# Democrats! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 20, 2006, 8:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/democrats/349109 "2006-03-20T08:56:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 2\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2006, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/democrats/349109/141 "2006-03-25T18:14:32Z")
> [@Hentor the Barbarian](#): > > Are any of these issues particularly noxious to gun owners/proponents of gun ownership? Which ones and why? For my money, I think these are pretty straightforward and no-brainer positions. I think all of them are no-win positions. I look at it this way. I am pro-abortion rights. If someone suggested a plank in a party platform aimed at whittling away those rights, I would be against them. It wouldn’t matter if some of the suggestions weren’t too bad. What would matter is the attitude behind whittling at all. That’s the same thinking that the (or at least some of the) pro-gun rights people (I’m one) have. If you look at guns and think “We need more laws!” then it doesn’t matter what the specifics of the laws are that you suggest–you’re already on the wrong side. Hope this makes things a little clearer, at least from this perspective. I don’t speak for anyone, mind you. This is just my thinking. ---
**Author:** ![pantom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/34f0e0/32.png) [@pantom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pantom)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2006, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/democrats/349109/142 "2006-03-27T00:37:23Z")
If I may. First of all, thanks to **jsgoddess** for the mindlessness of her thinking; if you need to see why we get so upset, simply bookmark the post, and refer to it. Stupid doesn’t do justice to it. Now, the thing of it is, up here we did stuff for ourselves by ourselves and on our own. We then took what we did and exported it to rural, poverty-stricken places. What do we get in return? Contempt. That, and brain-dead Republican presidents who get elected because they _promise_ to cut taxes. I got news for you idiots: debt is a tax. Ask your kids when they have to pay it back. Now, on to specifics: New York State built the New York State Thruway on its own and by itself. Senator Moynihan got the state reimbursed for the expense after it was made a part of the interstate highway system, but the point remains. Near me, there’s the Palisades Interstate Parkway, jointly maintained by New York and New Jersey. Small highway, but it makes the point: interstate highways don’t have to be built by the Feds. Our ports are maintained by our [self-financed Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.](http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9060908) No Army Corps of Engineers need involve themselves. We have the [New York State Power Authority,](http://www.nypa.gov/) established by FDR in 1931 when he was NY governor, and the basis for, among others, the [Tennessee Valley Authority.](http://www.tva.gov/) When New York, and Newark and Jersey City in New Jersey, wanted to set up reservoirs, they did it on their own. When Atlanta wanted to do this, they went to the Feds, hat in hand, and got [Lake Lanier,](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Lanier) built and maintained _to this day_ by the Army Corps of Engineers. Up here in Bergen, the water works are privately owned and run, for a profit, by a profit-making company. 'Cause, you know, we’re such leftist bastids. Then the red states turn around, from their artificially built Federal resorts, fed by power from Federal power plants, with ports and waterways dredged and maintained at Federal taxpayer expense by the Army Corps of Engineers, and transported to their jobs on roads built by the Feds at Federal taxpayer expense, and tell the Northeast, which did all of this _on their own with their own money_, how we’re the ones who aren’t self-reliant, budget-conscious, and all the rest, so they’re going to vote Republican, so _we_ don’t tax _them_ to death. Hypocrisy beyond belief. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/democrats/349109.md?page=7)