Bill Maher: It’s ‘Ridiculous,’ ‘Quaint’ & ‘Nonsensical’ to Think 2nd Amendment Can Prevent Tyranny

HBO host Bill Maher had MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell as one of his guests on "Real Time" Friday night, and the two were adamant that the Second Amendment cannot protect against tyranny (and that such a conversation shouldn't even really be happening in this age).

After pointing out the poll where 44% of Republicans said an armed revolution might be necessary in order to protect liberties in the next few years, compared to 18% of Democrats, Maher said:

"Can we get to, first of all, how ridiculous it is for people to think that the Second Amendment protects them from tyranny. Didn't Waco solve that? We just had the anniversary a couple of weeks ago. Remember Waco? You know what they had in Waco? They had like 1.9 million rounds of ammunition; they had .50 caliber machine guns; they had grenades...What did the government have? Everything else. The winner and still champion - the United States government. Thinking the Second Amendment protects you from tyranny is like thinking the First Amendment protects you from Thor. It's quaint. It's ridiculous. It's nonsensical. And they never get called [on] it!

After Pete Hegseth, a veteran, asked whether Maher couldn't imagine a scenario even in the abstract where liberty might need to be preserved at the point of a weapon, O'Donnell said to audience applause: "Zero. We're past it. We're past it!...This country [is] long past the point where you would ever have to rise in arms against this government."

When Hegseth said he should make his case to the rebels in Syria, O'Donnell countered: "These nuts are not talking about Syria -- 44% of the Republican lunatic party believes they might have to rise in arms...They're not talking about Syria."

O'Donnell and Maher also lamented how America tends to "romanticize" guns, playing a clip of Rick Perry's NRA video, Maher calling Perry, Ted Nugent and Sarah Palin the "axis of a**holes."

"Gun ownership is a minority activity," Lawrence concluded. "The rate of gun ownership is declining significantly, that's why the NRA is pushing this so hard. And what you have in terms of gun sales is simply fanatic collectors. People have 48 guns where they used to have four. And that's how you get gun sales in this country, not by getting new buyers."

Watch the entire segment, below: