A Budget/ Fiscal Cliff Deal

from Politico:

The emerging fiscal cliff deal is enough to leave Republicans with a major New Year’s hangover.

The package being negotiated by Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell and Vice President Joe Biden amounts to a defeat for the GOP on multiple fronts.

It not only raises tax rates, but also extends stimulus-era tax policy, prolongs emergency unemployment benefits, maintains targeted tax breaks derided by the party as corporate handouts and revives limits on deductions for the wealthy that have been dormant for almost a decade — all policies that the GOP has fought. It’s expected to raise $600 billion over 10 years.

Just so we all understand:

1. This deal would reduce the deficit by $600 billion over ten years
2. The 2012 federal budget deficit was $1.1 trillion

So this great new budget proposal would make up about half this year's deficit if it worked all of its magic this year, but it will be more like $60 billion in deficit reduction this year.

More things to know:

1. Our taxes are going up
2. New Obamacare taxes are being added
3. Businesses will not be hiring
4. The government doesn't even have a vague hope of balancing this year's budget deficit

The most important point to understand:

You idiots voted for this.

Bailout

I'm watching the book talk about "Bailout" by Neil Barofsky and I've had a few thoughts that I would like to share.

About the author (BookTV description):

From 2008 to 2011, Mr. Barofsky was special inspector general in charge of oversight of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). He is currently a senior fellow at New York University School of Law. 

Some thoughts:

1. Barofsky identifies himself as a "lifelong Democrat" and yet the Bush administration appointed him to be the inspector general of TARP; his was a "merit appointment.".  I have heard of several people appointed to political roles, who were democrats, by the Bush administration because of merit.  I have yet to hear of one case where the Obama administration has appointed a republican to a political role because of his/ her merit.  (If you want to point to Chuck Hagel's possible appointment to become Secretary of Defense, then I'd like to point out that Hagel is too moderate a republican even for John McCain.)

2. Barofsky has interacted a little with our Treasury Secretary, Tim Geithner.  The Treasury Secretary was apparently uninterested in knowing how well TARP was implemented.  Barofsky says he was literally cursed at by the Treasury Secretary, in their only one on one meeting, because he had the nerve to suggest that Tim Geithner is anything other than the most transparent Treasury Secretary ever.  He also mentioned numerous information leaks, from the Treasury Department, under Geithner's watch.

3. Barofsky gives the implementation of TARP an "F."  He say that all it did was save large banks, which were not good, and has made them worse.  He predicts that we will have another economic slowdown because of the bad decisions that were made "in 2008, 2009, 2010."

4. He says he is a "lifelong democrat" and contributed to Obama's 2008 campaign.  I wonder how many people are lifelong members of either party and never bother to figure out if the party that they support does what they want it to do.  And let's look at the results.

5. When asked about the "fiscal cliff" he says it is over dramatized about this particular point in time.  He says that an economic slowdown is the time to "strengthen our safety nets."  I wonder how many democrats support the people because they think the democrats care about the poor and think that the republicans think that the poor can rot.  I think that more voters should reconsider my fourth point above.  (He says the government should help the poor more; look at how well that has worked.)

6. He predicts that we'll get some sort of "fiscal cliff" deal that delays the problem for a few months, when we'll get to deal with it again.  I agree.

(I'm skipping commenting on some of his comments, even if I disagree, because I don't find them new or particularly interesting.)

7.  He says there was a bill that would have been the law instead of Dodd-Frank, that had bipartisan support, but the President opposed it and so we got Dodd-Frank instead.  Barofsky thinks there were some small good points in Dodd-Frank but it failed to successfully regulate the banks, which was its main purpose.  (I think that Dodd-Frank is all kinds of awful.)

8.  Multiple times Barofsky has said things that make me wonder if his does not think less of Obama since he has been actively involved in Washington politics.  I have no doubt that he voted for Obama twice, but I think that he should have looked at my point number four.  (I was trying with this point to look at the president from Barofsky's point of view.  I am surprised at how often he seems to be at odds with Obama's administration.)

9. Callers to talk shows, and speech questioners, are almost always colossally awful.  Almost all.

10. He watched, firsthand, how badly TARP failed.  He watched, firsthand, how badly our government failed to prevent, and he even thinks that the government helped to create our current economic situation.  He said that he thinks that the decisions made by our government in 2008-10 will hurt us in the near future.  He said that the big banks that got bailed out got to design their bailout.  And yet, despite all of that, he thinks that the government is capable, with more regulations, of preventing, or minimizing the damage from, the next economic disaster.

There may be something in the water in Washington that makes the people there think that if only the right people are in place, if only the right rules are in place, then the government will give us nothing but sunshine and rainbows.

Oh, and by the way: Point four! Point four! Point four!

How much failure would it take before people realize that the government is always incompetent?

11.  He repeated my points one, three, and eight during an answer to a caller's question.

My final thoughts on the book talk, and I'll write it simply so that small minds (that means democrat voters) will understand:

1. The government made things worse.
2. The government always makes things worse.

Why do you still watch tv?

We know that journalists are full of it. 

We know that every aspect of media has liberal messages in it.

We know that politicians and journalists lie like mad.

Why do any of you still watch tv? Or read newspapers?

Get your news from blogs and twitter instead.  At least you'll know where the biases are coming from.

Update: Did I mention that the media is biased?

Privatize the Police?

Might not be a bad idea.

Insuring Against Crime

by Gil Guillory
by Gil Guillory

What if there were a company that would patrol your neighborhood and be financially liable for losses due to crime on your property…would you be interested in subscribing? Could something like that actually work and be profitable, and would it be preferable to tax-funded patrol?

This idea has been suggested by a number of libertarians, from Molinari to Rothbard to Benson to Hoppe to Barnett. Some people think the insurance component of such a venture would completely swamp its viability.

So how much would it take to just cover the payouts for losses? My friends and I decided to find out. We took data from the FBI Uniform Crime Reports and the Department of Justice (sic) National Crime Victimization Surveys, picked a specific location in the US, did a little bit of math, and found out:

To insure against the peril of murder, assuming each victim's estate would be given 1 million USD, it would cost about $8 a year per household.

To insure against the peril of rape, assuming each victim would be given 50,000 USD, it would cost about $21 a year per household.

To insure against the peril of battery/assault, assuming each victim would be made whole for monetary losses only, it would cost about $3 a year per household.

To insure against all property crimes (robbery, burglary, motor vehicle theft), assuming each victim would be made whole for monetary losses only, it would cost about $126 a year per household.

But wait — you already have car insurance and homeowner's insurance! What if the payouts were capped at your homeowner's insurance deductible, where your insurance company already starts picking up the tab?

Well, then, to insure against all property crimes, it would cost only about $25 a year per household.
Maybe the idea isn't so crazy, after all.

Eric Peters on Sen Fienstein's New Gun Law Proposal

This law follows in the footsteps of Adolf Hitler who first required gun registration, then gun confiscation, and then unleashed genocide.

The traitorous, demonic U.S. Senator Feinstein — one of the most evil, wretched women to have ever disgraced the floor of the U.S. Senate — has patterned her gun confiscation and criminalization law after Adolf Hitler’s laws. This is not surprising, as her desired outcome is exactly the same: the destruction of freedom, the enslavement of the population and the rise of government tyranny in America.

-Eric

Howlin' Wolf

Gregory's Gun Law Problem

Some links about Meet the Press' David Gregory's breaking the gun laws that he is arguing for.

Summary:

Meet the Press’s studios are located in Washington DC.  This morning on “Meet the Press”, David Gregory decided to wave around a 30-round AR-15 magazine.


From DC’s gun laws:

DC High Capacity Ammunition Magazines – D.C. Official Code 7-2506.01
(b) No person in the District shall possess, sell, or transfer any large capacity ammunition feeding device regardless of whether the device is attached to a firearm. For the purposes of this subsection, the term large capacity ammunition feeding device means a magazine, belt, drum, feed strip, or similar device that has a capacity of, or that can be readily restored or converted to accept, more than 10 rounds of ammunition. The term large capacity ammunition feeding device shall not include an attached tubular device designed to accept, and capable of operating only with, .22 caliber rimfire ammunition..”

Because of the few 2+2=5 comments that refuse to believe their eyes, David Gregory says at the 9:46 mark at the video provided here:

“Here is a magazine for ammunition that carries 30 bullets.”

Legal Insurrection hasn’t gotten an answer back from NBC on their violation of DC law as of this update.   It sure is inconvenient for NBC that David Gregory not only stated it was “a magazine for ammunition that carries 30 bullets”, but that subject matter expert NRA CEO and executive VP Wayne LaPierre was two feet away to witness it in person.

Police quote:

 “From: “DC Police (imailagent)” <customerservice.mpd2@dc.gov>
Subject: Email from DC Police (Intranet Quorum IMA00519327)
Date: December 24, 2012 4:13:12 PM EST
To: -

The Metropolitan Police Department is in receipt of your e-mail regarding David Gregory segment on “Meet the Press.” MPD has received numerous e-mails informing us of the segment. NBC contacted MPD inquiring if they could utilize a high capacity magazine for their segment. NBC was informed that possession of a high capacity magazines is not permissible and their request was denied. This matter is currently being investigated. Thank you for taking the time to bring this matter to our attention.
Customer Service – Metropolitan Police Department”

NBC's Statement & Description of Statement:

Another individual contacted me and showed me they got the exact same response from DC police.  It’ll be interesting to see where this goes now.
CNN Politics is now reporting that DC police are investigating whether David Gregory broke the law.

It’s not known whether the magazine Gregory had in his hand was authentic or a prop. D.C. police spokeswoman Gwen Crump told CNN the department is investigating the matter and would have no further comment at this time.

That’ll probably be the excuse they run with later.  But the problem is, the way the statute is written, it also includes:

or similar device that has a capacity of, or that can be readily restored or converted to accept, more than 10 rounds of ammunition

So it doesn’t even matter if it is a prop.  A prop can be readily converted.  There have been asinine comments galore about how he was just holding up an empty magazine body.  Wouldn’t matter under the statute.  A USGI magazine like the one he held up is composed of only four parts – a magazine body (the boxy main piece), a spring, a follower (a piece that is pushed up by the spring and pushes cartridges up to the top), and a floorplate (the bottom piece that holds the spring in on the other end of the magazine body).  There’s not really much to be said.

Summary of the Event:

When NBC news anchor David Gregory was arguing about banning high capacity magazines he displayed one on television in front of NRA chief executive LaPierre. In a delicious twist of irony David Gregory is now being investigated by the police for violation of Washington D.Cs ban on large capacity magazines.

I do not have sympathy for the man, not just because he is trying to infringe on 2nd amendment rights by arguing for laws that have no affect whatsoever on gun violence or violence in general. But also because a person arguing to make something illegal who doesn't take the time to make sure that what he is presenting isn't already illegal in the area he is presenting deserves what he gets. I doubt he has any sympathy for gun owners or gun store owners who have been nailed for failing to understand all of the byzantine labyrinth of our countries, state, and municipal codes, regulations and laws on firearms; so he gets none from me.

Note to all hoplophobs and gun grabbers. Being ignorant of not only how firearms work when trying to take away second amendment rights makes you look foolish; and only helps my cause. But as we see now, being utterly ignorant of the laws as well could also land you in trouble. Many, though unfortunately not all, gun owners are all too keenly aware of the wire thin line we walk when.  Maybe David Gregory will gain some sympathy for law abiding citizens who are turned into criminals because of ineffectual and ludicrous laws, but I doubt it.  So I will settle for some schadenfreude.

And a summary of the events during an interview with the blogger who "broke" the story:

4) Some people are wondering why gun-rights folks are making a big deal over the Gregory thing, given the premise that gun-rights folks by and large want fewer firearms restrictions. What’s your take on that?

It’s an illustration of hypocrisy on many levels by David Gregory’s actions.  David Gregory is vehemently anti-rights, but he went so far as to knowingly and willfully break the very type of laws that he demands more of.  He states that more laws are needed, yet he by his own actions proves that those sufficiently motivated by bad intentions, whether criminals or madmen – can know the consequences and will still break any laws.  Thus it proves the futility of such laws.

If we live in a nation of laws, Gregory will be prosecuted (and possibly his staff will be wrapped up in a conspiracy charge), and the unjust laws that he wants expanded will send him to prison.  There has already been at least one pro-gun lawyer offering to defend Gregory, as the law is a violation of his Second Amendment rights, even though Gregory wants those rights taken away (though seemingly from everyone but privileged people like himself).  It will be his chance to agree that the laws he demands are unjust and absurd, or to be held to account by his own rules.  It will highlight the need to enforce existing gun laws rather than pass new ones, as well as the frivolous nature of most gun laws.

If we live in a nation of men and not laws, where some animals are more equal than others, then Gregory will be given favorable treatment and let go with nothing more than a slap on the wrist.  It will highlight the hypocrisy further, as evidenced by the David Gregory memes already circulating the internet, with pictures of him holding the magazine and captions like “If I were a black teenager, I’d already be in jail”.

It contrasts sharply with the story of 1st Lt. Augustine Kim, a two-tour veteran who was imprisoned by DC for actual innocent, unknowing violations.  

Ultimately when Alan Gura takes Heller v DC II up to the Supreme Court, it will be a shining example of government hypocrisy if the law is enforced against poor, little people like Dick Heller but not against the rich, powerful like David Gregory.

A New Tax Idea

No one is happy with how our government taxes us and how much that it spends (except politicians, and who cares about what they think).

Why not let taxpayers decide where their tax dollars get spent?

We already spend billions of dollars and many hours filling our our income tax forms, so why not add a few pages that list all of the things that the federal government spends money on?

If our tax form has a list of all of the places that we spend money on, then the individual tax payer could decide exactly how much of his tax dollars go to each government job or program.

If you are worried about retirement, then you could put all your money towards Medicare and Mediciad.

If you want to support the troops, then you could put all of your money towards the defense department.

If you want to support "the right to choose," then you could put your tax dollars towards funding abortion clinics.

This idea would not be much more complicated than what we already do each tax season.  And each taxpayer could put his, or her, tax dollars exactly where he, or she, wants them.

My guess is that some government programs would not get funded, like the National Endowment for the Arts, and other government programs would get more funding.

But the funding would be what each taxpayer wants to pay for.  The taxpayer would decide where his, or her, tax dollars go.

If we are going to have our spending go to all sorts of things, then why not let each taxpayer spend wherever he, or she, wants to spend?

As a benefit, our budget would always be balanced.

The Worst Anti-Gun Article That I read Today Updated

Read this article and marvel at how awful a political article can be.

My comment:

This article is astonishingly awful and Ms. Moore should be ashamed for having written it. Were I an editor at this website, and even if I agreed with the sentiment, I would not publish this or any other article from Ms. Moore, because of how astonishingly full of lies, insults, and misleading information that it is.

Automatic weapons have been illegal since 1934.

All but one mass public shooting have occurred in gun free zones.

Legal weapons have stopped many mass shootings.

There is a minimum age for buying a gun, there is no minimum age to get an abortion.

There is a minimum age for buying bullets, there is no minimum age to get an abortion.

You need to pass a background check to buy a gun, you need no background check to get an abortion.

There is a waiting period before you can buy a gun, there is no waiting period before you can get an abortion.

To claim that the NRA is bad because it no longer teaches gun safety in schools is stupid because politicians, who you support, have made it illegal for them to do so.

This article is astonishingly awful, and Ms. Moore should be ashamed for having written it. It is no wonder to me why so many do not like guns, when people read such misinformation, and lies, such as this and think it to be in any way accurate.

Update: I suspect that my comment was moderated out of existence.  Some replies that I wrote to other commenters after leaving the above comment are in place, but the above comment was not.

More Evidence Against Lying Gun Control Suporters

How much evidence do we need to have before realizing that the media and pro gun control supporters are hypocritical, lying, bastards?

I doubt David Gregory intended to violate D.C.’s ban on the possession or transfer of high capacity ammunition magazines when he waved around such a magazine during his interview of Wayne LaPierre yesterday.

...

Gregory’s possible violation of the law was exposed by the conservative blogosphere, which also pointed out that Gregory sends his kids to a school with armed security at the same time he was mocking the NRA suggestion of armed security in schools.

Comment from the article:

rec_lutheran
 
Of course Gregory should be prosecuted. If he were an ordinary citizen the DC police would persecute him mercilessly.

And if the DC police decide to ignore the violation (the most likely outcome), opponents of gun control should bring this up at every opportunity. Just as some of the loudest voices calling for tax increases turn out to be tax cheats, just as some darlings of the feminist movement turn out to be rapists (William Jefferson Clinton), the hypocrisy of the anti-gun movement should be exposed.

h/t: Althouse

Gulliver's Travels

by Jonathan Swift

This is a classic book that I gave a good shot at reading.

The story is about a sailor getting stuck first with a bunch of tiny people, then with giant people.

The book started with some sort of (angry?) letter from the main character about I don't know what.

A page or two into the story the main character is shipwrecked on a deserted island that is inhabited by tiny people.  I'm not sure how big the people are supposed to be. At one point it is said that they are six inches tall and their horses are four and a half inches tall.  But at another point the main character stretches his handkerchief on some sticks as an elevated stage. (I don't know why.)  And apparently the mounted tiny people perform military maneuvers on his handkerchief stage.  If I'm not mistaken, a handkerchief is about a foot square which would mean that about four four and a half inch tall horses would fill the stage.  There are also repeated references to the tiny people needing ladders to climb on top of him when he is lying down.

I stopped reading after getting a fair ways in.  Once again a classic book of literature disappoints me as reading materiel.  A guy getting stuck with tiny and giant people is a very interesting idea, but Gulliver's Travels is very poorly written and I won't bother to finish reading it.

Shooting A Deer

I attempted to shoot two bucks with my bow this season.  I missed one and got one.  You may be able to learn from the stories of my two shots at deer with a bow this year.

Let's start with the deer story that includes a happy ending.

I picked a new treestand location this year because I wanted a stand closer to the cover than I had in previous years.  I picked a tree that covered a corner of brush and trees.  If deer move from the main bedding area to my big food plot, then they will pass through this corner of brush and trees.

I probably averaged seeing three 1 1/2 year old bucks each night that I sat there.  So one night I first saw the standard nine does and fawns and the usual two 1 1/2 year old bucks.  Then in the distance I saw another deer and a flash of some long tines over its head.  I saw parts of the deer for a time straight ahead of me through lots of brush and branches.  He was following a doe and I expected him to pass by me.

His tine length meant that I knew that I wanted to shoot him if I got an opportunity.  He took his time walking around about 30 yards in front of me, but there were to many branches to shoot through.

I expected him to walk from in front of me to my right.  While I was waiting for him to clear the brush I considered which sight pin I would use.  (Bow sights often have 3 or 5 pins.  You put the top pin on a target that is 20 yards away, the second on a target that is 30 yards away, etc.)  I thought that if he cleared the brush at one point that he would be twenty yards away.  If he cleared the brush near some taller grass, then I'd use the 30 yard pin...

And then I realized that I was thinking too much.  I've shot several deer, I've shot my bow a lot.  So, I stopped thinking, and when the deer presented me with a shot, I lifted my bow and shot him.

I don't remember raising my bow, I don't remember putting the sight on the deer...I just did it.

Once you have shot your bow enough and become confident that you will be successful when shooting at deer, then you to will no need to over think taking a shot.

I hit him a bit far back, but he was quartering away and the exit hole was right behind the right front leg.  This hole acted as a drain and I had a solid foot wide, solid blood trail for about 30 yards until I found the dead buck.

Now that you know what to do, let's look at what not to do.

Another night I was in the same tree and saw the usual few does, fawns, and small bucks.  Then a deer came from behind me ant to my right.  I got a glimpse of him through a clearing, and I would have had a shot if he had given me a bit more warning before showing up.

He looked big, but I did not know how big.  I heard him rub his head in some branches over a scrape, but I could not see him because a tree was between us.  He looked like a nice one.  But how big?

"HOLY SH*T!" I thought as I saw him through the trees.

I had a great look at his antlers through some tree branches, but no shot.

"I can shoot through those branches," I thought. "No, he's following that doe.  He's about to give me a good shot...But I can shoot through those branches...I shouldn't. How big are his...freaking huge...don't look at the horns wait for the shot...please move, please move, please move...he's a monster...don't look at the horns; wait for a shot."

And after a while he took a few steps out from behind the tree and presented me with a picture perfect 20 yard, standing, broadside, shot.

At this point I'd like to point out the two types of releases.  One type of release has a metal buckle, like your belt, and the other uses Velcro to attach to your wrist.  I prefer the Velcro because there is no metal to click against anything and make a noise.  The problem with my Velcro was the tag end.  I did not need the full length of Velcro to attach the release to my wrist.  And I was wearing a plastic mesh face-mask, to be more camouflaged.

Once I had the shot: I drew my bow, and my release's tag end made a ripping noise as it brushed against my face-mask.

When that happened all that I could think of was that I had made a noise, buck, heard it, and was about to run away.

"Shoot! Shoot! Shoot!" Was all that I could think.

I panicked, rushed my shot, and missed by a mile.

Dammit.

Charitible Giving vs. Government Handouts

Arthur Brooks wrote The Road to Freedom recently.  His book was about making the emotional arguments for less government rather than the logical arguments. 

One of those arguments was that private charities do a better job of providing for the poor than does the government.  Private charities receive donations from voluntary contributors; government poverty benefits are taken from all taxpayers.  And when the government has lots of poverty benefits the potential charity donors say, "why should I donate to charity when I already pay taxes that go towards poverty programs?"

An article at the Circle Bastiat covers this subject a bit more fully.

First of all, what is wrong with private charity stepping in to fill the gap? With the present economy as bad as it is, providing succor to the swelling ranks of the needy will inevitably be a “struggle”. What is wrong with that struggle being voluntarily borne by donors and competently administered by private charities instead of involuntarily borne by taxpayers and incompetently administered by bureaucrats?

Furthermore, it is interesting that, according to the Chronicle of Philanthropy’s ranking of the states according to charitable giving, 9 of the top 10 are deMause’s dreaded red states, and 8 of the bottom 10 are blue.

Georgia ranks way up at #8.

Maine, deMause’s “model state”, scrapes the bottom at #49.

And in terms of the median contribution of its residents, Maine is dead last.
But then, who can blame them? Surely they think they’ve fulfilled their role by funding Maine’s copious welfare rolls with their taxes. True, state welfare harms much more than it helps. But the point is, regardless of the results, they’ve already paid their part in their minds.

With this effect in mind, plus Obama’s repeated proposals to limit tax deductions for charitable giving (echoed recently by Cato Institute Fellow Daniel Mitchell), it is more apt to speak of a “war on charity” than a “war on welfare.”

John Browning: Man and Gunmaker

by James Barrington

This book is about the undisputed greatest gun designer.  The book is short (49 pages).  It is very simply written.

Rather than a book, I would suggest that this is a long paper describing why John Browning is the greatest gun designer in history.  It reads like a list of some of the guns that Mr. Browning designed, with some, limited, background information.

Read it if you can get it free on an e-reader, skip it if you can't.

Debating Advice

1. You will not convince the person that you are debating.
2. You might convince a witness to the debate.
3. Name calling and insults from you are unacceptable and will encourage the other side.
4. If you do not get called names and insulted by your opponent, then you are not debating right.
5. Mercilessly attack their arguments, not their person.
6. You demeanor must be polite, cheerful, and in good humor.
7. You should not get mad, for any reason.  
8. Stay positive and stay focused, look for the flaws in their arguments and destroy them with your words.

Whoa

from here

For clearly, Washington is preparing for something, whether it is economic collapse and civil unrest, "natural" disasters, or civil war … 

Whatever it is, it’s something, and we know the bureaucrats are preparing for something, given the Department of Homeland Security’s purchases of hundreds of millions of hollow-point bullets and high-powered battle rifles, Barack Obama’s Executive Orders to seize control over mass communications in America and seize U.S. infrastructure and people involuntarily, Obama’s preparing the FEMA rendition camps (not to mention the many coffins and mass graves being prepared), the U.S. Army’s manual which outlines a plan to kill rioters and demonstrators, the Army’s training troops to drive tanks through U.S. streets, FEMA’s preparing for food storage confiscation, and more unconstitutional and criminal Obama-police state policies now.

There is also Obama’s NDAA provision of indefinite detention of Americans, which gives the President the power to have the military seize and detain indefinitely anyone that the President or his minions have deemed a "terrorist," a "combatant," or otherwise a criminal, without providing any evidence against the accused. 

Obama also has claimed the power – upheld by the court bureaucrats – to assassinate anyone he chooses, based on his own reasons, without any due process or any evidence against the accused.
A widely publicized example of that was Obama’s assassination of Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, whose only "crime" was criticizing U.S. foreign policy within his religious sermons, totally protected by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. (I have addressed that here and here.)

You see, the power-grabbers have started with the Muslims, after the widespread post-9/11 brainwashing of Americans toward anti-Muslim prejudice and acceptance of anti-Muslim government policies and militarism. 

So, thanks to the sheeple zombies’ approval of the post-9/11 hysterical "War on Terror," Washington has now been cracking down on speech, critics of stupid government bureaucrats, political dissent and government whistleblowers. But start with the Muslims and they will go on from there.

More recently, former Marine Brandon Raub’s Facebook posting questioning the government’s official explanation for 9/11 caused such a stir, he was criminally abducted by Secret Service and local authorities and involuntarily detained in a psychiatric ward. He is not the first victim of the State’s such crimes, as there have already been others in recent years.

Gun Controllers Admit to Knowing Nothing About Guns

Mother Jones magazine apparently felt the need to describe the various types of guns, because they admit that the people who want to ban guns know nothing about the subject.

As my colleague Kevin Drum pointed out Wednesday, a lot of journalists are seeking to say something meaningful about guns in the wake of Newtown…and failing miserably because their knowledge of guns is rather limited. In fact, this is grist for the NRA, which constantly rails against "the liberal media" and unarmed citizens: If you don't know guns inside and out, they argue, you have no right to an opinion on the issue.

Even while attempting to inform gun controllers on the subject they do it badly.

Some of the different categories of guns that they describe: "automatic," "machine gun," and "assault weapons".  Doesn't that sound rather redundant?

They also describe bullets:

The bullet (1 in the diagram above) is technically the projectile that is fired from a gun. It is part of a cartridge, and is encased (2) with a gunpowder propellant (3). Cartridges and bullets are sometimes referred to colloquially as rounds.

How many gun controlling idiots now think that shotguns fire "bullets"?

At least they are almost honest about two things:  

"Assault weapon is a nebulous and relatively recent term."

&

"California, one of a few states that maintains its own ban on assault weapons, uses this rather confusing flowchart to define the term. "

More accurate definition of "assault weapon":  “It’s black and makes us poopoo in our panties!”

In conclusion: #idiots

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas! Happy Hanuka-uh!  Etc.!

Usual posts to follow today.  Although both you and I should probably be doing something other than surfing the internet today.

How can we believe anything?

Mother Jones Magazine

In the wake of the slaughters this summer at a Colorado movie theater and a Sikh temple in Wisconsin, we set out to track mass shootings in the United States over the last 30 years. We identified and analyzed 62 of them, and one striking pattern in the data is this: In not a single case was the killing stopped by a civilian using a gun.

Ann Coulter

This will come as a shock to people who know something about the subject.

The magazine reaches its conclusion by simply excluding all cases where an armed civilian stopped the shooter: They looked only at public shootings where four or more people were killed, i.e., the ones where the shooter wasn't stopped.

Now how is the average person supposed to know who to believe?  One is clearly full of sh*t, but how can someone tell which one?

Similar examples can be pulled from any subject and any issue, so how are we supposed to know who to believe?

Ever?

On any issue?

Every time someone uses any data to back their claim we need to question it.

John Lott was a guest on Piers Morgan's CNN show recently.  Here is a quote from Morgan:

I'm sorry, but that's just a complete lie. It's a complete lie. The gun murder rate in Britain is 35 a year, average. You need to stop repeating a blatant lie, about what happens in other countries.  [cross talk]  No, you're not going to get away with this. You lied about it the other day. Thirty-five gun murders a year in Britain, eleven to twelve thousand in America. Stop lying, because what you say drives Americans to defend themselves.

Here we have a CNN show host calling a guest a liar, and then claiming that average number of murders in Britain is 35 a year.  Here is the data from the UK government:

 

Can you point to a year when the number of murders in Britain was ever as low as 35 in a year?  And that doesn't take into account the fact that the number of all murders, not just those that involved guns, went up dramatically since they banned guns.



A supposedly unbiased CNN news host calls a guest a liar and then makes numbers up.

How are we supposed to believe anything?

(It would be nice if journalists were non-partisan fact finders, but I doubt that many of those exist anymore.  If they ever did.)

And you need to remember to look out for the data that lists "gun incidents," or similar.  Those studies often include all incidents involving guns, even those where the gun saved the day.  If a mugger with a knife threatens some guy and the guy draws a gun and scares the mugger away, then that incident will often be included in the number of gun incidents, and will make the data look like there is more gun crime then there actually is.

How can we trust anything?  How can we believe anybody?

***

I may be too partisan, and too pro-gun, to impartially decide a winner from between the two quotes that opened this post, but I find it hard to argue with the rest of what Ann said:

If we care about reducing the number of people killed in mass shootings, shouldn't we pay particular attention to the cases where the aspiring mass murderer was prevented from getting off more than a couple rounds?

It would be like testing the effectiveness of weed killers, but refusing to consider any cases where the weeds died.

In addition to the Portland mall case, here are a few more examples excluded by the Mother Jones' methodology:

-- Mayan Palace Theater, San Antonio, Texas, this week: Jesus Manuel Garcia shoots at a movie theater, a police car and bystanders from the nearby China Garden restaurant; as he enters the movie theater, guns blazing, an armed off-duty cop shoots Garcia four times, stopping the attack. Total dead: Zero.

-- Winnemucca, Nev., 2008: Ernesto Villagomez opens fire in a crowded restaurant; concealed carry permit-holder shoots him dead. Total dead: Two. (I'm excluding the shooters' deaths in these examples.)

-- Appalachian School of Law, 2002: Crazed immigrant shoots the dean and a professor, then begins shooting students; as he goes for more ammunition, two armed students point their guns at him, allowing a third to tackle him. Total dead: Three.

-- Santee, Calif., 2001: Student begins shooting his classmates -- as well as the "trained campus supervisor"; an off-duty cop who happened to be bringing his daughter to school that day points his gun at the shooter, holding him until more police arrive. Total dead: Two.

-- Pearl High School, Mississippi, 1997: After shooting several people at his high school, student heads for the junior high school; assistant principal Joel Myrick retrieves a .45 pistol from his car and points it at the gunman's head, ending the murder spree. Total dead: Two.

-- Edinboro, Pa., 1998: A student shoots up a junior high school dance being held at a restaurant; restaurant owner pulls out his shotgun and stops the gunman. Total dead: One.

By contrast, the shootings in gun-free zones invariably result in far higher casualty figures -- Sikh temple, Oak Creek, Wis. (six dead); Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Va. (32 dead); Columbine High School, Columbine, Colo. (12 dead); Amish school, Lancaster County, Pa. (five little girls killed); public school, Craighead County, Ark. (five killed, including four little girls).

All these took place in gun-free zones, resulting in lots of people getting killed -- and thereby warranting inclusion in the Mother Jones study.

If what we care about is saving the lives of innocent human beings by reducing the number of mass public shootings and the deaths they cause, only one policy has ever been shown to work: concealed-carry laws. On the other hand, if what we care about is self-indulgent grandstanding, and to hell with dozens of innocent children being murdered in cold blood, try the other policies.

Double Quaint

Despite its age, I occasionally think that "double quaint" is funny.

The US Post Office is on the brink of default. It could soon completely run out of money and then… what exactly do we use the post office for anymore? I guess Netflix disks. Well, I canceled the disk portion of Netflix when they raised the price, so I don’t care about that. I guess I also get a few bills, but they can e-mail those to me if they have to. Not really sure we even really need the post office anymore; it’s another one of those things that’s kind of quaint these days. And one of the reasons it’s running out of money is that its workers are unionized — double quaint!  - Frank J

My "Fiscal Cliff" Prediction

The news is full of our fiscal cliff situation.

My prediction is that one of two things will happen:

1. We go over the cliff
2. An 11th hour deal that does not much of anything (a few billion in deficit reduction and delays the cliff's implementation for a while)

Noticeably absent from my prediction is that possibility that a new balanced budget is created any time soon.

My suggestion to the republicans: Tell the democrats that you will agree to any balanced budget so long as no new taxes are added.  Change the tax rates, cut spending wherever, so long as a balanced budget is the result.

My suggestion to democrats: Propose some sort of balanced budget.



Are we all ready to welcome the new year with higher tax rates, new Obamacare taxes, and employers avoiding hiring or expanding their businesses?

Thanks President Obama!

Wonder Why Our Economy is a Mess?

Have you been wondering why our economy is a mess?  Have you wondered about 0% interest rates? Have you wondered why kids these days can't get a job?

Well, wonder no more:

Dumb Ways (for an Economy) to Die by Jeffery Tucker and Douglas French

excerpt:

Stimulate Failing Sectors. The crash of 2008 exposed gigantic investment errors goaded on by previous bad Fed policy. The market tried so hard to make things right. But the Fed, the Treasury, and every living government official fought the entire way, with TARP, QE, ZIRP, Operation Twist, bankruptcy protections, debt creation, and many trillions of dollars in squandered wealth. And for what? To save the housing, banking, and financial sectors from the consequences of their errors. But the errors haven’t gone away. The sectors haven’t been stimulated. The net effect has been to ratchet down wealth creation, and so it will be until the stimulators stop diverting wealth and start facing up to reality.

Protect Against Imports and Exports. “Economic patriotism” is one of the most dangerous phrases in the English language. It means using the taxes called tariffs and quotas to prop up economically inefficient industries in our borders and failing to allow consumers to get the best deal whenever they can find it. Obama brags: “We’ve brought twice as many cases against unfair trading practices than the previous administration and we’ve won every single one that’s been decided.” The archetype case concerns China. You are paying more for lower-quality tires due to this intervention, at an estimated cost to consumers of $1.1 billion. The goal of energy independence is a bad one because it diverts production from efficient to inefficient technologies. Protectionism (and we have it for thousands of goods such as sugar, cheese, and ball bearings) is for losers. The belligerence against China is harmful. The sanctions against Iran and a dozen other countries are stupid. The U.S. economy needs to embrace the global economy, or else it will die alone.

Regulate Everything. In the name of health, safety, the environment, and intellectual property enforcement, nothing that exists has been left outside regulatory management. Each day, an average of 68 new regulations appear, giving bureaucrats the opportunity for endless meddling and harassment, and shutting down entrepreneurial ideas. Every machine in your home has been forcibly degraded, from your toilets to your washing machines to your soap. We can’t kill bugs in or out of our homes. Lawn equipment is wonky now, thanks to the regulatory tsunami. IP enforcement through patents and copyrights has slowed the pace of development of media, software, and industrial machinery. Enterprise lives in a cage and still somehow manages to stay alive. But what are we missing as a result? That’s the great unknown.

There are many ways that the government has interfered with our lives read about some more of them here.

Look at this list of dumb ways to kill an economy. It is a stunning tribute to the private sector and the power of enterprise that we manage to grow and still somewhat prosperous, regardless of this relentless beating.

And we wonder what’s happened. We wonder why capital is fleeing, why people are leaving, why wealth is not being created, why growth is anemic. This is not a reality built into some kind of civilizational way or some inexplicable great stagnation. It is all a direct result of a conscious decision to wreck the machinery of freedom. It’s dumb.

Quote of the Day, 12/23/2012

I think one thing that’s been missing in this discussion is that essentially all the multiple victim public shootings in the United States, and all the ones in Europe, have one factor in common – that is, they keep occurring where guns are banned.

- John Lott

Savoy Brown

Quote of the Day 12/21/2012

Nothing beats a huge stick!

-Rathergood.com

Poverty Has Won The War on Poverty

I was going to write this post but The Whited Sepulchre beat me to it. 

Excerpt:

Libertarians are often caricatured as uncaring bastards who would throw their grandmothers out on the street if Granny ever stops harvesting her percentage of the wheat crop.  But it really is possible to be in favor of Granny's continued existence in her old age, while opposing John Boehner and Barack Obama being her means of support. 

How long are you going to continue to support a government that fails at everything that it does?  How many years, and trillions of dollars, will it take before you realize that the government is too thoroughly incompetent to achieve anything good?

The Stupidity Cliff

Read the Antiplanner and be enlightened.

A common saying (sometimes attributed to Samuel Francis, but I first heard it before he is supposed to have said it) inside the DC Beltway, at least among fiscal conservatives, is that America has two political parties: the Evil Party and the Stupid Party. It appears to the Antiplanner that the Stupid Party has once again found itself in a no-win situation over the co-called fiscal cliff.

Republicans have promised no increase in taxes, while Democrats want to increase taxes only on the rich–those who earn more than $250,000 a year. The latest Obama plan projects that such a tax increase will yield about $140 billion a year over the next ten years. Since fewer than 3 million tax filers earn more than $250,000 a year, that works out to an average $50,000 or so increase in annual taxes per person.

The idea of creating a fiscal cliff–a deadline by which Congress must reduce deficits or face automatic tax increases and spending cuts–may have sounded great to fiscal conservatives when it was first proposed. It doesn’t look so good now. If Republicans agree to Obama’s tax increase, they will be accused of breaking their promises. If they allow the country to go over the cliff, Democrats will respond next year with a middle-class tax cut that Republicans will find difficult to reject, else they’ll be blamed by all taxpayers, not just the wealthy ones, for raising rates. Either way, Dems win, Reps lose.

...read more.

Car Coolness

Recently Jeffery Tucker wrote about how car manufacturers are all making similar cars because government rules limit their options.

Kit car manufacturers don't need to follow all of the same regulations, so they can make cool cars.  A kit car manufacturer he linked to was Factory Five Racing.

Apparently for $13,000 (plus a bit more for an engine and transmission) you can get a car kit that looks like a Shelby Cobra!



If I had the space for it, I'd not be blogging, I'd be ordering my new car kit.

How cool is that?

Rhymes With Cars & Girls

I've added several new blogs to my blogroll recently, but I'd like to make a special note of Rhymes With Cars & Girls. 

excerpt:

I’m genuinely surprised that Susan Rice won’t be the next Secretary of State. After all, while I’m not a Beltway insider, I’ll bet you dollars to doughnuts that Susan Rice is a woman. And that alone is a great qualification right there. Quick civics lesson: by tradition, Secretaries of State are women. Everyone knows that. There will not be any male Secretaries of State going forward. You can jump in a time machine to the year 5432 and ask “Who is the Secretary of State?” and the one thing you can be sure of is that it’s gonna be a woman because then (like now) women will still be considered good people to make Secretaries of State so that they can dance with and charm foreign heads of state and such. Ask why it’s not a man, and you’ll get puzzled, uncomprehending looks. So if today in your daily life you see a woman, then quick, make her the Secretary of State! You may not get another chance. I also hear she’s black, which makes it racist not to give her Job X (for all values of X). So what the heck is going on? I still don’t quite know who ‘Susan Rice’ really is, but I would have thought her being Secretary of State should have been a done deal the moment it was conceived of.

Let's ban Guns...

...and watch murder rates go up. 

from John Lott:

UK:


Ireland and Jamaica:

More Gun Debating

John Lott recently debated (by "debated" I mean "got talked over and ignored) CNN show host Piers Morgan.

See it here.

Two things that Piers kept repeating were the number of people killed by guns and asking "how many people need to be killed by guns before pro-gun people shut up and go away agree with whatever Piers says?"

Two questions for Piers:

1. How many mass murderers need to go out of their way to kill in "gun free zones" before you realize that "gun free zones" are where mass murders target?

With just one single exception, the attack on congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson in 2011, every public shooting since at least 1950 in the U.S. in which more than three people have been killed has taken place where citizens are not allowed to carry guns.

-John Lott

2.  (Source for following)

In 1929, the Soviet Union established gun control. From 1929 to 1953, about 20 million dissidents, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.

In 1911, Turkey established gun control. From 1915 to 1917, 1.5 million Armenians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.

Germany  established gun control in 1938 and from 1939 to 1945, a total of 13 million Jews and others who were unable to defend themselves were rounded up and exterminated.

China  established gun control in 1935. From 1948 to 1952, 20 million political dissidents, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.

Guatemala established gun control in 1964. From 1964 to 1981, 100,000 Mayan Indians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.

Uganda established gun control in 1970. From 1971 to 1979, 300,000 Christians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.

Cambodia established gun control in 1956. From 1975 to 1977, one million educated people, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.

Defenseless people rounded up and exterminated in the 20th Century because of gun control: 56 million.

How many murders, with guns, occur in this country?  More, or less, than 56 million?


And a question for you CNN viewers: Do you think that CNN is unbiased and non-partisan? If "yes," then I direct your attention to Piers Morgan.

Nobody Knows Anything, But I'm Always Right

The problem that socialists, communists, and democrats have is that they want to control things so that (allegedly) peoples' lives will be better.  The problem comes from the fact that not one socialist, communist, or democrat has no idea what the best wage is for, say, a McDonald's employee.  They all have opinions, and often the power to enforce those opinions, but they are favoring opinions on subjects that they have very limited knowledge about.

One of the beauties of favoring small government is that I don't go around telling people what they should do.  Instead I say, "leave them alone."

As long as no one is injured or forced to do anything, then what business is it of mine or yours?

What business is it of yours or mine how much some executive gets paid?

Leave them alone.

*Many on the left may claim that McDonald's employees are "injured" by not being paid "a living wage."  But that is a corruption of the word "injured," and that argument leads to using words that have no meaning.

Quote of the Day, 12/20/2012

Business are already being regulated to death by Obamacare, and all this deficit spending means borrowing that has to be paid back with inflation or higher taxes. Why on Earth would anyone try to hire people now? This economy is a wreck.

- Wintery Knight

Talking about libertarians

Two libertarians discuss libertarianism, interacting with non-libertarians, and where the best place to live is.

(For some reason I cannot upload the video here, try this link.

But Guns Are Banned in Britan!?!

...also...HA!

When it comes to the question of violent crime, the British are fairly smug. Why? Because, well, there’s less of it in Britain than in America. Bunch of cowboys over there, right?

According to the Mail, Britons suffer 1,158,957 violent crimes per year, which works out at 2,034 per 100,000 residents. By contrast the number in notoriously violent South Africa is 1,609 per 100,000.

The U.S., meanwhile, has a rate of 466 crimes per 100,000 residents, which is lower than France’s, at 504; Finland’s, at 738; Sweden’s, at 1123; and Canada’s at 935.

National Review Online 

Fyi: Guns are good.

Meanwhile in Israel...

from John Lott:

Arguing Against Opposition Rather Than The Issue

In the post that I posted yesterday, I posted (How many times can I get post into one sentence?) some replies to a comment that I left at the Huffington Post (Answer: 5).  My comment included the stats that I found in this post.  The results of that post were to say that there is a direct correlation for more murders per capita to more gun restrictions.

Naturally some on the left disagree.  The following are two replies that I received to my comment.  I want you to notice that they are arguing against my posting opinion opposite to their own.  They are arguing that my opinion should not be made, not that it is wrong.

ChineseBracelet

Nice blog post you are quoting there. Unfortunately, "Spootville" (for god's sake) makes the classic mistake of confusing correlation with causality.

Besides, are law-abiding gun carriers in those neighboring states actually drawing their guns and chasing off would-be shooters? Do you have any numbers on that?

And: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/090930121512.htm

the-lexicon

ALL studies that report numbers like this are false on their face. FALSE. They are statistically corrupt and the methodology is complete garbage.

You can't compare murder rates to gun laws, state-by-state, and expect it to mean ANYTHING.

the inference here is that concealed carry in a state like NH is CAUSAL to the low murder rate. It's simply false. People carrying guns is not stopping other people from murdering. It's simply not. It's a ridiculous conclusion.

Notice that they are not saying that I am wrong*, they are saying that I should not oppose them.

Another reply that attacks my making an argument, not the argument itself:

natgirrl

Oh please, don't you think that with 20 dead 1st graders, we are far beyond semantics? 

These commenters are not claiming that other countries that have more gun restrictions than the U.S. have less crime (like another commenter did, and who is also wrong, but at least wants to argue the issue rather than me).  They are not comparing other sets of states to show where less gun control has meant more crime.  They are not claiming that gun violence has gone up after concealed carry was allowed (the opposite is true).  They are claiming that my argument is not the one that I should make against them.

They do not want to debate the actual issue, they seem to want to debate weather or not a counter to their claim argument should be made.

This seems to be something that I am noticing more with these comment debates.  They oppose that I oppose them, not my arguments. They want to criticize me and my methods for disagreeing with them rather than criticize my arguments.

***

Arguing that my comment is wrong because I confused correlation with causality could be a legitimate argument.  But here is my reasoning for posting what I did.

Their argument- we need more gun control because more gun control will mean less gun violence

My argument - the places that have more gun control have more murders than the places that have less gun control

I thought that I was directly contradicting the argument of my opponents.

And, oddly enough,  an Atlantic writer agrees with me. (I don't endorse his political  ideas, and this post was actually written before that one.)

*Well, the-lexicon is saying that I am wrong, but he is also calling data (from the U.S. Census Bureau) a "false," "garbage," "study."  So, what does he know?

More Freedom, Less Government

Europe’s loss of these men was America’s gain. We did not guarantee these immigrants subsidized medical care, a right to a job, a right to an education, or anything from the government other than protection for their freedom and the right to try to succeed and keep what earnings they made. That was all that was needed. We promised liberty; other nations did not. We got the immigrants we needed to give us the boost to become a first-rate power in the world, because the best reason to come to America was the freedom of opportunity this country afforded these individuals.

- Burt Folsum

Quote of the Day, 12/19/2012

I know my sensitive side, because it has a rash.

-Ed

Drunk Driving = Charged Twice

To start with, no, neither I nor anyone that I know just got a DUI.

My question is: Why is drunk driving a crime?

Let me know where I go wrong with these few points:

1. If a driver is completely sober, drives a ways, and does not have an accident, then there is no victim and should be no crime.
2. If a driver is drunk, drives a ways, and does not have an accident, then there is no victim and should be no crime.
3. If a driver is completely sober, but while driving, is at fault for an accident, then there is a victim and the responsible driver has committed a crime and should pay for damages.
4. If a driver is drunk, and while driving, is at fault for an accident, then there is a victim and the responsible driver has committed a crime and should pay for damages.

The way it works now is that driver 2 will be charged with a crime despite there being no victim, and driver 4 will be charged with two crimes despite there being only one (set of) victim(s).

Why should driver 2 be charged with a crime at all?  Because he is potentially more likely to have an accident?  If "potentially more likely" is all it takes to be a crime, then why isn't driving a car "potentially more likely" to cause an accident then not owning one?

If "potentially more likely" is all that it takes, then where is my Nobel Prize for Medicine?  I once owned a chemistry set and therefore aren't I "potentially more likely" to cure cancer?

If "potentially more likely" is all that it takes, then, because I own a ladder, were is my award for saving people from burning buildings?

Why is "potentially more likely" all that is necessary for a crime?  What, then, isn't a potential crime?  Why isn't their a potential for heroics and appropriate rewards?

Driver 4 is at fault for an accident, but why is he treated differently than driver 3.  Both drove cars, both caused accidents, both created victims.  What is the difference between them?  Why should driver 4 be charged twice for one crime?

If you have lost loved ones due to drunk drivers, then I am sorry for your loss.  But how is their loss different that it would have been had the driver been sober when the accident occurred?

Charging people for crimes when there is no victim is a terrible thing to do.

Causing damage to someone is already rightly illegal; why do we charge some of those offenders twice for committing one crime?

Huffington Post Comments, 12/17/2012

FredSays

When did the definition of "A well regulated militia" in the 2nd Amendment morph into "A chaotic, muddled group of everybody and his brother (sister)?" 

Me

"The people" in the 1st, 4th, 9th, and 10th amendments means "the people"

Why would "the people" in the 2nd be any different?

AlanPittsburgh

Answer your own question. 

Me

"the people" in the 2nd amendment means "the people" just like in the other amendments.  

***
FredSays

When did the definition of "A well regulated militia" in the 2nd Amendment morph into "A chaotic, muddled group of everybody and his brother (sister)?" 

Me

"The people" in the 1st, 4th, 9th, and 10th amendments means "the people"

Why would "the people" in the 2nd be any different?

DakkonA

"A well regulated militia being necessary"

In other words: people need guns because we need militias made up of those people.

What used to be militias are now police and national guard.  

Me

You are incorrect. What used to be militias was the military, as its primary focus.

"The strongest reason for the people to retain their right to keep and bear arms is as a last resort to protect themselves against tyranny in government."

-Thomas Jefferson 

***

FredSays

When did the definition of "A well regulated militia" in the 2nd Amendment morph into "A chaotic, muddled group of everybody and his brother (sister)?" 

Me

"The people" in the 1st, 4th, 9th, and 10th amendments means "the people"

Why would "the people" in the 2nd be any different?

JShankel

Then why mention a well regulated militia at all?  Why not just say people have the right and that's it?  

Me

Militia was added, I suspect, to be one more argument in favor of arming "the people."

Why should "the people" mean different things in different amendments.

If I join a militia, should I be able to own any guns that I want? If "militia" is the part that distracts you, then I propose that every gun owner found his/ her own militia and then ignore all our anti-freedom gun laws. 

***
Me

He used a legal gun obtained illegally, and used it where it was illegal to have. He broke two gun laws already why would adding a third make any difference?

trweste144

Because it won't be the same law and the first two proved ineffective.  What would you propose to fix the situation, then?  

Me

If the first two were ineffective, then why would another be any different?

Note that the CO shooter went out of his way to shoot in the only theater in his area that advertized a gun free zone.

Note also, that with one exception, all shootings where 3 or more people were killed since 1950 occurred in "gun free zones."

We cannot prevent crazy people from doing crazy things. We can do a better job of identifying crazy people. And we can stop creating a shooter's preferred target places "gun free zones."

BTW, have you heard about the 22 children stabbed in China last Friday? How well did gun control prevent violence there?

http://www.courant.com/sns-rt-us-china-stabbingsbre8bd065-20121213,0,5592318.story

***
cargofuzz

Why is it that whenever anyone says, "we need to look at this issue and have a meaningful conversation about how to stop gun violence," all the extreme right hears is "Obama wants to take away all your guns!" Has Obama Derangement Syndrome effected criticial thinking that much among the right? Sorry...just answered my own question...

Me

Because every time we hear "we need to look at this issue and have a meaningful conversation about how to stop gun violence," there is always an attempt to ban and/ or restrict our guns.

wetheplants

Funny how Republicans are supposed to be so concerned about "security"... It must be only our security from other countries then, god forbid we take efforts to protect people in our own country! 

Me

Funny how the Obama administration favors giving arms to Mexican drug lords, and "freedom fighters" in Libya and Egypt, but is opposed to American citizens owning guns. 

***
cargofuzz

Why is it that whenever anyone says, "we need to look at this issue and have a meaningful conversation about how to stop gun violence," all the extreme right hears is "Obama wants to take away all your guns!" Has Obama Derangement Syndrome effected criticial thinking that much among the right? Sorry...just answered my own question...

Me

Because every time we hear "we need to look at this issue and have a meaningful conversation about how to stop gun violence," there is always an attempt to ban and/ or restrict our guns.

Cheryl Fitzpatrick

Boo hoo, enough of this rhetoric!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

***

cargofuzz

Why is it that whenever anyone says, "we need to look at this issue and have a meaningful conversation about how to stop gun violence," all the extreme right hears is "Obama wants to take away all your guns!" Has Obama Derangement Syndrome effected criticial thinking that much among the right? Sorry...just answered my own question...

Me

Because every time we hear "we need to look at this issue and have a meaningful conversation about how to stop gun violence," there is always an attempt to ban and/ or restrict our guns.

IFany

And so does having a gun make you feel what safe, superior, in control, that you can go and kill the local wildlife. Does it appease some primitive instinct to kill with a gun, You have a gun for what reason that you can't live in this world without them, Tell me about how many times you heard that some one spoiled intruders with their heroic shootout, Or the how that in coming end times you or any one else will defend hearth and home from what zombies, or rampaging looters, This thing about having a gun is a real mental issue in this nation 

Me

 "And so does having a gun make you feel what safe, superior, in control, that you can go and kill the local wildlife."

Yes: http://spootville.blogspot.com/2012/10/scooooore.html

Does not owning a gun make you feel safe in that if you are attacked you will need to wait until help arrives?

I have a suggestion: if someone attacks you, and after you ask you attacker to pause while you call the police, you should then call the nearest pizza place and order a delivery. Would you like to bet on who arrives first? The cop or the pizza?

How about a list of stories where gun owners saved lives: http://gunssavelives.net/

***
natgirrl

For those of you who want the right to have as many assault weapons as you want, then you should be required to carry insurance on said firearms as well as submit to a yearly mental health evaluation . With rights comes responsiblity. 

Me

An "assault weapon" is a political term that has no meaning in actual definition of guns.

The guns that you think would be banned by banning "assault weapons" (the guns that shoot multiple rounds with one trigger pull) have been illegal since 1934.

natgirrl

Oh please, don't you think that with 20 dead 1st graders, we are far beyond semantics?  

Me

If the death toll is your concern, then we should remove the leading cause of shooting in this country: gun free zones.

You can question my means of disagreeing with you, but you cannot question the fact that banning guns leads to more, and worse, shootings.

the Aurora shooter, who killed twelve people earlier this year, had a choice of seven movie theaters that were showing the Batman movie he was obsessed with. All were within a 20-minute drive of his home. The Cinemark Theater the killer ultimately chose wasn’t the closest, but it was the only one that posted signs saying it banned concealed handguns carried by law-abiding individuals. All of the other theaters allowed the approximately 4 percent of Colorado adults who have a concealed-handgun permit to enter with their weapons.

and

With just one single exception, the attack on congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson in 2011, every public shooting since at least 1950 in the U.S. in which more than three people have been killed has taken place where citizens are not allowed to carry guns.