter-writer and his like-minded friends also support the notion that Freedom of the Press, as found in the First Amendment, applies only to newspapers and printed periodicals, specifically those produced with a quill pen or on paper made from rags.

As our founders could not have possibly foreseen the motion picture industry, television or the Internet in the 18th century, Freedom of the Press as found in the First Amendment should not apply to these. Obviously, we need more stringent government intervention, similar to that found in North Korea and China, to suppress such free expression of thoughts and ideas. Sound good?

Scott V. Cooper

Raleigh