So, what in that post was false, or so great an exaggeration that it might as well be a falsehood?
There’s a big difference between claiming something is an existential threat, and describing an existential threat.
Yes. Being against gun violence, even very passionately or hyperbolically so, doesn’t require the presupposition of imminent and permanent threat from a dangerous enemy in order to make sense.
But being in favor of treating private gun ownership as not just another form of property but rather a necessary fundamental right, which is essential to the continuation of a society’s liberty and security, does.
Why do so many Democratic policies result in death?
Right there. It’s IMPOSSIBLE that we’ll be dead due to guns. And lack of gun control regulations does not come anywhere near meeting the definition of treason.
This is the toxicity of First Amendment ideology, rather than the Press in and of itself, which when practiced by non-ideologues is largely harmless and manageable.First Amendment ideologues are committed to the fantasy that the mere possession of a Printing press or newspaper or even a blog automatically carries with it an intrinsic connection to heroism, patriotism and liberty. In order to sustain that fantasy, they require somebody in the role of a dangerous enemy that their writings are crucially needed to defend against.
One of the GOP’s strengths over the past 40 years has been their willingness to take strong stands. People like leaders who take strong stands; people aren’t so crazy about leaders who equivocate about the issues of the day.
I’ve been saying for years (here’s one from 15 years ago) that the Dems’ big problem is their tendency to avoid strong stands on many issues. If it’s not clear that you intend to do much of anything about a problem, people aren’t going to come out of the woodwork to vote for you on that account.
There are a lot more people who want these shootings to stop happening, than there are pro-gun people. The problem is, the pro-gun people vote; other than perhaps the pro-Israel folks, there aren’t any issue groups that can match them for intensity. They’ll show up at the polls, in good years and bad.
So the question is, how do you get the anti-massacre people to vote? You do it by taking a strong stand against the weapons of mass slaughter. You don’t do it by saying we need better background checks. (You can still say it and mean it, but it better be down the list, rather than at the top. Because it’s not going to be the stand that will get the large anti-massacre majority to the polls.)
So if the Dems are willing to take a strong stand, then yeah, let’s roll with this issue. But they’d better not try to throw weak sauce at it.
?!
Perhaps. About 8000 people are murdered each year by guns. About 2% by “assault weapons” , so 160. Four times as many were stabbed to death.
500,000 American die each year due to smoking- 50,000 due to second hand smoke. You are 300 times more likely to die from Second Hand smoke than by a assault weapon. That chain smoker who lives in the apartmnet beneath you is more dangerous that the guy with a collection of “assualt weapons”.
15000 die from Prescription Opioid abuse. Alcohol kills 80,000 or so. Traffic accidents kill over 40000.
And we’re trying to reduce all those other problems too. Why should one be exempt?
Becuase it has protection in the Second Ad, which the others dont have. And indeed, we are trying to reduce murders and violence. Just not by putting law abiding citizen gun owners in prison for crimes their guns might possibly commit. Extra police, extra sentencing for gun use during the commission of a crime, better forensics to catch killers, and so forth.
If your point was that for all of those things, we just throw up our hands to give thoughts and prayers, rather than doing something about it, then you’d have a point about it.
As we address all of those problems with actual actions to reduce the harm that those do, your analogy breaks down upon the very first observation.
And exactly what protection does the Second Amendment give to weapons of mass slaughter?
So you would say the ACLU is the flip side of the coin to the NRA? Or are you just testing your find text and replace skills?
The analogy’s not convincing because the desirability of freedom of expression doesn’t actually depend on positing an oppressive enemy. People like to speak their minds and express their beliefs whether other people are trying to oppress them or not, and that’s what fundamentally motivates the formulation of the First Amendment.
Contrast that with the Second Amendment’s elevation of one particular form of property possession, that of firearms, to a constitutional right explicitly necessitated by the security needs of the state. An enemy to be defended against is the whole raison d’etre of that right.
You can see the difference right there in the wording of the Amendments:
It’s right there in post #77. The claim was made that if the “treasonous GOP” remains in power, we’ll ALL be shot to death.
All 327 million of us?
Doesn’t that seem like a rather extreme exaggeration?
You forgot the rest of my reply: “And indeed, we are trying to reduce murders and violence. Just not by putting law abiding citizen gun owners in prison for crimes their guns might possibly commit. Extra police, extra sentencing for gun use during the commission of a crime, better forensics to catch killers, and so forth.”
It’s not just "thoughts and prayers’ we are working daily to try to reduce violent crime. But reducing guns does NOT reduce violent crime.
It gives none, Machineguns, explosives, cannon etc are effectively banned.
So you recognize hyperbole, you just don’t understand it?
I understand it just fine, thank you. However, it appears that other posters in this thread do not.
Here’s a hint: there is a difference between hyperbole, and bs.
No, you are working to increase the punishments for violent crime, which is something that has never had an effect. We can’t tell if reducing guns would have an effect, as it’s never been tried in the US.
There are those on this very board who would like to see the machine gun registry opened up.