9 minute video on Brits and gun "control"

Christian Graus

Oakman wrote:

Is that a reason to simply give the government carte blanche?

No, but what are you resisting ? That they take away weapons you don't need, on the basis of a threat that is entirely in your minds ?

Oakman wrote:

To not only not resist, but to willingly give up the means of resistance?

Again, this is ridiculous. You have no means of resistance.

Oakman wrote:

Is the enormous firepower you posit enough of an inducement to decide that the government is always right? No matter what?

No, it's a reason to assume that cutting down the number of children who get needlessly shot every year is worth losing ground on something that is just a fantasy.

Oakman wrote:

As a student of history, can you name me one government that did not take all the power it could get?

'all the power it could get' doesn't just mean all the power it could take by force. Australia is not remotely armed, and our societies are very similar, in many ways, I think you're more oppressed by government than we are.

Oakman wrote:

Can you name me a country, including yours and mine, that has not used its armed forces to imprison or kill people whose only crime was being different?

Well, I know that we have, so, no. But, here's the rub. When did this happen in the US, and was it stopped through an armed uprising of hte populace ?

Oakman wrote:

Can you name me one government that would not govern better if it was a little bit afraid of what its citizens would do if it overreached its bounds?

You're on drugs if you think your government is scared of you.

Oakman wrote:

When exactly is it okay to say "there is some sh*t I will not eat?"

This sounds good, but it has nothing to do with what we're talking about.

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista.

Christian Graus

Stan Shannon wrote:

he danger comes when government uses public works as a means of controlling the population itself using some excuse of trying to stimulate the economy.

Controls them in what way ? Do you mean that taxes would have to be raised, or some effect of running a deficit ?

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista.

Mike Gaskey

Christian Graus wrote:

That they take away weapons you don't need

now whose fucking decision should that be - some half baked jackass that is currently in power?

Christian Graus wrote:

You have no means of resistance

bullshit, only if you bare your throat.

Christian Graus wrote:

it's a reason to assume that cutting down the number of children who get needlessly shot killed in auto accidents

garage those autos!

Christian Graus wrote:

When did this happen in the US, and was it stopped through an armed uprising of hte populace ?

thnking, thinking, thinking - oh, I have it. It was called, ready for this, the Revolution.

Christian Graus wrote:

You're on drugs if you think your government is scared of you.

right, the very reason there's constant pressure to overturn the 2nd Amendment or render it moot is bacause benevolent leaders want what is best for, drum roll, the children.

Mike - typical white guy. The USA does have universal healthcare, but you have to pay for it. D'oh. Thomas Mann - "Tolerance becomes a crime when applied to evil." The NYT - my leftist brochure. Calling an illegal alien an “undocumented immigrant” is like calling a drug dealer an “unlicensed pharmacist”. God doesn't believe in atheists, therefore they don't exist.

JimmyRopes

Mike Gaskey wrote:

I'm not sure about knives, bet there's a correlation to knife ownership and knife deaths as well.

Since everyone owns a knife, my grandmother owned many very sharp knives, I don't think there is a statistically significant correlation. I remember being boarded by the US Coast Guard while out on a friend’s boat fishing one night and being asked if we had any weapons on board. We responded no and the Coast Guard Officer walked over to a cutting board and picked up a rather long filleting knife and said that you would be surprised at how many people say no when they have knives on board. My response was that is because it is a tool and not a weapon. By the same token if I have a hammer on board it is a tool unless I whack someone in the head with it. Then it becomes a weapon. Until then it remains a tool.

Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopes

Stan Shannon

Christian Graus wrote:

Controls them in what way ?

I mean organization of large portions of the available work force to achieve centrally planned goals defined by a collectivist government.

Christian Graus wrote:

Do you mean that taxes would have to be raised, or some effect of running a deficit ?

I mean precisely what I said. To the greatest extent possible, infrastructue should be paid for with consumption taxes. Obviously, there will be times when other taxes will be needed, or deficit spending required. But that should be purposefully kept to as small an overall share of the expense as possible.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Oakman

Christian Graus wrote:

At it's core, the issue is that the US is home to far more gun murders per capita than any other country,

Not true. Of English-speaking countries, South Africa takes first place; In the Americas, Colombia outshines us, world-wide, Thailand is so far beyond any other country as to not be in the same ball park. And if you forget about trying to blame guns per se, you discover that there are 24 major countries that have a higher murder rate per capita that the U.S. It appears that in many countries a knife or a hammer serves quite well. So if that is the core issue, I guess maybe things aren't quite so black and white as you thought.

Christian Graus wrote:

They steal your freedom by telling you that you're free, not by pointing a gun at you.

I agree. And one of the freedoms they seem to be offering is the freedom to be helpless when MS13 shows up in force. If somehow they could guarantee that gun crime would shrink by the same percentage as gun control grew, I might feel very differently. But, as the statistics from Washington, DC and New York City seem to show, when gun control is at its strongest, so is gun crime.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Algoraphobia: An exaggerated fear of the outside world rooted in the belief that one might spontaneously combust due to global warming.

Oakman

Stan Shannon wrote:

Obviously, there will be times when other taxes will be needed, or deficit spending required.

You are now in total agreement with Nancy Pelosi. :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Algoraphobia: An exaggerated fear of the outside world rooted in the belief that one might spontaneously combust due to global warming.

Stan Shannon

http://www.nowpublic.com/world/uk-knife-deaths-highest-records-began[^] An interesting contrast...

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Stan Shannon

Oakman wrote:

You are now in total agreement with Nancy Pelosi.

Except for the "purposefully kept to a minimum" part.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Christian Graus

Precisely. None of this will happen, and it has no need to, Americans are already enslaved to their government, there's no need for a show of force. But, if it did, people would fold.

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista.

JimmyRopes

That is because they don't have acces to guns. ;P

Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopes

Mike Gaskey

Stan Shannon wrote:

interesting

and I was trying to be funny. I bet there'd be a kerfluffle over my switchblade as well.

Mike - typical white guy. The USA does have universal healthcare, but you have to pay for it. D'oh. Thomas Mann - "Tolerance becomes a crime when applied to evil." The NYT - my leftist brochure. Calling an illegal alien an “undocumented immigrant” is like calling a drug dealer an “unlicensed pharmacist”. God doesn't believe in atheists, therefore they don't exist.

JimmyRopes

Let's face it the UK is rapidly becoming a violent society. Even the Bobbies are carrying guns! Gone are the days of walking up to a criminal and saying come along old chap I am locking you up.

Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs
Think inside the box! ProActive Secure Systems
I'm on-line therefore I am. JimmyRopes

Christian Graus

Mike Gaskey wrote:

now whose f***ing decision should that be - some half baked jackass that is currently in power?

Well, someone with an ounce of common sense, I'd have hoped. Which the gun lobby severely lacks, it seems.

Mike Gaskey wrote:

bullsh*t, only if you bare your throat.

Oh, you can commit suicide if you like. But, it won't stop them, if your delusions ever actually played out in reality.

Mike Gaskey wrote:

garage those autos!

I'm sorry, I am surprised to find out that you're so stupid, because I don't usually think of you that way. Seriously.

Mike Gaskey wrote:

thnking, thinking, thinking - oh, I have it. It was called, ready for this, the Revolution.

Oh, OK. so, again, back when the weapons you had were actually capable of standing against the weapons of your oppressors ? This is my core point.

Mike Gaskey wrote:

right, the very reason there's constant pressure to overturn the 2nd Amendment or render it moot is bacause benevolent leaders want what is best for, drum roll, the children.

OK, so you're saying that both you and the government don't give a damn about gun deaths in the USA ?

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista.

Christian Graus

Stan Shannon wrote:

I mean organization of large portions of the available work force to achieve centrally planned goals defined by a collectivist government.

Even if that' organisation' is giving jobs to people who can't find work ?

Stan Shannon wrote:

I mean precisely what I said

I am trying to understand it tho.

Stan Shannon wrote:

To the greatest extent possible, infrastructue should be paid for with consumption taxes.

Sure, I agree.

Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista.

Stan Shannon

Christian Graus wrote:

Precisely. None of this will happen, and it has no need to, Americans are already enslaved to their government, there's no need for a show of force. But, if it did, people would fold.

First, I would be curious how you define 'enslaved'. I not sure I disagree, but I hardly see how the US would be that much different than Australia in that regard. Do you think we are more or less enslaved now that Obama and the democrats are in power? Second, no one believes that a rebellion comprised of civilians with small arms would pose much of a threat to the federal government. However, there are any number of scenarios that could well play out in which the federal government would be restrained in some way or not be fully in control of its military force. In those situations, an armed public could play a significant factor. The real problem, as I have pointed out in the past, is not the government's control of the military. Its greatest weapon is its abillity to control the distribution of food. Even in the 18th and 19th centruy, when some 90% of the population lived on farms and could grow their own food, there was a great deal of hunger and disruption of supply. It would be many orders of magnitude worse in a modern industrial society.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Oakman

Christian Graus wrote:

on the basis of a threat that is entirely in your minds ?

That's what Octavius said, What Napolean said, What Cromwell said, etc.

Christian Graus wrote:

You have no means of resistance.

I already posited this for the sake of the argument. If I fight against tyranny, I will die. OK. But my question was, does that mean I shouldn't fight?

Christian Graus wrote:

cutting down the number of children who get needlessly shot every year is worth losing ground on something that is just a fantasy.

Well, according to the Australian, kids in Australia are twice as likely to get killed as kids in Britain, yet you both outlaw guns. Maybe there are other things in play here? For instance, in great swaths of the USA, child murder is virtually unknown, the problem is confined mainly to the big cities of the East and West coasts, and to the Southwest. 85 percent of U.S. counties did not have any child murders in the year I found statistics for (1997.) There is, unfortunately, an almost 1:1 correlation between centers of Hispanic population and child deaths (85% of child death in this country, by the way occurs, from fists, blunt objects, knives, etc. But presumably we'd want to end those deaths, too.) I'm not thrilled by saying that, but the figures are there. And they gibe with the violence levels attributed to a number of South and Central American countries.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Algoraphobia: An exaggerated fear of the outside world rooted in the belief that one might spontaneously combust due to global warming.

Stan Shannon

Christian Graus wrote:

Even if that' organisation' is giving jobs to people who can't find work ?

If that were indeed an absolute necessity to keep people from actual starvation and rampant homelessness. But the control of wealth needed to maintain such projtect inhibits the economic growth which would otherwise occur if that wealth were circualtiong freely in that same society, putting those same people to work in more productive endeavors not controlled by the government. The notion that government can be trusted with such power is entirely misplaced. The greatest imporatnce of free market capitalism is that it can function independently of the state. And the key factor in any free society is to keep government small so that it cannot control people's lives.

Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.

Oakman

Stan Shannon wrote:

Except for the "purposefully kept to a minimum" part.

Nope, the menaing of minimum is not fixed. As Yoda said, pregnant there is and not pregnant there is. A little bit pregnant is what conservatives get when they go to Washington.

Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Algoraphobia: An exaggerated fear of the outside world rooted in the belief that one might spontaneously combust due to global warming.

Christian Graus

Oakman wrote:

That's what Octavius said, What Napolean said, What Cromwell said, etc.

Perhaps. But, I don't think you're right in considering their situations to be analagous. And you're ignoring the core issue. The US Army as bigger guns than you can hope to have.

Oakman wrote:

If I fight against tyranny, I will die. OK. But my question was, does that mean I shouldn't fight?

Not at all. But, you'll die if you own a hand gun or not.

Oakman wrote:

Well, according to the Australian, kids in Australia are twice as likely to get killed as kids in Britain, yet you both outlaw guns

Possible. I mean, guns are not the only way people die. The HUGE jump in homicides is between the US and countries that do work to keep guns out of the population.

Oakman wrote:

Maybe there are other things in play here?

Of course.

Oakman wrote:

For instance, in great swaths of the USA, child murder is virtually unknown, the problem is confined mainly to the big cities of the East and West coasts, and to the Southwest.

Yes. I am told there are more murders in the south than anywhere else, but if you take out revenge killings that the south is the safest place to be, for both property crime and murder.

Oakman wrote:

There is, unfortunately, an almost 1:1 correlation between centers of Hispanic population and child deaths (85% of child death in this country, by the way occurs, from fists, blunt objects, knives, etc. But presumably we'd want to end those deaths, too.) I'm not thrilled by saying that, but the figures are there. And they gibe with the violence levels attributed to a number of South and Central American countries.

I was more thinking of kids who find a gun and take it to school, those sorts of things. I am sure that's a small proportion of the number that makes the US the number one in homicide, I admit to choosing an emotionally charged example to make my point, but the core issue is, the US outstrips Australia and the UK on homicides by far more than 100%, per capita. And, you have guns. Coincidence ? I do agree with the point that Michael Moore makes in Bowling for Columbine. The US news culture is one of keeping people in a state of fear