Guns Because

[Blind groper]

Problem is that I've presented numerous arguments that you simply ignore or elide, the primary argument being that the right to individual self defense is not subject to statistical analysis of the abusive use of firearms. You've never once bothered to address this because you know you can't make a cogent argument for disarming one person because of the bad behavior of another.

We went down that path a long time ago, and thrashed that argument to death. The problem is that you, conveniently, have chosen to consider the 'right' to bear arms to be divine in nature and utterly sacred. That, of course, is bullshit. Humanity has had a wide range of 'rights' issued to various groups, and later rescinded, again and again throughout history. There is nothing sacred about 'rights'. They are simply political tools used by whoever is in power to gain support.

There was a time in England, a century or two after the Normal conquest, when a Norman aristocrat had the 'right' to treat Saxon commoners as he wished, including raping the pretty girls and killing any males who objected. The American 'right' to bear arms is just as wrong as that Norman 'right'. It is an outlier. It is a weird exception to the normal rules of civilised behavior in the western world, and a joke to all the civilised nations, except the US.

[Tyrannical]

There was a time in England, a century or two after the Normal conquest, when a Norman aristocrat had the 'right' to treat Saxon commoners as he wished, including raping the pretty girls and killing any males who objected. The American 'right' to bear arms is just as wrong as that Norman 'right'. It is an outlier. It is a weird exception to the normal rules of civilised behavior in the western world, and a joke to all the civilised nations, except the US.

And what ended that Norman right? Could it have been an armed citizen uprising
Of course citizens freely bearing arms is an outlier, just as a Republican form of government with men beholden to no King was an outlier. The Western norm previous to the United States was a hereditary monarchy where the King exercised supreme authority. It was that way in the US until armed citizens overthrew his control. Small wonder that other monarchies did not want their citizens to have that power.

Really good example though groper, not too often people destroy their own argument with their own example

[aspire1670]

There was a time in England, a century or two after the Normal conquest, when a Norman aristocrat had the 'right' to treat Saxon commoners as he wished, including raping the pretty girls and killing any males who objected. The American 'right' to bear arms is just as wrong as that Norman 'right'. It is an outlier. It is a weird exception to the normal rules of civilised behavior in the western world, and a joke to all the civilised nations, except the US.

And what ended that Norman right? Could it have been an armed citizen uprising
Of course citizens freely bearing arms is an outlier, just as a Republican form of government with men beholden to no King was an outlier. The Western norm previous to the United States was a hereditary monarchy where the King exercised supreme authority. It was that way in the US until armed citizens overthrew his control. Small wonder that other monarchies did not want their citizens to have that power.

Really good example though groper, not too often people destroy their own argument with their own example

You suck at history, Tyrannical. Norman droit de Seigneur was dismantled by English Common Law. An English King did not exercise supreme authority of his Americam Colonies. And Britain together with most other european monarchies had an armed citizenry and parliamentary sovereignty up until the early years of the twentieth century. An armed citizenry in Britain has been gradually reduced ( but not in other monarchies) along with an increase in public and private accountability and a reduction in firearms crimes. In the US, not so much.

[Blind groper]

Yeah. Tyrannical really does suck at history. His statement about a Republican government not beholden to a king is also an outlier is total bullshit.

The word 'republican' has a moderately fuzzy definition, but one definition is simply a political system in which the government and national ruler are elected by the people. By this definition, the whole British Commonwealth, and all of western Europe are republics, along with much of the rest of the world. A constitutional monarch cannot be called the national leader, which means all those nations meet the definition.

Americans often like to think of the USA as a world leader in democracy and in liberty, and that also is bullshit. The developments leading to democracy and personal liberty took place in Europe - not North America.

The first parliament anywhere in the world was 1236, after Magna Carta, when King John was forced to accept a parliament to oversee his dictates. Democracy and personal liberty grew from this seed, long before the USA was even dreamed of.

[Gallstones]

Another fine anti-gunner spokesperson--you go girl!

The Diana Don'tGetit DeGette Guide to Gun Safety

In light of the on-going gun debate, as a service to my constituents I have drafted a quick guide to gun safety. It explains how guns work as I understand it and offers some commonsense tips.

HOW GUNS WORK

At right, you can see a diagram of a magazine.
"Magazines are ammunition, they’re bullets. If you ban them in the future, the number of these high capacity magazines is going to decrease dramatically over time because the bullets will have been shot and there won’t be any more available".


This is a diagram of an AR-15. Guns work by using the spring in the magazine to detonate the black powder inside the long tube at the end. The proton pack generates a powerful electromagnetic field that helps propel the bullet down the tube where it then exits and murders someone. Sometimes people murder each other with shotguns, which are similar to the AR-15 but have laser sights and vent holes.

Congresswoman Diana DeGette (D-CO) who, along with Rep. Carolyn McCarthy, reintroduced the house bill to ban magazines capable of holding more than ten rounds of ammunition was involved in a Denver Post public forum on gun control yesterday.[04.02.13]


I sure hope she ends up on a committee to decide whether religion or evolution should be taught in the public schools. Who wouldn't support that appointment?

BTW, only a portion of this is parody--you guess which portion.

[Jason]

dafuq.. that isn't even wrong.

[Gallstones]

Yeah. Tyrannical really does suck at history. His statement about a Republican government not beholden to a king is also an outlier is total bullshit.

The word 'republican' has a moderately fuzzy definition, but one definition is simply a political system in which the government and national ruler are elected by the people. By this definition, the whole British Commonwealth, and all of western Europe are republics, along with much of the rest of the world. A constitutional monarch cannot be called the national leader, which means all those nations meet the definition.

Americans often like to think of the USA as a world leader in democracy and in liberty, and that also is bullshit. The developments leading to democracy and personal liberty took place in Europe - not North America.

The first parliament anywhere in the world was 1236, after Magna Carta, when King John was forced to accept a parliament to oversee his dictates. Democracy and personal liberty grew from this seed, long before the USA was even dreamed of.

The Iroquois [Haudenosaunee] Confederacy

[the book]The Genius of the People, alleged that after the many weeks of debate a committee sat to combine the many agreements into one formal document. The chairman of the committee was John Rutledge of South Carolina. He had served in an earlier time, along with Ben Franklin and others, at the Stamp Act Congress, held in Albany, New York. This Committee of Detail was having trouble deciding just how to formalize the many items of discussion into one document that would satisfy one and all. Rutledge proposed they model the new government they were forming into something along the lines of the Iroquois League of Nations, which had been functioning as a democratic government for hundreds of years, and which he had observed in Albany. While there were many desirable, as well as undesirable, models from ancient and modern histories in Europe and what we know now as the Middle East, only the Iroquois had a system that seemed to meet most of the demands espoused by the many parties to the debates. The Genius of the People alleged that the Iroquois had a Constitution which began: "We the people, to form a union. . ."

Highlight mine.

Also see the book 1491 by Charles C. Mann Chapter 11 The Great Law of Peace pages 358--362 2005 copyright edition.

"The Haudenosaunee were probably the greatest indigenous polity north of the Rio Grande in the two centuries before Columbus and definately the two centuries after."
....
"The alliance rules of operation were contained in the Haudenosaunee Constitution, AKA the Great Law of Peace.
When issues came up the the fifty sachems, representatives of the clans of the Five Nations would be summoned. It was a consensus driven body and all decisions had to be unanimous. The heads of the clans (matrilineal societies) were all female and they chose the sachems--all male."
...

"When there was a matter of great emergency or importance, the sachem council had to submit the matter to the people for a decision."

...

"Scholars debate estimates of the founding of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, but nobody disputes that the Haudenosaunee exemplified the formidable tradition of limited government and personal automomy shared by many cultures north of the Rio Grande."

The first American Libertarians.

[Blind groper]

Gallstones

At the time the Iroquois formed their 'constitution', they had no written language. Anything decided was passed down by word of mouth. Such things are really, really, really unreliable. What was originally decided most probably did not resemble in anything other than vague outline, what was later claimed.

We have the same thing here in NZ, with our native people, the Maori. They also had no written language, and their claims as to their 'history' based on word of mouth errors were laughable.

All that can be declared about the Iroquois agreements are those that prevailed at the time. Anything earlier will be so error filled as to be useless. Of course, what I am saying is not politically correct, and all the PC morons out there will vow and declare that the word of mouth bullshit is accurate. Doh!

Anyway, the point of what I am saying is that any claim of democratic government hundreds of years before the time has to be taken with a very, very big pinch of salt.

[Gallstones]

Gallstones

At the time the Iroquois formed their 'constitution', they had no written language. Anything decided was passed down by word of mouth. Such things are really, really, really unreliable. What was originally decided most probably did not resemble in anything other than vague outline, what was later claimed.

We have the same thing here in NZ, with our native people, the Maori. They also had no written language, and their claims as to their 'history' based on word of mouth errors were laughable.

All that can be declared about the Iroquois agreements are those that prevailed at the time. Anything earlier will be so error filled as to be useless. Of course, what I am saying is not politically correct, and all the PC morons out there will vow and declare that the word of mouth bullshit is accurate. Doh!

Anyway, the point of what I am saying is that any claim of democratic government hundreds of years before the time has to be taken with a very, very big pinch of salt.

Racist.

[Blind groper]

Racist.

Not at all. I am a realist, and I know how unreliable word of mouth communication is.

Ever played the game of whispers?
You get a circle of people, and the first whispers a short message into the ear of the second, who passes it to the third etc. By the time the message has got to person 10, for example, it is unrecognisable. A very simple principle. This simple principle is about communication, not race.

This is made worse by the malleability of memory. People think they remember past events clearly, but they are only deluding themselves. Without written records, remembered data is altered over time. Just think of the fisherman who caught a fish 'this long', and realise how that length changes years later when he recounts the story. This memory malleability works to distort word of mouth communications even more when it is passed down over many generations.

[orpheus]

Racist.

Not at all. I am a realist, and I know how unreliable word of mouth communication is.

Ever played the game of whispers?
You get a circle of people, and the first whispers a short message into the ear of the second, who passes it to the third etc. By the time the message has got to person 10, for example, it is unrecognisable. A very simple principle. This simple principle is about communication, not race.

This is made worse by the malleability of memory. People think they remember past events clearly, but they are only deluding themselves. Without written records, remembered data is altered over time. Just think of the fisherman who caught a fish 'this long', and realise how that length changes years later when he recounts the story. This memory malleability works to distort word of mouth communications even more when it is passed down over many generations.

As an interesting side note to this, the composer Harrison Birtwistle has said that if he arrives at a moment where he wants to repeat something, he will never turn the pages back to copy it out directly; that would be too academic. He always relies on his memory, knowing full well that his memory will distort the thing. For him the important thing is the context: the role of "C" in the sequence ABCDE is not the same as it is in WXCYZ. Its meaning is changed - however slightly - by its context. He's honed his compositional skill to allow the distortions of his memory to work for him; its very unreliability provides him with subtle changes that he could never achieve by literal "copy and paste". I love Harry's music; others hate it. However, I think even his detractors recognize that this sort of compositional procedure renders his music extraordinarily alive.


edit: sorry for the derail, folks. Free popcorn for all in compensation.

[Gallstones]

Rutledge proposed they model the new government they were forming into something along the lines of the Iroquois League of Nations, which had been functioning as a democratic government for hundreds of years, and which he had observed in Albany.

Rutledge--a white guy who could write.

Assuming that non-literate, non-whites could not have developed and practiced democracy is racist.
The scholars, who have studied the evidence, believe they could and they did. I trust them to know.

What kind of government do you assume savages non-literate, non-whites developed and practiced?
Why do you assume those options excluded democracy?
Where did you get your expertise on American Indian history and culture such that you can confidently dismiss the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and their Constitution The Great Law of Peace?
What credentials have you to lend credibility to your denial?

A practice is not a telling.

[Blind groper]

Gallstones

The bit I challenged was the statement that the Iroquois had practised a democratic league of nations for hundreds of years. Without written records, they would not know that.

[Gallstones]

Gallstones

The bit I challenged was the statement that the Iroquois had practised a democratic league of nations for hundreds of years. Without written records, they would not know that.

You going to answer my questions?

[Gallstones]

The last agonal gasps of a political carreer [hopefully] about to die?

Sen. Feinstein Says Congress Poised To Restrict Video Games

April 5, 2013

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said Wednesday that Congress may be forced to take action to limit video game violence.

Speaking to an audience of around 500 in San Francisco, Feinstein, who led the charge in the Senate on an assault weapons ban, said the video game industry should take voluntary steps to make sure it does not glorify guns in the wake of the December mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. She added that if the industry does not, Congress is prepared to take action, according to the Associated Press.

Feinstein said that video games play, "a very negative role for young people, and the industry ought to take note of that."

This micromanaging codependent buttinski needs to retire.