Gun lovers don't see how far gone they are....

[gamerunknown]

@Abatis

That’s exactly what I condemn. What a pile of ineffectual horseshit.

Cool, good to know where you stand. Article 2, Section 2, Clause 2 of the United States Constitution discusses the power to sign treaties, but that wasn’t the method used for acceding to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Instead, the UN ambassador voted in favour of it. Carter signed the International Covenant of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights acknowledging the right of everyone to social insurance. At any rate, sufficient to demonstrate that it’s hardly “newspeak”.

For the USC & BoR the “take back” clause is the 2nd Amendment which recognizes the original right of self defense of the citizens and secures the means for the people to rescind the powers they lent to government if they don’t like how government is acting . . .

Deluded. The American populace has, effectively, zero capacity to thwart the will of its government. The US has a dedicated propaganda department and a military expenditure 41% of the world’s share. For a citizen’s militia to reach parity with the US military, they’d have to have nuclear weaponry pointed at D. C. Otherwise they’d be limited to ineffectual campaigns like those true patriots Ted Kaczynski, Timothy McVeigh, Douglas Wright or Nidal Hassan. Those guys could really identify when the government had overstepped its boundaries.

No but I did like where he was a doctor and he had use his huge penis to show a woman how to have orgasms because her clitoris was in her throat. That was a good one!

I take it you haven’t read the account of Orwell joining the Marxists Internationalist group by that response.

@Abatis

which is why it is important to paint the NRA as not just a gun rights org. but a radical right wing org supporting all manner of right wing causes).

your (the anti-liberty side’s

One might, if one wasn’t concerned with being PC, claim that your side and the government are the*** real ***co-conspirators and accomplices of murderers, rapists, and thugs.

Guess what, we might finally agree on something!

So, are you game (more to the point of the intellectual capacity of leftist anti-gunners, are you still with me or was that TLDR)?

Yup, firmly convinced now that the NRA is a wholly apolitical pressure group which has no ideological slant whatsoever.

@Abatis

And this is the crux of the problem and why the divide exists. You have zero understanding of what a RIGHT is.

Actually, in an international context, things you dismiss as entitlements are held to be far more fundamental rights than being able to keep a magnum in a nightstand.

Reluctance of people whose charge it is to raise warnings (we don’t want to huwrt widdle Timmy’s fweelings) has contributed to shootings like Virgina Tech and Aurora and others. Neither Cho or Holmes were legally barred from purchasing firearms and both passed the background checks although it is any layman’s diagnosis that both were batshit crazy.

Which snippet of information pertinent to both Cho and Holmes do you think would be the basis of a good gun control law?

Likewise, instead of enforcing the laws against straw-buying and funding the man hours needed to actually uncover gunrunning, it is much easier to just enact “One Gun a Month” and VIOLA, politicians have “done something” about gunrunning!!!

Oh, those viola politicians, always stringing us along…

As for the part related to weapon’s offences, could you be more specific as to the solution? If someone is convicted of committing a felony with a firearm, should their firearms be confiscated and they be permanently blacklisted from purchasing more firearms?

BUILD MORE PRISONS

The US currently has the highest prisoner : population ratio in the world. Crime rates have fallen as imprisonment has increased, but Canada has experienced similar drops in crime, seriously questioning any causal chain. Murder rates remain higher in states with the death penalty than states without. Recidivism in countries like Norway with some of the cushiest prisons in the world is far lower than in the US. Current evidence suggests that imprisonment actually increases recidivism compared to other sentences. My friend got a first in Criminology and is now studying it at Cambridge, so I’ll lean on her for cites if you desire.

Of course that would force politicians to stop trying to convince suburban soccer moms that little Brice and Dakota have the same chance of getting gunned down on their cul-de-sac as Hakim and Jeaquaan have, slinging shit down in the hood.

and you had the audacity to complain about dog whistles.

[Abatis]

@gamerunknown

Article 2, Section 2, Clause 2 of the United States Constitution discusses the power to sign treaties,

I know. I just wanted to know where you were going with that. For the last 6+ months some heated debate has has been focused on the UN Small Arms Treaty and whether it has any implications for US gun owners rights if ratified and signed by the US government.

@gamerunknown

Carter signed the International Covenant of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights acknowledging the right of everyone to social insurance.

Was that the primary factor in the USA finally enacting Universal Health Care? If not then the UN and its flowery rights declarations are just ineffectual horseshit. The UDHR hardly represents hard and fast unequivocal, unavoidable mandates for member states . . . Especially when some of the most egregious offending nations are charged with enforcing it LOL.

@gamerunknown

At any rate, sufficient to demonstrate that it’s hardly “newspeak”.

I am comfortable with my assessment in the context I used it pertaining to the discussion of the nature of rights in the USA. I did not make any statement about the UDHR until you brought it up. The UN is not premised on the principles of conferred powers and retained rights so my disagreements can’t really be applied to the UN and its rights declarations; those second generation cultural, economic and social rights could be maintained as “fundamental” for the UN.

@gamerunknown

Deluded. The American populace has, effectively, zero capacity to thwart the will of its government.

The 2nd Amendment is not a provision mandating tactical equivalency. It only is intended to keep the original ratios the framers embraced and recognized as “securing the free state”.

The framers stated that in 1788 the largest standing army that could be maintained would, at most, amount to 1% of the total population. These government forces would be outnumbered ("opposed" was the word James Madison used) by “citizens with arms in their hands” by a ratio of 17 to 1.

In modern times that superiority has grown a bit, it now stands at 25 armed citizens to one soldier (2.9 million active duty and reserve military vs 75 million “citizens with arms in their hands” in a nation of 311 million “total souls”.

While the founders did not envision every person being armed they certainly desired a significant percentage (17-20% of the population) to be properly situated with small arms to effectively resist the government’s standing army (1% of the population) with violence.

That ratio is the only condition they intended to preserve with the enactment of the 2nd Amendment for that would allow the formation of a “well regulated militia” when necessary. As far as maintaining the superiority ratio, it has worked even better than they hoped.

<rebuttal to the rest of your post in a little while>

[Capt_Kirk]

Ok some observations here

First for those of you who are not from here, in some ways we tend to think of ourselves in the same way we think of our Founding Fathers, you know the guys that took on the most powerful Nation on Earth when we didn’t really have an army and beat them into submission (with help, Merci Beaucoup Mon Amis). The first politician who tells us we have to give up our guns because of a UN treaty will swiftly be booted out of office and likely hung from a nearby tree. Total non starter

DC was incredibly stupid for pursuing the Heller case to the SCOTUS, given the make up of the Court. but it is now a Constitutional right for an individual to possess firearms.

Felons generally cannot have firearms ever, with few exceptions.

I own long guns and handguns but would give up the handguns if you got most of the illegal guns off the streets, seriously offer still stands.

The US has a deplorable level of gun violence and way too many people in prison and our prisons seem to breed more criminal behavior.

I am open to solutions but I am not about to give up my handguns while the gangs are armed to the teeth

Capt

[Abatis]

@gamerunknown

I take it you haven’t read the account of Orwell joining the Marxists Internationalist group by that response.

DILLIGAF

@gamerunknown

Yup, firmly convinced now that the NRA is a wholly apolitical pressure group which has no ideological slant whatsoever.

The NRA is a single issue organization. They support anyone who supports gun rights. That position is rare for democrats and others on the left. I’m not a spokesperson for the NRA and if we were discussing another hot-button topic like abortion or gay rights or drug policy you would hear me denigrating religious right wing conservative whackos.

@gamerunknown

Actually, in an international context, things you dismiss as entitlements are held to be far more fundamental rights than being able to keep a magnum in a nightstand.

That’s fine and I fully accept that and would never argue that the political philosophy that the USA is founded on would work anywhere else. Locke and Sidney (and others) “spoke” to our founders and the founders / framers embraced their governmental model and rights theory which form the unalterable fundamental principles of the US Constitution. Those principles can’t be forced on other nations or cultures but neither can the various communitarian / statist models be argued to be supported by the US Constitution.

So what we have is the conflict of 20th century second generation “positive” rights being forced into a government model that can not be said to authorize government to have those interests or act in that fashion.

@gamerunknown

Which snippet of information pertinent to both Cho and Holmes do you think would be the basis of a good gun control law?

Well it exists already. Anyone “who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any mental institution” is forbidden to purchase, own or use a firearm or possess ammunition.

Problem is, as disturbed as those two individuals were, nobody who witnessed their detachment and downward spiral took the necessary steps . . . Neither was ever adjudicated as a mental defective or had been committed to any mental institution so there was no mental health disability for their gun rights. Even if they had been, there was no assurance that their status would have been available in the background check system. After the VA-Tech shooting the Governor signed an Executive Order reforming Virgina’s data entry policy into the National Instant Check System (NICS). Not that it would have made a difference in Cho’s case as there was no determination.

Certain legal thresholds must be met to disable someones gun rights.

Federally, they are:

[INDENT]18 U.S.C. § 922(d) - It shall be unlawful for any person to sell or otherwise dispose of any firearm or ammunition to any person knowing or having reasonable cause to believe that such person -

(1) is under indictment for, or has been convicted in any court of, a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year;
(2) is a fugitive from justice;
(3) is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance
(4) has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any mental institution;
(5) being an alien . . . illegally or unlawfully in the United States
(6) who has been discharged from the Armed Forces under dishonorable conditions;
(7) who, having been a citizen of the United States, has renounced his citizenship;
(8) is subject to a court order that restrains such person from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner of such person or child of such intimate partner or person, or engaging in other conduct that would place an intimate partner in reasonable fear of bodily injury to the partner or child . . .
(9) has been convicted in any court of a misdemeanor crime of
domestic violence.[/INDENT]

@gamerunknown

Oh, those viola politicians, always stringing us along…

LOL! Ok ya got me!

@gamerunknown

As for the part related to weapon’s offences, could you be more specific as to the solution? If someone is convicted of committing a felony with a firearm, should their firearms be confiscated and they be permanently blacklisted from purchasing more firearms?

That is the law presently and not just for firearm crime; the purchase/own/use prohibition is placed upon being charged for any crime punishable by a year or more in prison.

@gamerunknown

The US currently has the highest prisoner : population ratio in the world.

True and too many beds are being filled by non-violent and drug offenders which leaves too many real bad guys roaming the streets. Most murder victims and murderers are established criminals and “in the game” of criminal activity.

Percentages of murder victims with criminal histories:

Baltimore 91%
Newark 85%
Milwaukee 77%
Philadelphia 75%

[INDENT]"“The notion that these (murders) are random bolts of lightning, which is the commonly held image, is not the reality,” says Kennedy, who has examined the backgrounds of murder suspects and victims in multiple U.S. cities. “It happens, but it doesn’t happen often.”

The slaying of truly innocent victims is so unusual in Baltimore that the chief prosecutor says the city has become dangerously numb to the carnage. “If we don’t put human faces on the victims, we will become desensitized,” State Attorney Patricia Jessamy says."

USAToday[/INDENT]

@gamerunknown

and you had the audacity to complain about dog whistles.

Not racist, just reality. If you are not young and black and involved in the drug trade ones chances of being a murder victim are very low. Blacks represent 12.6% of the population but amount to 49.7% of murder victims (FBI)

[Capt_Kirk]

Nitpick but a big one,

The NRA is by no means a single issue org. I was a member and I left because the NRA is a rightwing, anti Obama, Pro Life etc and they constantly send you info, voters guides and the like.

Capt

[Scumpup]

@Capt_Kirk

Nitpick but a big one,

The NRA is by no means a single issue org. I was a member and I left because the NRA is a rightwing, anti Obama, Pro Life etc and they constantly send you info, voters guides and the like.

Capt

No, that isn’t right. I resigned my life membership because the NRA is exactly a single issue organization; and in the last 10 or 15 years that issue has become maximizing revenue.

[Abatis]

@Capt_Kirk

Nitpick but a big one,

The NRA is by no means a single issue org. I was a member and I left because the NRA is a rightwing, anti Obama, Pro Life etc and they constantly send you info, voters guides and the like.

Capt

I’ve been a member for over 30 years and I have never seen them take an opinion on abortion.

They support pro-gun candidates and certainly, many of them are pro-life but I can’t see assigning the NRA with that except by some ridiculous proxy.

Anti-Obama?? Uhhh… yeah, definitely, with cause.

Are you CaptKirk on OTL? If so we have parried in the past.

[Capt_Kirk]

I will temporarily retract until I have a cite as I was working from memory

I do not participate on any other boards

Capt

[gamerunknown]

@Abatis

The purpose of this Orwellian new-speak is to redefine our rights into a fuzzy, moldable menu of services, privileges and entitlements. Upon our display of various ID cards (except to vote), filling out the proper forms and payment of license fees, a bureaucrat can stamp “APPROVED” and our benevolent government will bestow our rights upon us.

Ok, I didn’t take issue to any great degree with anything in your most recent post, but this seems to be evidence of cognitive dissonance. You oppose ID cards for everything other than voting? A voter ID is by necessity a form of photo ID and will contain all the metrics a government will need to keep tabs on someone. One of the few things I agree with Ron Paul on is that a “National ID card is part of fear-based government.” - and a voter ID system is one method of implementing a national ID.