Reply #3: You're making a poorly-substantiated leap

[Orrex]

If you attack anyone with a deadly weapon, you forfeit your Rights, and specifically, your right to live.

What is your basis for that statement? Why does "deadly weapon" equal "forfeiture of right to live" rather than "right to freedom" or something similar? What if no cop is nearby--does any ol' bystander have the "right" to kill the attacker?

Please understand that if I'm attacked and have a reasonable expectation of harm or death, I will fight off my attacker by any means at my disposal. But I don't pretend that I'm magically justified to do whatever I feel like doing just because the jerk had a knife. Instead, I accept that my actions (ie., killing him) will have consequences, and I elect to live with those consequences.

If a guy attacks me with a crowbar, for example, and our fight ends with neither of us jailed or dead, am I free to hunt him down five years later and kill him because he forfeited his right to life half a decade earlier?

Where do you see the limit of this forfeiture, or is it permanently irreversible? Even if we agree that the attacker has forfeited his life, why does that give me the "right" to kill him?