In regard to the right to use reasonable force in self defense (so far no disagreements across the board), I submit that if you are deprived of the reasonable means of EFFECTIVE self defense you are in effect deprived of your right to reasonable self defense.
Self defense must by its nature be effective, or it is just a gesture of self defense (like screaming no no to a determined rapist, so that he can be charged in court later, if he does not strangle his victim and only witness in between).
This means I cannot erect a water cooled machine gun nest on my roof. Whether you can be deprived of semi-automatics, to be reasonable you would have to look at the self defense environment and see if a semi is proportional to the threat, but then there are other uses of semis. I suspect not, as no criminal would take on a home invasion if they thought the inhabitant had "just" a semi auto .22LR at hand. Any bang stick would do. The other issue is out and about rather than home self-defense and here we have the issue of hand guns. In other words, as much as I disagree with the Government's decision, semi confiscation does not impact on anyones right to effective self-defense.
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