George "Macacawitz" Allen on Guns
Some of you may know that I work for the National Park Service, so when I see the NPS in the news, I take notice. At the risk of being called a fascist again, I submit that today's NYT editorial board got it right about guns and George "Welcome to the real Virgina" Allen:
November 22, 2006
Editorial
A Parting Shot From George Allen
As a last little gift to America, Senator George Allen, who was narrowly
defeated by James Webb this month, has introduced what may be his final
piece of legislation: a bill that would allow the carrying of concealed
weapons in national parks. The argument behind the bill is that national
park regulations unfairly strip many Americans of a right they may enjoy
outside the parks. The bill has passed to the Senate Committee on Energy
and Natural Resources, where we hope it will die the miserable death it
deserves.
Americans' confusion about the Second Amendment is now nearly total. An
amendment that ensures a collective right to bear arms has been misread in
one legislature after another -often in the face of strong public
disapproval- as a law guaranteeing an individual's right to carry a weapon in public. And, in a perversion of monumental proportions, the battle to extend that right has largely succeeded in co-opting the language of the
Civil Rights movement, so that depriving an American of the right to carry
a gun in public sounds, to some, as offensive as stripping him of the right
to vote. Senator Allen's bill is, of course, being cheered by the gun
lobby, which sees it not as an assault on public safety but as a way of
nationalizing the armed paranoia that the National Rifle Association and
its cohorts stand for.
If Americans want to feel safer in their national parks, the proper
solution is to increase park funding, which has decayed steadily since the
Bush administration took office. To zealots who believe that the Second
Amendment trumps all others, the parks are merely another badland, like
schools and church parking lots, that could be cleaned up if the carrying
of private weapons were allowed. The concealed-weapon advocates are doing an excellent job of sounding terrified by "lonely wilderness trails." But
make no mistake. Senator Allen's bill would make no one safer. It can only
endanger the public.
Well I'm a gun owner. They stay home. Only if I'm going long trip is one in car, truck. Allen must be smoking great shit. They F#$k around the few days they call themselves working and then some a-hole dreams this up.
MAybe link to Griff's rant thread?
The only positive I can see to that bill is you wouldn't be hassled for having it in the car if you stopped in a park on a trip/vacation.
Concealed carry in the park? No.
Visiting the Liberty Bell? No.
Smokey Mts? No
Grand Canyon? No.
Olympic? No.
Everglades? No
Mt McKinley? If you're hiking in Grizzly country...a big one and on your hip, not concealed.
Generally not needed...it'll die in committee. :cool:
Everglades? No
And THEN you see that giant Burmese Python coming toward you!
Some woman, trying to take a picture of a momma Black Bear at Great Smokies, got her head dang bit clean off. Doubt a gun woulda helped in that case. Maybe some common sense would have, however.
I carry just about everywhere else. I see no reason a park should be different. I don't see any reason to expect the NYT to get anything "right" about armed citizens, either.
If Americans want to feel safer in their national parks, the proper
solution is to increase park funding...
That's beyond comical.
That's beyond comical.
Why is that "comical"? Do you even have any idea how much law enforcement goes on in our parks? Drunks, poachers, artifact stealers, suicide cases, drug dealers, teenagers tearing up battlefields. Funding for Park Service law enforcement has been cut to the bone to the point where we have interpretive rangers doubling as LEs. You think it's better to fund faith-based organizations?
Haliburton?
WTF do you want? Until you spend 15 years working for the Park Service I really don't think you are in the position to say what is or isn't "comical."
I would very much like to be able to go to see the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, The National Constitution Center, and Valley Forge Park without being forcibly disarmed.
Whether or not I have a gun is none of anyone's freakin business.
And in case you were wondering, I live in Virginia.
Why do I have to disarm just to appease you? Who the hell are you that I have an obligation to make you feel more comfortable? The guy who plans on mugging/abducting/stealing the children of/ me and you has a gun? Why shouldn't I?
We've seen the future of gun control. It is Washington DC.
We've seen the present of concealed carry. It is Virginia.
Bring on the Gun crime stats between DC and VA. Go ahead... make my day.
Bring on the Gun crime stats between DC and VA. Go ahead... make my day.
Virginia is mostly rural, and its largest city is considerably smaller than DC. You may be confusing cause and effect.
It's been said elsewhere by Major Gun Guru Colonel Jeff Cooper that a collective right to bear arms cannot be practiced without practicing an individual right to do the same.
That editorialist is also pig-ignorant of the state of the scholarship on the Constitutional right, which view of the Second is the polar opposite of what he states. He's being about as smart about the Second Amendment as Klansmen are about the Fourteenth. Remarkable how ignorant some people will be; if I owned that paper, I'd fire him for incompetence and patent hostility to human rights. It's a matter of fact that no one who lives by the First should denigrate the Second; it is easy to see how they go hand in hand as overall checks and balances on governmental power.
HM, concealed carry's salubrious effects do not depend one whit on population density. Northern Virginia is in effect one large built-up area, urb upon suburb. Consider Florida, and Miami-Dade with its huge urban population. They have benefited from liberalized concealed carry longer than most, and crime is and remains well down.
Crime-lovers around the District keep things in their current unsatisfactory state of affairs. Were the country to put this matter into my hands, by a few simple changes of law I'd cut DC crime in half in six to eight months, with no bottoming-out in sight. In two years or so, Anacostia, a notably bad neighborhood, would be a pretty nice place.
Isn't there a difference though, between the right to own a gun and the right to move about heavily populated areas with a concealed weapon?
No. The right is defined as the right to keep and bear arms. They are linked. Being able to own a pistol does me no good if I need it in the community and it is locked in a cabinet at home.
About all the difference I can think of is you can benefit more people per stroll. Properly speaking, in the United States there isn't a difference.
The English are not raised to comprehend the idea of a citizen militia and its police powers -- while it's neither organized, nor very demanding of the individual citizen in any one day of his life, American law encourages the citizenry to do something about criminal or life-threatening behavior if at all possible. In a certain rather narrow range of situations, opening fire is about the best and only option.
This is part of our entire conception of a republic. Some will say that it was all very well for the Wild West but now there are police departments. That argument tends to dry up when it is pointed out that saving lives never obsolesces, and is by no means delegated to sworn officers only. In the early West, true enough, DIY justice and defense of self or other was the only available course, which made the West look pretty hairy though the actual casualty rate was pretty low, as most of the bang-bang was confined to those areas where there was a population mostly of transients, almost entirely of young men, and liquor. Strong drink got them shooting -- and mainly missing, when it came to human targets.
The English are not raised to comprehend the idea of a citizen militia and its police powers
They are largely responsible for our needing it, though.
There was this thing, you may have heard of it, called the American Revolution.
Yep. Was a fucking long time ago. Dont see how that relates to your current need for small arms.
Also, the need for weapons in everyday life had as much to do with being a frontier nation as with the revolution
Incidentally Urbane, Up until very recently the concept of militia was a strong part of the English consciousness. We held to a militia system for over a thousand years. It was the duty for every freeborn man to hold arms throughout the saxon and medieval period.
In British history books it is not called a "revolution" at all, but merely "The Loss of the American Colonies".
Well it was in the book I had. (1978, 3rd form public school)
I think the key there is '1978'. Believe it or not, progress happens even in blighty.
They are re-writing history?!
History isn't static. Historical scholarship is a constantly changing and revising affair. However, this is about how history is taught to children, rather than scholarship. How history is taught is and has always been subject to the political zeitgeist and prevailing orthodoxy. The book you are referring to is from a time when the concept of 'Empire' was still tenously clinging on, albeit it in terms of something lost. Nowadays, that concept is a historical one and brings little or no influence to bear upon the teaching of our young.
Dont see how that relates to your current need for small arms.
The UN and other socialist...sorry, of course I mean "progressive" elements continue to insist that we prove we "need" things in order to be allowed to keep them.
To my mind, how important it obviously is to these people that I be disarmed is some of the best proof I have that I "need" to continue to be armed.
I had British neighbors once upon a time who referred to the American Revolution as the American Rebellion and sported a bumper sticker that read "Paul Revere was a snitch!"
It's all a matter of perspective.
Brian
nope, we do call it the American Revolution.... and with good cause.... those colonials were definately revolting.....
geee...even the Australian ones? (who happen to be doing very well in the cricket atm) :)
especially the....the...aus....oz.....ab..... them thar lot down under...
(ashes? what ashes? hmmmph... it's only a game....)
How sad. And I thought you had a 'thing' for...ummm...aussies. ;)
ah, well. as I said, it's only a game.
mmmm......how game are you? (in best Leslie Phillips accent)
Well at 4/427, I'm more than game. :)
Incidentally Urbane, Up until very recently the concept of militia was a strong part of the English consciousness. We held to a militia system for over a thousand years. It was the duty for every freeborn man to hold arms throughout the saxon and medieval period.
Which is where WE got it from. What's more, as a society that loudly makes a point of its citizens being freeborn, we're determined to keep them around.
Your society should not drop this, or you'll be
1984 in only a matter of time. You have only to reread the book to say
yuck to that. At least, that's all
I have to do. You?
Which is where WE got it from. What's more, as a society that loudly makes a point of its citizens being freeborn, we're determined to keep them around.
Roger that.
Your society should not drop this, or you'll be 1984 in only a matter of time. You have only to reread the book to say yuck to that. At least, that's all I have to do. You?
Forgive me, but we aren't the ones who started a perpetual war against an invisible enemy :P That said, we are the most surveiled nation in Europe.
At least, that's all I have to do. You?
I am very familar with Orwell's work.
ISTR that every home in many of the cantons of Switzerland are required to posses and to be profiecent with arms. Yet one so rarely sees hordes of swiss 'sportsmen' swanning around the alps blasting away at the yodellers, nor even swaggering around their downtown malls 'carrying'. Why would that be?
@ ali - was going to say I'm going to train my big guns on you, but tbh at 9/602 and then a paltry response of 53 for 3, I think I'm more inclined to shoot our own team!
It's far worse than that Jay. ;)
Show us ya guns baby!
Wooohoooo! England all out for 157 in the first innings!!!
Looks like we'll be one up in the series to kick things off. :D
*sniff...* it's only a game....
As you can see I am new to this forum, in fact this thread brought me to it.
I think the article posted overlooks the practicality of this law. While the text of the bill being introduced certainly makes it clear the law is about using a gun for protection, the law's real world effect is a practical one.
Having lived near Gettysburg National Park and currently living near Valley Forge National Park the current prohibition of carrying a gun through them creates several problems. The first is that many people who have a permit and legally carry a gun concealed may not be aware of this prohibition. It is your duty to know the law, but this is not common knowledge even among informed gun owners. The second problem is that these parks are large and have prominent throughways that are used by many during their daily commute & regular drives. These two circumstances have to potential to land one of the good guys in very big trouble.
I don't think the intent of the bill is to make the parks safer, but to add uniformity to concealed carry laws.
Welcome to the Cellar, martinbrody.:D
Good point. A lot of parks have major through travel.
I think that travel through the park without intention of stopping would be covered as 'peaceable journey,' in the same way that you can drive through a post office parking lot or within 1000 feet of a school while armed, just so long as you don't go inside the buildings.
...every home in many of the cantons of Switzerland are required to posses and to be profiecent with arms. Yet one so rarely sees hordes of swiss 'sportsmen' swanning around the alps blasting away at the yodellers...
The fact that the armed Swiss are NOT gunning those yodellers down is a testament to their commitment to peace at any price.
Here's to the Swiss!
What's wrong with yodelling?
btw, it's not a practice soley kept for the swiss. Plenty of country singers do it too. ;)
Yeah....but do they do it wearing funny pants?
I carry just about everywhere else. I see no reason a park should be different.
Now
that's comical...
Okay. Serious question:
I understand the logic of armed citizenry. I even agree, to a certain extent with the wisdom of that concept. After all, a citizenry who aren't armed are potentially at the mercy of powerful armed governments. What I don't understand is the desire to walk around armed. Is life so dangerous that people feel the need to carry weaponry wherever they go? Who/what does the gun protect them from? How likely is it that someone will need to use their gun?
Yeah....but do they do it wearing funny pants?
They opt for silly shirts.
Is life so dangerous that people feel the need to carry weaponry wherever they go? Who/what does the gun protect them from? How likely is it that someone will need to use their gun?
If there were known to be a vampire in your city, would you carry garlic with you? I mean, it's just one vampire, what are the chances that you'll run into him? On the other hand, what's the
harm in carrying a little garlic with you? It can't hurt, and it just might save your life.
To a responsible gun owner, there is no reason
not to carry in most situations. And if it saves you or a random stranger's life from a crime just once in your entire life, wouldn't it be worth it?
I like that analogy Clodfobble!
I would carry garlic if I knew there was a vampire in my city, of course I would. But I wouldn't carry 1 crossbow, tip dipped in holy water, vampires, for the despatch of - check.
In my case I think it's solely the environment I grew up in. If you grow up with an unarmed populace, carrying guns is more likely to seem unnecessary, and people defending carrying concealed guns for a trip to the park will sound militant. I'm happy to admit YMMV however.
That's an interesting analogy Clod.
If you grow up with an unarmed populace...
You're kidding yourself. Your "populace" is no more "unarmed" than it is "drug-free".
How likely is it that someone will need to use their gun?
Much less likely than if it was known that all the law-abiding are unarmed.
How likely is it that your home will burn? Yet you still have fire drills, fire extinguishers and smoke alarms, don't you? And having them, the likelyhood that a small conflagration will grow to consume an entire building is vastly reduced.
If someone dropped a lit cigarrette in a rubbish bin, would you simply call the fire brigade and wait? After all, *they* are the trained professionals...
How likely is it that your home will burn? Yet you still have fire drills, fire extinguishers and smoke alarms, don't you? And having them, the likelyhood that a small conflagration will grow to consume an entire building is vastly reduced.
On the surface, that's a great analogy. But for it to be fully accurate, those things you listed would also have to sometimes cause fires as well as protect against them.
On the surface, that's a great analogy. But for it to be fully accurate, those things you listed would also have to sometimes cause fires as well as protect against them.
:thumb:
How likely is it that someone will need to use their gun?
Ironically, having it usually means not needing it.
And nothing de-intellectualizes an argument like being one-on-one with someone who wants you to die and has the means to make it happen. I see all the chin stroking logic going on in this thread and wonder how far it would get you when you absolutely, positively need to kill someone in order to stay alive.
The shortest unit of time in the universe is the time it takes for someone staring down the barrell of a gun to realize that the feebly constructed intellectual argument they have been clinging to like a warm blanket is about to cost them their life.
Bad guys have guns. Blame whoever you want but they do. Do whatever you want and they still will. So you can be the principled recipient of a bullet in the head or you can level the playing field. I have no objection to whichever choice you make and ask why anyone thinks they have the right to make that choice for me.
How likely is it that I will need it? To address the question is to quantify my need for one. To quantify is to justify. To whom must I justify? And exactly how is it that I am accountable to them? I don't recall relinquishing that control.
On the surface, that's a great analogy. But for it to be fully accurate, those things you listed would also have to sometimes cause fires as well as protect against them.
All analogies have non-congruent features, or they wouldn't be analogies. But I will point out that there are many more things in the world that spontaneously cause fires (hypergolics, highly-reactive metals, strong oxidizers) than there are weapons that spontaneously cause violence. Weapons don't cause violence...and that's the flaw in *your* implcit analogy.
If you're intent on demonizing tools that can be used for defense as well as to commit crime, rather than holding responsible
the people who actually commit the crime (because it causes less cognitive dissonance to your no-fault sense of relativistic humanism, perhaps?) then I'm afraid that there's not much that can repair your logic.
If you're intent on demonizing tools that can be used for defense as well as to commit crime, rather than holding responsible the people who actually commit the crime (because it causes less cognitive dissonance to your no-fault sense of relativistic humanism, perhaps?) then I'm afraid that there's not much that can repair your logic.
"If" indeed. You're saying my logic is flawed, that I think nobody is responsible for their actions, and that it all confuses me. Fuck you. You're reading an awful lot into my post.
Yes. I've stated in the past that weapons are tools. We've covered this before. Your analogy above says that weapons are tools only for preventing crime. I'm pointing out that weapons are also tools for committing crime. Pretty simple really.
Maybe I should have typed "be used to cause" instead of "cause," but I forgot that I was dealing with the queen of semantics. Sloppy of me.
Maybe I should have typed "be used to cause" instead of "cause," but I forgot that I was dealing with the queen of semantics. Sloppy of me.
I could quite easily use a smoke alarm to start a fire
if that was my intent. It's the people and their intent that matter, not the tools.
Words matter too. "Semantics" is the science of meanings, not a reason to dismiss an argument.
Notice how quickly the choir chimed in with the "guns are evil" chant right behind you.
Never mind, I know better than getting into these discussions!
Not the queen of spelling:
I love that age old argument "guns don't kill people, people kill people"
Yeah, with guns. It's much harder to kill someone with rocks and sticks.
And easier yet to do it wholesale with a car or truck. The argument is age-old because the animism that gives rise to demonizing weapons seems perpetual. That an argument is old doesn't speak to its validity; if you would surrender the irrational belief that guns cause violence it wouldn't be necessary to repeat it.
Sorry if you had a problem with my spelling; it looks correct to me. Please bear in mind that in the sentence you quoted, "intent" is not a noun.
Sorry if you had a problem with my spelling; it looks correct to me. Please bear in mind that in the sentence you quoted, "intent" is not a noun.
Yepper, you were right, I was wrong on that! :redface:
Anyhoo, I do agree that people kill people. I don't anthropomorphize weaponry any more than I do cars or trucks, or this chair my big butt is currently plopped in.
I just think it's harder to kill people if you are armed only with sticks and rocks. I bet those Columbine boys would have had a much lower "success" rate without semi-autos.
Anyway, I can't say anything that you won't refute, or that hasn't been said over and over in this Cellar. So, I'm going to keep the big butt seated and the big mouth shut and go find a funny thread.
And easier yet to do it wholesale with a car or truck.
Cars and trucks are pretty expensive.[SIZE=2]
[SIZE=2]“Gun control? We need bullet control! I think every bullet should cost 5,000 dollars. Because if a bullet cost five thousand dollar, we wouldn't have any innocent bystander .”[/SIZE]
Hey, that might just work!
[/SIZE]
I love that Chris Rock bit:
''Man, l would blow your fucking head off,
if l could afford it. l'm gonna get me another job,
l'm gonna start saving some money...and you're a dead man. You better hope
l can't get no bullets on layaway."
I just think it's harder to kill people if you are armed only with sticks and rocks.
It's harder to
live if you have only sticks and rocks. That's why we've made better tools.
It's easier to die with better tools.
*yawns*
... still waiting for the 'armed society is a polite society' line......
There was an average of 160,000 troops in the Iraq theater of operations during the first 22 months of the war, and 2,112 deaths during that time. That gives a firearm death rate of 60 per 100,000 soldiers. The firearm death rate in Washington, D.C., is 80.6 per 100,000 for the same period. You are about 25 percent more likely to be shot and killed in the U.S. capital, which has some of the strictest gun-control laws in the nation, than you are in Iraq. Conclusion: The U.S. should pull out of Washington immediately.
lmao
Very good work Ibram
LoL. excellent.
I heard a really scary statistic. For young black men living in the scarier area of L.A, life expectancy is shorter than if they were on deathrow.
No. The right is defined as the right to keep and bear arms. They are linked. Being able to own a pistol does me no good if I need it in the community and it is locked in a cabinet at home.
Agreed, the "increase funding" line is
complete bullshit, unless he is talking armed escort for every single person in the park at
all times.
This guy has to be on crack.
Yep. Was a fucking long time ago. Dont see how that relates to your current need for small arms.
Also, the need for weapons in everyday life had as much to do with being a frontier nation as with the revolution
Incidentally Urbane, Up until very recently the concept of militia was a strong part of the English consciousness. We held to a militia system for over a thousand years. It was the duty for every freeborn man to hold arms throughout the saxon and medieval period.
My side-arm saved my life several times. You should speak of things you
know about.
As far as the Chris Rock bit... I load my own rounds.
There was an average of 160,000 troops in the Iraq theater of operations during the first 22 months of the war, and 2,112 deaths during that time. That gives a firearm death rate of 60 per 100,000 soldiers.
Bad math there. That gives a death rate of 720 per 100000 per year. Firearm death rate will be less, as a lot of it is done by bombs, but that wasn't provided in your numbers.
How likely is it that someone will need to use their gun?
Do you wear a seatbelt in your car? Everytime, or nearly so? Do you have an accident every time you leave the driveway?
I just think it's harder to kill people if you are armed only with sticks and rocks. I bet those Columbine boys would have had a much lower "success" rate without semi-autos.
They could have used modern revolvers or black powder pistols with the same level of effect, possibly higher level. A "semi-auto" is not a machine gun.
Columbine would have been far worse if the improvised munitions had gone off as intended.
*yawns*
... still waiting for the 'armed society is a polite society' line......
Sorry, but the right answers are always the same and thus boring. If you want a constantly changing array of excuses you'll have to listen to the prohibitionist arguments.
As far as the Chris Rock bit... I load my own rounds.
Now I'm confused.
My side-arm saved my life several times. You should speak of things you know about.
I did speak of things things I know about ie. History. I did however ask some questions about things I don't know about. Have I, in this thread, condemned the use of firearms, or have I asked questions?
Sorry, but the right answers are always the same and thus boring. If you want a constantly changing array of excuses you'll have to listen to the prohibitionist arguments.
The arguments are always the same and thus boring. That doesn't make them right. Only right in your perception, and that of your cronies.
Did I misquote you?
Those were statements, equating the need for firearms with the middle ages... a very incorrect statement, illustrated by my facts.
People in rural areas, as well as non-military or police security personnel, use them as tools every day. I have been one of these people more than once in my life.
We cannot unmake guns... it is a naive argument and a waste of time.
Americans are not going to give their guns away, to ask is to remove the government that does so... that too is a naive argument and a waste of time.
Those were statements, equating the need for firearms with the middle ages... a very incorrect statement,
Sorry, you've misunderstood, or I have put my point across badly. The middle-ages thing was in response to someone else basically saying that militia was not something that a Brit would have any understanding of. I was merely making the point that we (Brits) have a much longer history of having a militia than in not having armed citizenry.
The point is still incorrect.
Our founding fathers also believed that an armed militia was required in case the government got too big for their britches.
The people should never fear their government, the government should always fear the people was a basic principal of our founding fathers.
Loading my own rounds means I load my own brass... I do not need to buy commercial rounds for my weapons if I do not want to. I can reload them myself, and do for my rifles.
"To disarm the people is the most effectual way to enslave them." ~George Mason~
"To ban guns because criminals use them is to tell the innocent and law-abiding that their rights and liberties depend not on their own conduct, but on the conduct of the guilty and the lawless, and that the law will permit them to have only such rights and liberties as the lawless will allow... For society does not control crime, ever, by forcing the law-abiding to accommodate themselves to the expected behavior of criminals. Society controls crime by forcing the criminals to accommodate themselves to the expected behavior of the law-abiding." —Jeff Snyder
TJ on Disarming Public
"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms...disarm only those who are neither
inclined nor determined to commit crimes...Such laws make things worse for
the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage
than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater
confidence than an armed man."
-Thomas Jefferson, quoting Cesare Beccaria
“And that the said Constitution be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the Press, or the rights of Conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms.”
-- Samuel Adams, Debates & Proceedings in the Convention of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 86-87 (February 6, 1788).
“Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect every one who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are ruined.”
-- Patrick Henry, 3 Elliot, Debates at 45 (Virginia Convention, June 5, 1788).
“God forbid we should ever be 20 years without such a rebellion. The people cannot be all, & always, well informed... what country can preserve it's liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms... The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. It is it's natural manure.”
-- Thomas Jefferson to William S. Smith on Nov. 13, 1787. The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, ed. Julian P. Boyd, vol. 12, p. 356 (1955).
“I ask, Who are the militia? They consist now of the whole people, except a few public officers.”
-- George Mason, 3 Elliot, Debates at 425-426, June 16, 1788
“If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, and only one person
were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified
in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would
be justified in silencing mankind.”- John Stuart Mill, On Liberty
“He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard
even his enemy from opposition: for if he violates this duty he
establishes a precedent that will reach to himself. ”- Thomas Paine,
Dissertation On First Principles Of Government
“The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities and officials and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. One’s right to life, liberty, and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections.” - Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943)
How is the point still incorrect?
I refer you to my earlier point:
Okay. Serious question:
I understand the logic of armed citizenry. I even agree, to a certain extent with the wisdom of that concept. After all, a citizenry who aren't armed are potentially at the mercy of powerful armed governments. What I don't understand is the desire to walk around armed. Is life so dangerous that people feel the need to carry weaponry wherever they go? Who/what does the gun protect them from? How likely is it that someone will need to use their gun?
I have already agreed that, in principle, the idea of an armed citizenry is a potentially good thing, because otherwise it is at risk from a powerful and armed government.....in what way have I disagreed with you?
The point I made was in response to someone, as I have already said, who suggested that somehow being British meant one didn't have a cultural understanding of militia.
I guess I misunderstood your point about the militia.
Bad math there. That gives a death rate of 720 per 100000 per year. Firearm death rate will be less, as a lot of it is done by bombs, but that wasn't provided in your numbers.
Hey, don't look at me, I just c/ped it...
The arguments are always the same and thus boring. That doesn't make them right. Only right in your perception, and that of your cronies.
Aliantha, right is no respecter of
opinion.
And the dubiously opinionated are no respecters of right.
Bloodthirstiness becomes no one, but even minimal self-respect would allow self defense, and not prohibit this or that tool to get it, particularly with any reference to the level of violence exerted in aid of a wrongful aggression. That leads to nothing but oppression by the savage, who are exactly the sort you particularly don't want to be oppressed by.
The psychological problems of the "ragers against self defense" have been fairly thoroughly explored, and the picture that emerges isn't pretty, as you can read in other gun threads.
Right, so now you're saying anyone who doesn't agree with your point of view has psychological problems? lol
You're on a roll today UG. ;)
Hey, don't look at me, I just c/ped it...
From Rep. Steve King (R-IA) and he was using old numbers and bad math, even though DC is bad. :cool:
I'm still trying to figure out how more funding will make me safer in a park...:thepain:
UG, or anyone else, how much kick do the Glock Slimline .45s have?
I want a .45 that will not break my wrist. I need the smaller handle, like on the Glock 6, because I want to get a good grip in it. I am only wanting a .45 and have to have a Glock. It is what I used on the ranch and just won't use anything else (wind, rain, sand, pond, pig-shit... still fires). Greatest handgun of all time. Always used the .45 for stopping power and the fact I could get rounds at Wal-Mart (hey, we worked all the time in the middle of nowhere). I have a revolver now, but want to go back to a pistol, which I turned back in when I left the ranch and the one I used when in security. I have never owned one of my own, just issued through work.
I'd bet it's a
little bouncier on firing if your Slimline is a small-magazine type. Anything as big as the 17 or the 20-odds will have that much more bullet mass to soak up the acceleration, with the heavier weight of a magazine of .40 or .45 bullets being noticeable. You might notice the slide cycles faster -- I've noticed that about some 9mms versus my .45 1911 types. Everything would get done a hair quicker.
You can get pistol competition things like PAST gloves to help with recoil owie during practice sessions. While you wouldn't lumber yourself with these during carry-use, they'd make for comfort while you get your marksmanship refined to whatever degree you want to afford. Then a little practice barehanded, as you carry, to iron out any differences of pointing or feel, and you're all kinds of ready.
Glock 36 -- 6 rd magazine, 765 grams fully loaded, over a pound and a half. The lighter slide means less perceived recoil than the bigger 1911 type pistols, part of whose kick is really the feel of a fairly massive slide going back and forth.
Aliantha, I'll assume from your smiley that you're being completely facetious. However, seriously now, you've reversed cause and effect: when I hoist the banner of self defense, guess who or what crawls out of the woodwork? We have seen the hoplophobic neurosis on extensive display from Spexxvet. The people who are sane, and knowledgeable, on self defense do
not fight me.
Well there was some truth to my comment UG. If you have a fault, it's being a bit obnoxious with some of your comments. ;)
As to why I don't think people need to carry guns, well, I've stated my opinion on the matter endlessly and so, at this point, since I live in a country where hand guns are illegal and the majority of the population feel this is a good thing, I'll just be thankful I live in a country where I don't have to fight this battle. :)
Thanks UG... though I will get some flack for having a "chick gun", it is popular with females in the military and cops, particularly the Coast Guard in positions where they don't have to carry the 9 (the Guard's standard issue is the Glock 9)... I think it will be best for me now.
(I have fractured my wrist again and torn a tendon now... it will not heal properly this time)
Just one thing I wanted to share with you.
It's nice living in a place where you don't feel afraid every time you walk out the door. A place where you can walk down the street and see someone walking towards you and not think they might be going to mug you. A place where the safety is all around you, not just on your gun.
Having or not having a gun has nothing to do with that. Your neighborhood and your perspective on chance and being in the moment does.
I think destiny is a farce and do not worry about things I cannot control. I do my best to mitigate possible outcomes, after that, I don't sweat it... so it does not matter for those like me.
For those that sweat it, no number of guns, street-corner cameras raping us, cops, lost rights, etc, etc, etc, will be enough.
I think our two countries are very different rkz. You should come visit some day and then you might understand where I get my 'crazy way of thinking' from. :)
I have traveled to other nations. I have traveled quite extensively.
When going out I don't think about if I will get mugged/harmed. I have taken care of that contingency, just like I have taken care of the contingency of getting a flat tire, so I don't have to think about it.
Have you ever been to Australia?
Nope. I have been places where it is harder to get guns than Australia.
It's not hard to get guns in Australia. Just because they're illegal doesn't mean they're hard to get.
You know what I meant, "legally" is implied.
[QUOTE=rkzenrage]I'm still trying to figure out how more funding will make me safer in a park...:thepain:
More Rangers to watch over you and check on the bad guys?
I made a sarcastic statement about that earlier.
I take it you have not been in a state park or have a very clear idea of the scale of them in general?
Sure, we could always hire the Marines full time to escort each person and camping expedition full time... that would be what it would take.
If there were known to be a vampire in your city, would you carry garlic with you? I mean, it's just one vampire, what are the chances that you'll run into him? On the other hand, what's the harm in carrying a little garlic with you? It can't hurt, and it just might save your life.
To a responsible gun owner, there is no reason not to carry in most situations. And if it saves you or a random stranger's life from a crime just once in your entire life, wouldn't it be worth it?
There are pickpockets and purse snatchers in the city - better not wear anything with pockets or carry a pocketbook.
Oh, and better wear a facemask like Michael Jackson - there are people out there spreading germs.
... I think it will be best for me now.
(I have fractured my wrist again and torn a tendon now... it will not heal properly this time)
Ack!
Okay, this is going to sound pretty weird, but learn to shoot with your other hand. This will at least stop further damage until your body can get on top of things again -- or your orthopedic surgeon does.
I can shoot very well with both... I just want to try some damage control from here on out.
I'll just be thankful I live in a country where I don't have to fight this battle. :)
And ours, Ali, is a country that expects its citizens to be the ones to keep it a capital-R Republic, regardless of
anything.
Not for nothing did Thomas Jefferson, our third President, write "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
Just because they're illegal doesn't mean they're hard to get.
Ipse dixit.
Exactly why prohibition doesn't work. Only the criminals are armed.
Yup, "If you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have them" ... the rest of us will be targets.
Just like in DC, Maryland, and NYC.
In Australia, most victims of violent crime know their attacker. This is definitely true in the case of murder over and above other crimes.
How is having a gun going to save you when your husband kills you in your sleep?
It won't. How is having a gun going to save you when you start choking on your food? It won't do that either. There are a lot of ways having a gun won't be able to help you. Then again, there are also a lot of ways having a gun would be able to help you.
You people just don't seem to get that you live in a society that is fearful. You're constantly trying to protect yourselves against something that might happen.
No wonder George thinks it's ok to make pre-emptive strikes on nations which pose no threat. It seems the whole mindset is to protect yourselves against something which might just happen.
You can't control everything, and considering the murder rate in your country, I don't think all the gun toting is doing much good.
If on the other hand your country had a low incidence of gun related crime I'd agree that everyone having guns is a good idea, but until that day comes, there's no way anyone will convince me it is.
It would be a hard thing to quantify, but I have a feeling that more innocent people (unfortunately lots of children) are killed by loaded, accessible guns than are attacking criminals. This whole self-defense thing doesn't fly when you look at the numbers.
It would be a hard thing to quantify, but I have a feeling that more innocent people (unfortunately lots of children) are killed by loaded, accessible guns than are attacking criminals. This whole self-defense thing doesn't fly when you look at the numbers.
You do understand how stupid those two statements sound together, right? You know, since you just said that you yourself had not looked at the numbers, and in fact implied that you believe they don't even exist.
Incidentally, it's not a hard thing to quantify at all:
Gun FactsYou people just don't seem to get that you live in a society that is fearful. You're constantly trying to protect yourselves against something that might happen.
And you're
unable to protect yourself from things that DO happen.
Again, for the folks who missed it the first half-dozen times ... the majority of defensive uses of firearms involve NO SHOTS FIRED.
Some Accidental Death Stats are available here. These are numbers for 2002.
Accidental Death by Firearm ... total 776. That number is not missing any zeros.
For the same period, aggregate firearms deaths (which includes suicide, homicide, gang violence, shot by police while committing a crime, etc.) 28K and change.
Your car is still more dangerous than my gun.
You people just don't seem to get that you live in a society that is fearful. You're constantly trying to protect yourselves against something that might happen.
I think you may be over-generalizing a bit. Most places in the US are really very safe. Some folks on this board live or work where that isn't true or they have characteristics which make them targets, so they, sensibly, arm themselves.
Bush has done a great job of rallying fear though, I have to agree with that.
mmm..... apart from Griff, most pro-ponents of the gun- lobby seem to have resorted to individual insults...... whatever happened to the 'polite armed society'?
maybe cuz you aren't armed? ;)
Griff, I agree it was a generalisation, but you did seem to get the point I was making, so that's the main thing.
Wolf, like you say, we're all more likely to be killed by a car, but I think there's a big difference between using vehicular transport because it's a necessary evil, and carrying a leathal weapon just because I might need to use it.
Again... I learned first aid because I may need to use it... wanna' give me shit about it?
People lock their doors because they "may" deter theft... I hope you did not buy new locks when you moved...
IMO, people who actually ruled their lives by statistics are more likely to look a lot like this:
People wash with anti-bacterial soap, but they don't put treads on their tubs and drive instead of flying... they worry about false fears and ignore what kills far more people more often...
Having a gun you know how to use handy is just safer. Hopefully you will never use it... but, hopefully I never had to use my self-defense training or gun... it has not worked-out that way. Glad I had both.
I get your point rkz. I just disagree that's all.
Thanks for trying to insult me and anyone else who doesn't agree with your point. Just a point to think about though, while we're on the subject of sheep. Perhaps the same could be said of those who continue to recite the same rhetoric about guns being handy, and being tools, and being a safeguard against possible eventualities.
Perhaps if more people spent more time trying to promote a peaceful society, we wouldn't be having this discussion.
Over and out.
I only insulted those who made their decisions, regardless of what they were, based on one criteria... some gun owners do the same thing.
If you took it as though I meant you, you read it incorrectly.
The fact that my weapons have been handy (if you call saving one's life "handy") and are only tools are facts.
A peaceable society and gun ownership are mutually exclusive issues.
A peaceable society and gun ownership are mutually exclusive issues.
explains a lot.......
I think he may have left out a word, but I'm not so sure...
You people just don't seem to get that you live in a society that is fearful. You're constantly trying to protect yourselves against something that might happen.
Ali, Ali, you're being a lot less openminded than you should be. It's not fear we're talking about, much as you insist it should be. It is that we are determined to prevail -- regardless of the degree of force arrayed against us, we are determined to nonetheless prevail over it. We're just a bunch of winners, and we're going to stay that way. And apparently, we are determined in a fashion you can't wrap your mind around -- we do not surrender to wrongdoers. Friendly advice: never demand that of us. It will hurt if you try. You won't like to hurt that much.
No wonder George thinks it's ok to make pre-emptive strikes on nations which pose no threat. It seems the whole mindset is to protect yourselves against something which might just happen.
No threat? Every single intelligence service on the entire planet without a single exception assessed the Saddam regime as within a year or two of some kind of overwhelming weaponry with which to discomfit every friend we had in the region. I say we were right to do something about Saddam Hussein before he became favorably comparable with Hitler. The sole reason
anyone can claim "pose no threat" is because we hit them soon enough. Lazy thinking, Aliantha. We've done better foreign policy this Administration than the last, as a perusal of
Dereliction of Duty by Patterson might show you. Perhaps bloodier, but more purposive and using better strategy.
You can't control everything, and considering the murder rate in your country, I don't think all the gun toting is doing much good.
If on the other hand your country had a low incidence of gun related crime I'd agree that everyone having guns is a good idea, but until that day comes, there's no way anyone will convince me it is.
Switzerland. The place is stiff with assault rifles in most of its closets, together with 200 rounds ready ammo, and a requirement in some cantons that you have to carry your arms to a polling place to vote -- at least, by statute. And what's the Swiss murder rate?
Our overall national murder rate has spent some time below Scotland's. Outside of certain of our large cities that have suffered zones of urban decay, in which the bulk of murders and gun assaults take place, the murder rate, by any instrumentality, looks more like that of England. And England's murder and crime rates are both on the rise since they took the guns out of private hands, starting in that very year and growing annually. Thanks to England's worsening, we're looking better by the month. And month by month, we hope for our English cousins to finally come to their senses before the whole place looks like
A Clockwork Orange.
Aliantha, we've given you truth, in quantity, and you reply with blindness, closemindedness, and non-learning. Just what do you gain by testing our patience? You are wrong to think as you do, Aliantha, and your specific kind of wrongness opens the door, has opened the door, to violent crime and its state-scale equivalent, genocide. Believe me when I say you do not want a pro-genocide mentality; it corrodes the soul.
A peaceable society and gun ownership are mutually exclusive issues.
He may either have left a word out, or maybe was trying rather wildly to say the two issues were essentially separate ones.
A martial-artist mindset in combination with martial-arts skills is a lot like the peaceable but packin' mindset. My experience with martial arts suggests this is not only desirable but a highly likely outcome.
Training in how to fight efficiently, with anything from the two medial knuckles of your fist to a big wet rock to a selective-fire assault rifle, is not a guarantee that you will be made into a predator.
Thank god for cricket! That's all I can say.