Anyone still wondering if incrementalism is a thing and the 'assault' weapons bans won't eventually lead to all weapons, remember what They said about Two Weeks to Slow the Spread.
Exactly. Which is why the DOJ is trying to overturn the Fed Court on the airline masks... just to preserve the (unconstitutional) authority that was set via precedent because no one fought back.
Soooo typical that those douche bags couldn’t bear the loss of tyrannical control, the in-air cheering when people were notified of the ruling AND that it was a Trump-appointed judge that tanked the airline mask BS.
My understanding was that there were multiple lawsuits against that mandate. The DOJ slow-walked them, and as you know, other efforts to end mask mandates have been squashed by various courts.
92 dollars an hour is pretty steep, I'll stick with the woman down the street who only charges 25 dollars an hour. I'll bet she is hotter than you too.
My husband and I ordered an AR-15 with 12 30-round magazines and an additional 2,000 rounds of Ammo a few days ago to add to our small collection. Like the other guns we own, it will be stored safely in a locked biometric gun safe if we keep it at home (some are at home, some are in an outside vault, and all are always in the outside vault when we are away from home).
Ownership alone often sends enough of a message alone. Safe and responsible gun ownership.
Want to send a message? For those who don’t already own them take a gun safety class, learn about secure storage, and buy them.
There is a reason restrictions were so much less, with very little enforcement, in places with more guns than people. It’s difficult to enforce tyranny when literally no one will sign up and actually do the job of enforcing tyranny on an armed population. You don’t have to actually shoot anybody, which no responsible gun owner wants to shoot anyone. Ownership sends a message alone.
A particularly grievous loss was my Sig Sauer 556, which had all of the kick of a squirt gun and was amazingly accurate to 200 yards -- far enough to make the BLM and Antifa choose another street to burn. Now that it is gone, I guess we will have to depend on the police to show up.
A few years back, a salon owner was attacked at her business. Her husband, a cop (or retired cop, not sure) decided that was enough. He bought her a gun. She trained to use it.
A few years later, an intruder tried to attack her at her salon again. She was ready, aimed, fired.
The head of the police said he didn't like her approach. Apparently he thought it would have been better had she gotten killed instead.
Good on you that you aren't waiting around for people to protect you because too many are like that head of police.
I hear ya. Some people have more than one bathroom in their house which drives me crazy. What do you need with more than one bathroom anyway? Don't even get me started on people that have more than one kid! All you really need is about 1000 calories a day and a small amount of water. Maybe some rudimentary shelter but let's not get too greedy. Right now you might have more than those basic necessities to stay alive (shame on you if you do have more than you need). Very soon a nice man named Klause is going to fix all that with a magical reset that will eliminate all those greedy people that just don't understand that they have more than they need. You will own nothing and you will be happy but more importantly everybody else will own nothing. Just imagine the joy you will feel knowing everybody has been put in their proper place and nobody has more than they need. Let's hope those greedy folks with more firearms than they need don't fight back and ruin equality for the rest of us.
Why not? When the WEF started pushing the own nothing and being happy baloney, we built a second home. It’s been a very valuable investment. If Biden says we shouldn’t own AR’s, all while sending our hard earned money to arm Ukrainians and the Taliban, it’s an indication we might consider grabbing a few more as an insurance policy.
That requires a long history lesson acknowledging the US second amendment is unique in the world. Still, it can be somewhat simplified down to this country has never been invaded, no one has ever bothered to try, largely because unless they want to obliterate the US, there is no point - no foreign invader will ever occupy it - every army for hundreds of years knows there would be an American with a gun behind every blade of grass ready to go down shooting.
Tyrannical restrictions are nearly impossible to enforce on an armed population. It’s basic human game theory. Push someone armed to the edge with tyranny, and left with nothing else to lose, many humans won’t go down without taking an adversary with them. Assured mutual destruction. It’s the same reason we’ve avoided a nuclear war - one party or the other must get to the point they see their own destruction as inevitable, but if that does happen, the destruction will be mutual.
My neighborhood of 4,000sq ft+ custom homes on large perfectly manicured lots within the city limits and beltways, is rarely targeted by criminals despite the plethora of items criminals could easily exchange for cold hard cash. The everyday middle class looking in from the outside often believe it’s because of the fancy security systems. Ask any cop or criminal and their first response is “even the people in those neighborhoods with Biden signs in their yards are well armed. Criminals don’t try to get in very often because they realize they are unlikely to make it back out.” It’s why it makes the news when an expensive home is targeted in an upper class neighborhood despite being an everyday event in many middle and lower income neighborhoods.
None of these things would be true if people only theoretically had the right to defend their home and their country. It requires actually exercising the freedom and literally owning guns. Theoretical defenses mean nothing, only their material reality and easy access actually matters.
My grandmother shot for sport back in the 1920s, and I have one set of friends who own guns for sporting use, but I don't know of anyone else at all who owns a gun. We live in a safe area and have never been burgled here, although you do occasionally hear of people having stuff taken from garden sheds overnight. Actually, I do know one or two people who have air guns ... but I don't think anyone local would even consider having a proper gun except for sport and (as far as I know) even the police only carry guns if they will be going after a criminal who is suspected of having a gun ... we see things so differently on the British side of the pond. Thank you for your answers though, as I was keen to try to understand why people might want guns.
Quite obviously you didn't read the article you are commenting on, or you have atrocious reading comprehension. My vote is #2. No comprehension along with that lower IQ.
What exactly is “pitiful” about us? It’s easy to sling insults, but much harder to justify them. I’m curious, since you think I’m so pitiful, why? My husband and I are barely 4 decades into life and have earned our way to the 1% (we definitely didn’t come from money). We are raising kids who are kind and excel. We pay more into the “system” a year than most people make, only to watch neocons send it to arm Ukraine to the last dead Ukrainian. We vote for all children to access the excellent private conservative education ours get, and voluntarily donate more so that at least some kids who want an actual education can go to their school regardless of financial means. We are active in our community, donate about 18% of our income a year to charity, and take our children to give food (that we purchase) to the few homeless in our community several times a month.
We also know human history, which is full of tyranny.
I don’t particularly care if you think I’m a pitiful excuse for a human, because I’d bet more than you make a year I help more actual humans in need every year than you will in your entire lifetime, but I am curious if you can articulate why you hate me for owning guns and opposing tyranny, or if it’s just some silly propaganda you repeat in an empty attempt to convince yourself you “contribute” to society?
You really don't need to defend yourself. You enjoy the freedom to prepare yourself as you wish. I even understand the vault notion. My wee 410 short shotgun is near my bed just in case my door comes crashing down in the night. It's not in any safe and is loaded ready for use. I am not longer proficient in my trust 1911 pistol that once served that purpose. I will not live in fear or depend on anyone but myself.
he was writing a new book, but events kept overtaking what he was writing, he said every time he had a new idea about how bad the govt could get, the govt would surpass his fiction with worse acts, in a week
Technocratic thinking assumes the answer to any problem is another new policy. Ergo, even among the well-meaning common folk, if they get a couple new rules now and then something bad happens again (and that's a guarantee), what they will automatically do after future bad thing is demand a couple new rules. You don't even need a conspiracy for that to happen, it's just how technocrats (and much of the populace is technocrats now) think.
It goes deeper than that. Listen to Rep. Mondaire Jones at the hearing Thursday. He stated “The Amendment protects the collective right of the people as a whole to possess arms...Notice that while the Second Amendment is explicit that the government has the authority to regulate the use of arms, the Second Amendment does not include a single word about an individual right to own a gun.” So because the 2A says the “the right of the people” not “the right of the individual”, in his mind that means the right doesn’t apply to the individual. Problem is that the 1A also states “the right of the people”. How long until he claims that the 1A doesn’t apply to individuals? There’s the next incremental step they will take!
The multinationals leads by people who lacked any personal moral compass did, the small and mid sized businesses that make up the backbone of our economy, who are capitalist though infrequently neoliberals, did not.
That may be the case in the US, though I doubt it (don't have any numbers at hand, feel free to school me!). Here, about 9/10 of domestic business, industry etc. is owned by about a dozen families via various proxies and constructs. It is also heavily tied up in unions, trade groups, cartels, and politics as well as interest groups for various professional careers.
That’s a consolidation issue - largely enabled by governments claiming to want to “curtail the excesses of capitalism.” It’s really that any government can far more easily control Oligarchs than the many.
In the US there are over 50% fewer publicly traded companies today than there were in the 1980’s. Government expansion has enabled that by picking and choosing winners with government contracts. That’s also why we have little babies literally starving from no formula at the moment here in the US (and formula shortages have been going on for months) 😩
Corporatist state-capitalism may well be what is the dominating force for the western world for the rest of this century I'm afraid. Those in power tend to act to increase that power, until checked by natural constraints or a greater power.
Given that the process is now truly global, it could very well be that the "best case" scenario for toppling this is open conflict between the US-hegemony of the West, China and the islamic states. When the dust settles and the survivors pick up the piecesm they will no doubt blame the old system which caused the conflict and try to build a better one.
Until the cycle restarts and repeats - on the other hand, I'm a natural romantic pessimist so what do I know? :)
That gets to the key structural problem that has powered the steady encroachment of the state: even if private citizens were permitted to own tanks or fighter jets, very few would be able to afford them. Industrial weapons technology favors centralized power. When the weapons tech swings back to the advantage being in the hands of infantry, distributed republicanism will predominate again.
While I was deployed during the surge phase in Iraq, do you know how often we used tanks or called in air support? The armored unit that was stationed on one of the FOBs I was at did literally nothing.
Their tanks sat around and never left the base. We never called in air support or fire support. What good are they if you are in a urban or even suburban environment? Now crew served weapons on top of an armored vehicle are pretty damn handy. They are vulnerable to mines, IED, EFP though.
I don't know how useful tanks or precision airstrikes would really be against popular resistance. When I read about mujahideen fighting Russians in Afghanistan, most action was undertaken by locals on their home terrain and then they would disperse and wait to be called up again. Are you going to airstrike civilian homes just for a couple dozen insurgents? Eventually Russians carpet bombed areas with cluster munitions. Last I checked, they aren't in charge of Afghanistan.
Basically, tanks and jets are not the right tools for suppressing insurgencies.
On the other hand, the lack of certain weapons would hinder effective resistance. For example, mujahideen had lots of rpgs.
The other thing Americans generally lack is will to fight. The government might just provide that though given enough time.
Would you say it's fair to claim that US military is so adverse to taking losses it hampers its ability to achive mission parameters (mission creep by stupid politicians not included)?
Compare it to Russian doctrine, where 10 to 1 loss ratio is acceptable as long as the enemy is destroyed in toto, or chinese doctrine: "We have more soldiers than you have ammunition".
NB: I'm a civilian, so desktop general alert so to speak.
It is better not to overgeneralize. I think people discussed risk aversion in the context of body armor and uparmored HMMWV and then later MRAPs. So certainly the body armor and especially the side plate carriers they added were designed to reduce casualties from IEDs. But I ask you this, how much of the motive to produce all those successive upgrades was to prevent casualties and how much was defense contract grift? I ask this because in my few years in the military, there were multiple uniform changes. Berets were in general use for only about 5 years and then discarded. I've noticed many uniform changes since I got out. Did they change the uniform camo, hats, design, dress uniform design, etc every few years to better serve some need of soldiers? Or as a handout to uniform companies? I don't know.
Then about Russian doctrine. In the book Afghan Guerrilla Warfare, the authors interviewed Afghan fighters about their experiences fighting Soviets. In many cases, they were able to ambush Soviet convoys from the exact same hill MANY times. The Soviets rarely sent out an advance force of infantry to hold dangerous terrain in the paths of convoys. Now you tell me, was it due to doctrinal acceptance of casualties? Was it inexperienced command? Was it lack of manpower? I don't know.
I think it is best to focus on specific scenarios and avoid overgeneralizing. Even individual commanders personality can make a difference. It seems General Robert E. Lee owed a lot of his success to his shrewd knowledge of the Northern generals personalities for instance.
Changing details in the uniforms all the time sounds very much like some scheme or other to funnel money to providers, yes.
About the soviets, I'd have to say arrogance in command and not wanting to be there in the first place among the soldiers. I'm comparing it to their actions in Europe after WW2; they weren't shy about indiscriminate damage then, though back then the officers were of course veterans from WW2. Afghanistan was I believe a largely political affair meaning politically nominated officers in charge. The same mistake they did against Finland initially.
As for Ukraine, I think Russia achived it's military goals some time ago; what's happening now is a political action intended to quagmire the US ans the EU into a never-ending spending of aid for reconstruction. The idea would be that this would then cause strife and dissention among us when we quickly discover that just as with aid to asian, african and ME nations it just goes into a black hole of corruption. Russias goal is the same as China with regards to this: deligitimise western society and governements in the eyes of their own people. So far, they are succeeding.
Here’s the thing - authoritarian tyrants want to control. They destroy in the process, but never see it that way.
If the tyrannical leftists in this country literally blow it up, we can’t defend ourselves, but at that point, they have nothing left to control.
They want to control us, guns aren’t that expensive, and basic human nature still shows it’s hard to get people to fill the jobs of opressively controlling a population if that population can shoot back. Even the tyrants want to get home to their kids at night.
Imagine if the everyday Chinese could shoot back? They wouldn’t be locked up starving to death. Enough would take the prison guards out before they starved themselves to have no one working as a prison guard, I mean Covid enforcement patrol officer.
I feel we are very close to weapons tech having swung back to the common man. But, at the same time we are so close to losing our "consent of the governed" as a guiding, shared belief.
It's pretty clear that the ruling class no longer believes the consent of the governed is necessary. For now, they rely on manufacturing the appearance of consent. Ultimately they'll probably drop even that pretence.
However, history is pretty clear: money isn't power, information isn't power, influence isn't power. Power is power. At the end of the day iron will always rule gold.
Well, yeah, agreed. It appears that consent of the governed is not much of a factor in any discussion, ruling nor subject class. I hope through our developing stacks (and other) communities we can spread the message and get us all into action.
I can only hope that with our rapid iteration of tech and information the power transition won't take decades and millions of dead.
Just ponder for a bit: leftists used to love guns when it was the days of 'direct action' cells and violent armed resistance with [xyz] 'liberation front,' etc. That was because they didn't control enough of government. Now they control government and they want to disarm the populace. With government firmly in hand, they have implemented a reverse broken windows strategy where petty crime is encouraged and the failure to punish petty crime leads to violent crime. California, the experimental hothouse of left wing policy, is a prime example of this. News crews get held up for their cameras. If you try to stop the guys sawing off your catalytic converter with a power tool, they will shoot you. People leave their car doors open so their windows don't get broken (again).
Why the reverse broken windows policy?
If you are worried about the safety and survival of yourself and your family, you won't have time to worry about $40 billion for 'Ukraine' or ballot drop box stuffing or the long forgotten 1 billion for 'masks' Newsom spent. The disarmament of the populace is not just to leave them vulnerable to government oppression but also to leave the people in a state of terror from the criminal elements encouraged by the state. That includes the organized, politically directed criminal elements like black bloc protestors.
When I am weaker than you, I ask you for freedom because that is according to your principles; when I am stronger than you, I take away your freedom because that is according to my principles.
Original Dune series is a one stop shop for an education in the human condition. God Emperor directly deals with the radicals that seek to become aristocrats. I learned more from rereading those books many times than I did from my formal education.
The idea that gun control is a partisan issue does seem to be a recent trend. A quick look at the history seems to show that gun control first started under FDR as a response to prohibition era gang violence. But it didn’t really become partisan until the NRA started funding politicians in the 70’s. Now, I regularly hear, “as a liberal I don’t think anybody should own a gun”. Somehow the left doesn’t realize how dumb that sounds.
"The newest gun owner, is a liberal, who just had his house broken into"
I heard that in 1973, when I was 12 and sweeping up a gun shop each day in trade for empty shotgun hulls to reload.
I have heard it said, from coast to coast, in gun shops all over the US, and been the salesperson who sold to that "new gun owner" 100's of times.
People fear what they have no knowledge of, the term "Hoplophobe" was coined by Jeff Cooper many years ago, and is still apropos now.
But, if you teach them, it goes away quickly.
I have taught many classes for "new owners" and at one for females in a large city in FL, that was experiencing a surge in crime, I had 100 show up, 90% had never even been near a gun in thier lives.
I started the class with one item on a table, a power drill with a 1" bit chucked in it.
I drilled into a piece of wood and held it up to show the hole.
Then I asked how many had been near, or even used a drill. most raised their hands,
I then brought up a revolver from under the table, with a target with a hole shot into in.
I then explained that the gun, in and of itself, was nothing more than a long range power drill.
and there was nothing to fear from it. I took the battery out of the drill and pulled the trigger, nothing, I showed a empty cyl to them closed it and (pointed in a safe direction) pulled the trigger 6 times, nothing.
The feedback sheet I received at the end of the course, overwhelmingly cited that beginning part, as reducing thier fear of firearms.
The "gun" is just a tool, like a hammer and can be used for both good and bad, depending on the human using it.
i wonder how many owners of collections of different power drills going to a place at regular intervals to see how precisely they can drill different holes in blocks of wood there are....
It is a scenario covered in the amendment itself (i.e. those duly convicted of a crime). Whether it *should* be is definitely an even bigger question.
But as to literally, formally allowing for humans to be recognized as chattel, I somehow suspect most who buy Biden's "no amendment is absolute" line would start sweating to maintain consistency.
But maybe not, I can never tell how much shame some of these folks have left.
Great essay. I am completely baffled by my non-2A friends' inability to see the point you've expressed here. Our founders were men of genius; it sickens me to see them denigrated by such low calibre people.
This really is the hill to die on. They mean us harm.
"you cannot fight the state we have tanks and f-15's" That statement always seemed to me a threat. Essentially, our leaders are saying "If our own people are unhappy with us and want to revolt, we'll just kill 'em all.
That was my takeaway too. It seems we are getting dangerously close to the next shoe drop and the first move - which they desperately want the people to make. The list of "domestic terrorists" is already completed and all mapped. It's an interesting time to be alive, although, all in all, very sad.
Russ, I get you, and our own American Revolution was not so different. The origin of Rogers Rangers, a largely insurgent war.
Still, that our political leaders are so adamant! I believe they will certainly use such weapons against American citizens. Certainly, like @DogsLife suggests, because they label us domestic terrorists. How soon? Well...
Soon, I'm certain, we'll add our name to the list. Or, better said, re-add our name to the list of people who would not allow the Empire to take away their freedoms.
Yeah. Too many police will quietly enforce whatever illicit orders they are issued. And with the current purging of the military, we won’t be able to count on the remaining docile soldiers to stand up for freedom. They haven’t so far while it’s still relatively easy. If the last 2 ½ years have taught us nothing else, they’ve shown how tenuous our existence is and how quickly and readily everything can go to hell.
I remember "the list" of potential extremist breeding grounds disclosed during Obama's reign, which showed me I was among the number counted having attended "Christian schools and universities" and belonging to "Anti-abortion advocacy groups." That information was released a short dozen years ago. They compiled the list with a plan; they've been waiting for the right moment.
>>>>or worse, knows this full well but presumes that it is he and his who will be wielding the whip hand and doing the taking
I think this explains much of why even the apparatchiks of the deep state help implement big brother. They really have not thought it through and think they will somehow be immune from the Cubas and Venezuelas they are helping to create.
Read "Darkness At Noon" by Arthur Koestler. He was a member of the Communist Party in good standing under Stalin and then, during one of the purges, he was not. Was sent to the gulag and he describes how people would literally plead for Stalin to be notified that they were going to be shot, not realizing that Stalin was the one who sent them there.
Hit me last night how insane it is generally that one man does something bad, which is in fact already illegal, and the state thinks the only way to deal with it is to infringe upon the freedoms of millions who did nothing wrong. What an insane way to run a society.
This is because they want to disarm the country, and every incident of gun violence is a new excuse to attempt to take away everyone's firearms. I don't think they care one bit about anyone who is killed through gun violence, they know full well that taking guns away won't mean the criminals won't have firearms. They sure don't care when 30 or 40 people are shot in Chicago each weekend.
You know how we (and I, now former) city-dwellers were customarily sent to sleep-away camp for the experience of crude nature and brief respite from our superior urban lives?
We thought real life was just a sort of brief fantasy playtime before getting back to the reality of concrete and crowding and pre-cut chicken parts neatly wrapped in plastic in the shiny supermarkets that grew our food.
It's dangerous, I now know, that people raised thusly should have power over everyone else to the degree we now find ourselves in.
Bernie Sanders for example is Brooklyn through and through, as I am (or so I boast, I left there by four to be a Queens gal but there's no cachet in that...), and it's a real indulgence and fraud that he's spent his political life representing the people of Vermont (guess they ain't so smart). It's no wonder he doesn't understand the nature of a free people. I didn't either.
Now, you explain things clearly, and rationally, but unfortunately many of the people in this nation who also believe in the Second Amendment are as near to certifiable in much of their worldview as can be without literally wearing tinfoil hats.
I myself, perhaps only last week if I can remember clearly enough, only realized that that "well-regulated Militia" wasn't gonna have its arms handed out to them by govt. They already had them at home, for when they might be needed. They owned them.
And I've never ever seen anyone mention that before, ever. Why is that? Because the anti-Second Amendment people never ever stop screaming that it's only only only for that militia and for no other purpose.
You guys gotta up your game, because I ain't no legal scholar and yet, I think, I just managed to bite into the nutshell. Yeah, or nah?
"They already had them at home, for when they might be needed. They owned them." - Quite. Those rednecks out of the mountains showed up for good old George just in time. Their rifles and experience cost many British officers dearly allowing many British conscripts to join their enemy. They formed casual militias of the time to organize the rebellion. Let's hope we won't need to repeat the action.
"Well-regulated in the 18th century tended to be something like well-organized, well-armed, well-disciplined," says Rakove. "It didn't mean 'regulation' in the sense that we use it now, in that it's not about the regulatory state. There's been nuance there. It means the militia was in an effective shape to fight."
It meant . at the time it was written, that you had a firearm, ball flint and powder, and had the knowledge of it's operation. Most "able bodied" men, had the basics of marching and firing by volley taught to them at some point. What the new country of the US did not want, was a standing army that could repress the people, as they had just fought to shake off that yoke.
"Our system of government depends on citizens being able to freely elect leaders who will represent their interests. Unfortunately, that doesn’t always happen. In a study published 2014, two political scientists found that, on average, the policies representatives pursue are not in fact dictated by public opinion. This is the mark of a flawed democracy/republic: election without true representation.
In 2021, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) classified the United States as a "backsliding democracy" for the first time."
And see--Republican politician defenders of the Second have been really, really, hopelessly feeble at this. You guys are the only people, so far, in my whole life's experience, who've explained this so clearly and competently.
Utterly loathsome vermin. They piss me off, way more than the libtards.
We wouldn't be in this position if we didn't elect GOP enablers.
One of my most shameful mistakes,in my life, was sending Lindsey Graham a campaign donation.
I should've donated it to an organization that would've surreptitiously dropped him of in Ukraine for a "peace keeping delegation"...and then leaving him there to be a "freedom fighter "
Yes, you deserve to hang your head in shame. But I'll admit, as someone who loathes him almost entirely--he was a good brother and that counts in my book for something. You can't take care of family when they need you, nothing else will ever matter.
Ah, the history of that phrase is telling. "Well-regulated" during the period before and after the 2nd was passed meant "well functioning" as in a "well-regulated timepiece", or a well-regulated machine. Something that was well maintained so as to perform its function smoothly and accurately.
So, as you note, those who owned arms were expected to both keep them well functioning and to keep their own proficiency with whatever arms they owned honed and up to snuff...
As well, we as citizens have failed in the duty of organizing locally to provide regular (well-regulated) security, instead leaving that, just like education, up to the State. And you know, if 200 or so million Americans were armed and willing to protect their God given rights, tanks and F-15s and a million State owned soldiers would be meaningless.
I am now your neighbor, and, I swear, this is a true story, during the 2016 primary I walked from my apt. to the polling station with my little mouth trembling, trembling I say, thinking of my grandma and all the rest of my ancestors who had fled the Ukraine of the Russian Empire, and it was for them, for them I say, that I was voting so gladly for the first Jewish candidate for President. And I did the same Godawful dumb thing in 2020.
And he turned out to be a craven coward with no principles and supported by some of the most Godawful scummiest political allies, like, ever.
And this is a lesson to myself. Every time I actually do go and vote for someone, I regret it ever after. Every single time.
We remedy this by impoverishing, to the extent possible, those who lobby govt. Every less dollar to Facebook and AT&T and Verizon and Comcast and unions etc. etc. etc. is less influence they have to support those who are now unresponsive to us.
I'm not asking anyone to pass a purity test. I have cable and Netflix.
But see how fast Netflix snapped back from the abyss when their stock price crashed? Unwoke 'em in an instant.
I kept my darling little dumbphone for almost 20 years until they "upgraded" i.e. shut down its network. I replaced it with one only slightly less dumb and it's only for emergencies if I'm out walking, say, and zombie wolves start trimming my ankles.
If you have a mortgage, do you pay the minimum or, if you're not hamstrung by its terms, do you pay every two weeks, rounding up as much as you can?
We have lots and lots of power but we never use it. They ain't gonna give us theirs for free.
Anyone still wondering if incrementalism is a thing and the 'assault' weapons bans won't eventually lead to all weapons, remember what They said about Two Weeks to Slow the Spread.
first they came for the high capacity magazines.
and i did not own any high capacity magazines.
and so i was silent.
then they came for the...
this is all about the initial trojan framing to render the right a privilege subject to state nullification "if we have a good reason."
do so in one small regard and it places us upon the slippery slope upon which the rest may be taken.
Exactly. Which is why the DOJ is trying to overturn the Fed Court on the airline masks... just to preserve the (unconstitutional) authority that was set via precedent because no one fought back.
Soooo typical that those douche bags couldn’t bear the loss of tyrannical control, the in-air cheering when people were notified of the ruling AND that it was a Trump-appointed judge that tanked the airline mask BS.
My understanding was that there were multiple lawsuits against that mandate. The DOJ slow-walked them, and as you know, other efforts to end mask mandates have been squashed by various courts.
92 dollars an hour is pretty steep, I'll stick with the woman down the street who only charges 25 dollars an hour. I'll bet she is hotter than you too.
😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣 I always turn those "comments" in as spam. But, I do like the way you think!
Doesn’t matter what I may have had, I admit nothing, and don’t invade my property, or you’ll find out the hard way.
Clint Eastwood growling “get off of my lawn!”
🙌
My husband and I ordered an AR-15 with 12 30-round magazines and an additional 2,000 rounds of Ammo a few days ago to add to our small collection. Like the other guns we own, it will be stored safely in a locked biometric gun safe if we keep it at home (some are at home, some are in an outside vault, and all are always in the outside vault when we are away from home).
Ownership alone often sends enough of a message alone. Safe and responsible gun ownership.
Want to send a message? For those who don’t already own them take a gun safety class, learn about secure storage, and buy them.
There is a reason restrictions were so much less, with very little enforcement, in places with more guns than people. It’s difficult to enforce tyranny when literally no one will sign up and actually do the job of enforcing tyranny on an armed population. You don’t have to actually shoot anybody, which no responsible gun owner wants to shoot anyone. Ownership sends a message alone.
All of our guns were lost in a tragic boating accident.
A particularly grievous loss was my Sig Sauer 556, which had all of the kick of a squirt gun and was amazingly accurate to 200 yards -- far enough to make the BLM and Antifa choose another street to burn. Now that it is gone, I guess we will have to depend on the police to show up.
A few years back, a salon owner was attacked at her business. Her husband, a cop (or retired cop, not sure) decided that was enough. He bought her a gun. She trained to use it.
A few years later, an intruder tried to attack her at her salon again. She was ready, aimed, fired.
The head of the police said he didn't like her approach. Apparently he thought it would have been better had she gotten killed instead.
Good on you that you aren't waiting around for people to protect you because too many are like that head of police.
Genuine question ... why do you need them, and, especially, why do you need more of them?
I hear ya. Some people have more than one bathroom in their house which drives me crazy. What do you need with more than one bathroom anyway? Don't even get me started on people that have more than one kid! All you really need is about 1000 calories a day and a small amount of water. Maybe some rudimentary shelter but let's not get too greedy. Right now you might have more than those basic necessities to stay alive (shame on you if you do have more than you need). Very soon a nice man named Klause is going to fix all that with a magical reset that will eliminate all those greedy people that just don't understand that they have more than they need. You will own nothing and you will be happy but more importantly everybody else will own nothing. Just imagine the joy you will feel knowing everybody has been put in their proper place and nobody has more than they need. Let's hope those greedy folks with more firearms than they need don't fight back and ruin equality for the rest of us.
I love the snark! Good points all the way!
Why not? When the WEF started pushing the own nothing and being happy baloney, we built a second home. It’s been a very valuable investment. If Biden says we shouldn’t own AR’s, all while sending our hard earned money to arm Ukrainians and the Taliban, it’s an indication we might consider grabbing a few more as an insurance policy.
I'm no fan of Biden (or the WEF), but I don't really follow the argument. How do more guns give you more protection?
That requires a long history lesson acknowledging the US second amendment is unique in the world. Still, it can be somewhat simplified down to this country has never been invaded, no one has ever bothered to try, largely because unless they want to obliterate the US, there is no point - no foreign invader will ever occupy it - every army for hundreds of years knows there would be an American with a gun behind every blade of grass ready to go down shooting.
Tyrannical restrictions are nearly impossible to enforce on an armed population. It’s basic human game theory. Push someone armed to the edge with tyranny, and left with nothing else to lose, many humans won’t go down without taking an adversary with them. Assured mutual destruction. It’s the same reason we’ve avoided a nuclear war - one party or the other must get to the point they see their own destruction as inevitable, but if that does happen, the destruction will be mutual.
My neighborhood of 4,000sq ft+ custom homes on large perfectly manicured lots within the city limits and beltways, is rarely targeted by criminals despite the plethora of items criminals could easily exchange for cold hard cash. The everyday middle class looking in from the outside often believe it’s because of the fancy security systems. Ask any cop or criminal and their first response is “even the people in those neighborhoods with Biden signs in their yards are well armed. Criminals don’t try to get in very often because they realize they are unlikely to make it back out.” It’s why it makes the news when an expensive home is targeted in an upper class neighborhood despite being an everyday event in many middle and lower income neighborhoods.
None of these things would be true if people only theoretically had the right to defend their home and their country. It requires actually exercising the freedom and literally owning guns. Theoretical defenses mean nothing, only their material reality and easy access actually matters.
My grandmother shot for sport back in the 1920s, and I have one set of friends who own guns for sporting use, but I don't know of anyone else at all who owns a gun. We live in a safe area and have never been burgled here, although you do occasionally hear of people having stuff taken from garden sheds overnight. Actually, I do know one or two people who have air guns ... but I don't think anyone local would even consider having a proper gun except for sport and (as far as I know) even the police only carry guns if they will be going after a criminal who is suspected of having a gun ... we see things so differently on the British side of the pond. Thank you for your answers though, as I was keen to try to understand why people might want guns.
Just practically, you can lend to others and create a militia.
Quite obviously you didn't read the article you are commenting on, or you have atrocious reading comprehension. My vote is #2. No comprehension along with that lower IQ.
Because you are a free man. Read the article; learn it, know it, live it.
the message being: here lives a pitiful excuse for a human being...
What exactly is “pitiful” about us? It’s easy to sling insults, but much harder to justify them. I’m curious, since you think I’m so pitiful, why? My husband and I are barely 4 decades into life and have earned our way to the 1% (we definitely didn’t come from money). We are raising kids who are kind and excel. We pay more into the “system” a year than most people make, only to watch neocons send it to arm Ukraine to the last dead Ukrainian. We vote for all children to access the excellent private conservative education ours get, and voluntarily donate more so that at least some kids who want an actual education can go to their school regardless of financial means. We are active in our community, donate about 18% of our income a year to charity, and take our children to give food (that we purchase) to the few homeless in our community several times a month.
We also know human history, which is full of tyranny.
I don’t particularly care if you think I’m a pitiful excuse for a human, because I’d bet more than you make a year I help more actual humans in need every year than you will in your entire lifetime, but I am curious if you can articulate why you hate me for owning guns and opposing tyranny, or if it’s just some silly propaganda you repeat in an empty attempt to convince yourself you “contribute” to society?
You really don't need to defend yourself. You enjoy the freedom to prepare yourself as you wish. I even understand the vault notion. My wee 410 short shotgun is near my bed just in case my door comes crashing down in the night. It's not in any safe and is loaded ready for use. I am not longer proficient in my trust 1911 pistol that once served that purpose. I will not live in fear or depend on anyone but myself.
it is not an insult, just stating a fact.
and you will never be able to understand why.
Facts come with evidence and my inability to understand shouldn’t get in the way of your ability to articulate yourself. 😂
oh , i could, but why should i even bother?
for no matter what, you will never be able to get it.
Jan van ruth, you are so stunning and brave! Now go Slava Ukraini some more ;)
Found the fascist.
you should refrain from using terms that you do not know the meaning of...
He knows the meaning better than you. Perhaps you should seek an education.
ehhh...with such a post-modernist's cunning, there's a good chance this one just graduated from the likes of harvard.
You should not feed a troll. Something about pigs and mud.
ALL FEDERAL GUN LAWS ARE UNCONSTITUTIONAL
https://ragnarforseti.substack.com/p/all-federal-gun-laws-are-unconstitutional?r=hjhbr&s=w&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
Yes. The book ‘Unintended Consequences’ by John Ross goes into great detail regarding the history of firearms in the US.
John just passed away a few weeks ago
I’m sorry to hear that.
he was writing a new book, but events kept overtaking what he was writing, he said every time he had a new idea about how bad the govt could get, the govt would surpass his fiction with worse acts, in a week
Technocratic thinking assumes the answer to any problem is another new policy. Ergo, even among the well-meaning common folk, if they get a couple new rules now and then something bad happens again (and that's a guarantee), what they will automatically do after future bad thing is demand a couple new rules. You don't even need a conspiracy for that to happen, it's just how technocrats (and much of the populace is technocrats now) think.
Their technique is "nudging". Doing it this way, they hope no one will really notice as they chip away at our freedoms.
It goes deeper than that. Listen to Rep. Mondaire Jones at the hearing Thursday. He stated “The Amendment protects the collective right of the people as a whole to possess arms...Notice that while the Second Amendment is explicit that the government has the authority to regulate the use of arms, the Second Amendment does not include a single word about an individual right to own a gun.” So because the 2A says the “the right of the people” not “the right of the individual”, in his mind that means the right doesn’t apply to the individual. Problem is that the 1A also states “the right of the people”. How long until he claims that the 1A doesn’t apply to individuals? There’s the next incremental step they will take!
Wow! >Shudder!<
Never forget June 4, 1989. The government had tanks and guns, the people had nothing and their blood ran rivers on the streets of Tiananmen Square.
And the capitalist liberal democracies quickly shut their yaps because there was money to be made by moving production to China.
The multinationals leads by people who lacked any personal moral compass did, the small and mid sized businesses that make up the backbone of our economy, who are capitalist though infrequently neoliberals, did not.
That may be the case in the US, though I doubt it (don't have any numbers at hand, feel free to school me!). Here, about 9/10 of domestic business, industry etc. is owned by about a dozen families via various proxies and constructs. It is also heavily tied up in unions, trade groups, cartels, and politics as well as interest groups for various professional careers.
It's almost Medieval sometimes.
That’s a consolidation issue - largely enabled by governments claiming to want to “curtail the excesses of capitalism.” It’s really that any government can far more easily control Oligarchs than the many.
In the US there are over 50% fewer publicly traded companies today than there were in the 1980’s. Government expansion has enabled that by picking and choosing winners with government contracts. That’s also why we have little babies literally starving from no formula at the moment here in the US (and formula shortages have been going on for months) 😩
Corporatist state-capitalism may well be what is the dominating force for the western world for the rest of this century I'm afraid. Those in power tend to act to increase that power, until checked by natural constraints or a greater power.
Given that the process is now truly global, it could very well be that the "best case" scenario for toppling this is open conflict between the US-hegemony of the West, China and the islamic states. When the dust settles and the survivors pick up the piecesm they will no doubt blame the old system which caused the conflict and try to build a better one.
Until the cycle restarts and repeats - on the other hand, I'm a natural romantic pessimist so what do I know? :)
Very sad, very true, and a corporate habit that continues to this day.
That gets to the key structural problem that has powered the steady encroachment of the state: even if private citizens were permitted to own tanks or fighter jets, very few would be able to afford them. Industrial weapons technology favors centralized power. When the weapons tech swings back to the advantage being in the hands of infantry, distributed republicanism will predominate again.
While I was deployed during the surge phase in Iraq, do you know how often we used tanks or called in air support? The armored unit that was stationed on one of the FOBs I was at did literally nothing.
Their tanks sat around and never left the base. We never called in air support or fire support. What good are they if you are in a urban or even suburban environment? Now crew served weapons on top of an armored vehicle are pretty damn handy. They are vulnerable to mines, IED, EFP though.
I don't know how useful tanks or precision airstrikes would really be against popular resistance. When I read about mujahideen fighting Russians in Afghanistan, most action was undertaken by locals on their home terrain and then they would disperse and wait to be called up again. Are you going to airstrike civilian homes just for a couple dozen insurgents? Eventually Russians carpet bombed areas with cluster munitions. Last I checked, they aren't in charge of Afghanistan.
Basically, tanks and jets are not the right tools for suppressing insurgencies.
On the other hand, the lack of certain weapons would hinder effective resistance. For example, mujahideen had lots of rpgs.
The other thing Americans generally lack is will to fight. The government might just provide that though given enough time.
I hope you will be on "our" side.
I'm on the side of individual liberty.
You're on "our" side. Even if it's just me and my family.
Would you say it's fair to claim that US military is so adverse to taking losses it hampers its ability to achive mission parameters (mission creep by stupid politicians not included)?
Compare it to Russian doctrine, where 10 to 1 loss ratio is acceptable as long as the enemy is destroyed in toto, or chinese doctrine: "We have more soldiers than you have ammunition".
NB: I'm a civilian, so desktop general alert so to speak.
It is better not to overgeneralize. I think people discussed risk aversion in the context of body armor and uparmored HMMWV and then later MRAPs. So certainly the body armor and especially the side plate carriers they added were designed to reduce casualties from IEDs. But I ask you this, how much of the motive to produce all those successive upgrades was to prevent casualties and how much was defense contract grift? I ask this because in my few years in the military, there were multiple uniform changes. Berets were in general use for only about 5 years and then discarded. I've noticed many uniform changes since I got out. Did they change the uniform camo, hats, design, dress uniform design, etc every few years to better serve some need of soldiers? Or as a handout to uniform companies? I don't know.
Then about Russian doctrine. In the book Afghan Guerrilla Warfare, the authors interviewed Afghan fighters about their experiences fighting Soviets. In many cases, they were able to ambush Soviet convoys from the exact same hill MANY times. The Soviets rarely sent out an advance force of infantry to hold dangerous terrain in the paths of convoys. Now you tell me, was it due to doctrinal acceptance of casualties? Was it inexperienced command? Was it lack of manpower? I don't know.
I think it is best to focus on specific scenarios and avoid overgeneralizing. Even individual commanders personality can make a difference. It seems General Robert E. Lee owed a lot of his success to his shrewd knowledge of the Northern generals personalities for instance.
Valuable input, thank you.
Changing details in the uniforms all the time sounds very much like some scheme or other to funnel money to providers, yes.
About the soviets, I'd have to say arrogance in command and not wanting to be there in the first place among the soldiers. I'm comparing it to their actions in Europe after WW2; they weren't shy about indiscriminate damage then, though back then the officers were of course veterans from WW2. Afghanistan was I believe a largely political affair meaning politically nominated officers in charge. The same mistake they did against Finland initially.
As for Ukraine, I think Russia achived it's military goals some time ago; what's happening now is a political action intended to quagmire the US ans the EU into a never-ending spending of aid for reconstruction. The idea would be that this would then cause strife and dissention among us when we quickly discover that just as with aid to asian, african and ME nations it just goes into a black hole of corruption. Russias goal is the same as China with regards to this: deligitimise western society and governements in the eyes of their own people. So far, they are succeeding.
"to save the village we had to destroy it"
Here’s the thing - authoritarian tyrants want to control. They destroy in the process, but never see it that way.
If the tyrannical leftists in this country literally blow it up, we can’t defend ourselves, but at that point, they have nothing left to control.
They want to control us, guns aren’t that expensive, and basic human nature still shows it’s hard to get people to fill the jobs of opressively controlling a population if that population can shoot back. Even the tyrants want to get home to their kids at night.
Imagine if the everyday Chinese could shoot back? They wouldn’t be locked up starving to death. Enough would take the prison guards out before they starved themselves to have no one working as a prison guard, I mean Covid enforcement patrol officer.
Your post on this topic was brilliant and well worth reading in context of the 2A discussions.
https://barsoom.substack.com/p/how-weaponry-organises-society?s=r
I feel we are very close to weapons tech having swung back to the common man. But, at the same time we are so close to losing our "consent of the governed" as a guiding, shared belief.
Thanks!
It's pretty clear that the ruling class no longer believes the consent of the governed is necessary. For now, they rely on manufacturing the appearance of consent. Ultimately they'll probably drop even that pretence.
However, history is pretty clear: money isn't power, information isn't power, influence isn't power. Power is power. At the end of the day iron will always rule gold.
Well, yeah, agreed. It appears that consent of the governed is not much of a factor in any discussion, ruling nor subject class. I hope through our developing stacks (and other) communities we can spread the message and get us all into action.
I can only hope that with our rapid iteration of tech and information the power transition won't take decades and millions of dead.
We cannot forget. The CCP has successfully memory-holed what really happened there from the West.
Dude, you have been ON FIRE lately. Let's hope your muse is just getting started...
Just ponder for a bit: leftists used to love guns when it was the days of 'direct action' cells and violent armed resistance with [xyz] 'liberation front,' etc. That was because they didn't control enough of government. Now they control government and they want to disarm the populace. With government firmly in hand, they have implemented a reverse broken windows strategy where petty crime is encouraged and the failure to punish petty crime leads to violent crime. California, the experimental hothouse of left wing policy, is a prime example of this. News crews get held up for their cameras. If you try to stop the guys sawing off your catalytic converter with a power tool, they will shoot you. People leave their car doors open so their windows don't get broken (again).
Why the reverse broken windows policy?
If you are worried about the safety and survival of yourself and your family, you won't have time to worry about $40 billion for 'Ukraine' or ballot drop box stuffing or the long forgotten 1 billion for 'masks' Newsom spent. The disarmament of the populace is not just to leave them vulnerable to government oppression but also to leave the people in a state of terror from the criminal elements encouraged by the state. That includes the organized, politically directed criminal elements like black bloc protestors.
When I am weaker than you, I ask you for freedom because that is according to your principles; when I am stronger than you, I take away your freedom because that is according to my principles.
Frank Herbert (Dune)
Original Dune series is a one stop shop for an education in the human condition. God Emperor directly deals with the radicals that seek to become aristocrats. I learned more from rereading those books many times than I did from my formal education.
https://westernrifleshooters.us/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Resized_img3329-958x1024.jpeg
from the First Commander in Chief, and First President. Compare and Contrast. Then Choose.
The idea that gun control is a partisan issue does seem to be a recent trend. A quick look at the history seems to show that gun control first started under FDR as a response to prohibition era gang violence. But it didn’t really become partisan until the NRA started funding politicians in the 70’s. Now, I regularly hear, “as a liberal I don’t think anybody should own a gun”. Somehow the left doesn’t realize how dumb that sounds.
NRA started arming former slaves against the KKK following the Civil War, but of course that isn't going to be mentioned by democRat Bolsheviks.
Did not know that. That makes me happy!
"The wise ruler keeps bellies full and minds empty."
<insert fat guy meme saying "whut?">
He’s failing on that count, too. Bellies are not full, and minds are wandering.
He did say "wise ruler." The senile sundowning sh*thead occupying 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is anything but wise.
Quality
"The newest gun owner, is a liberal, who just had his house broken into"
I heard that in 1973, when I was 12 and sweeping up a gun shop each day in trade for empty shotgun hulls to reload.
I have heard it said, from coast to coast, in gun shops all over the US, and been the salesperson who sold to that "new gun owner" 100's of times.
People fear what they have no knowledge of, the term "Hoplophobe" was coined by Jeff Cooper many years ago, and is still apropos now.
But, if you teach them, it goes away quickly.
I have taught many classes for "new owners" and at one for females in a large city in FL, that was experiencing a surge in crime, I had 100 show up, 90% had never even been near a gun in thier lives.
I started the class with one item on a table, a power drill with a 1" bit chucked in it.
I drilled into a piece of wood and held it up to show the hole.
Then I asked how many had been near, or even used a drill. most raised their hands,
I then brought up a revolver from under the table, with a target with a hole shot into in.
I then explained that the gun, in and of itself, was nothing more than a long range power drill.
and there was nothing to fear from it. I took the battery out of the drill and pulled the trigger, nothing, I showed a empty cyl to them closed it and (pointed in a safe direction) pulled the trigger 6 times, nothing.
The feedback sheet I received at the end of the course, overwhelmingly cited that beginning part, as reducing thier fear of firearms.
The "gun" is just a tool, like a hammer and can be used for both good and bad, depending on the human using it.
So true. Thanks for my word of the day: Hoplophobe!
That is a great teaching tool. Thank-you for that example.
i wonder how many owners of collections of different power drills going to a place at regular intervals to see how precisely they can drill different holes in blocks of wood there are....
It’s called a job site
jan van has never been on one of those.
When the Bill of Rights is not absolute it is time to throw out the SOB's.
Fun trick: if someone claims 1A or 2A is "not absolute," see if they believe in a non-"absolute" 13A that allows you to sometimes own slaves.
to play devil's advocate, isn't that basically common in prison system labor programs?
It is a scenario covered in the amendment itself (i.e. those duly convicted of a crime). Whether it *should* be is definitely an even bigger question.
But as to literally, formally allowing for humans to be recognized as chattel, I somehow suspect most who buy Biden's "no amendment is absolute" line would start sweating to maintain consistency.
But maybe not, I can never tell how much shame some of these folks have left.
Shame? That would be less than zero
Most prisoners, that I know of, get paid a small stipend for their labor. Slaves, I don't believe, got paid at all.
They won't see it; the conversion to total cognitive dissonance is complete.
Brilliant Wesley, thank you.
japanese war staff was told: "there is a rifle behind every blade of grass" concerning the potential to occupy the usa.
that observation for usa will not change.
no matter what the fascists can run through their sham government.
ALL FEDERAL GUN LAWS ARE UNCONSTITUTIONAL
https://ragnarforseti.substack.com/p/all-federal-gun-laws-are-unconstitutional?r=hjhbr&s=w&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
as are state and local infringements!
these sham government has presided over killing a million babies per year since 1973!
their concern for human life is not obvious.
their fear of an armed, free citizenry is blatant...
Great essay. I am completely baffled by my non-2A friends' inability to see the point you've expressed here. Our founders were men of genius; it sickens me to see them denigrated by such low calibre people.
This really is the hill to die on. They mean us harm.
"you cannot fight the state we have tanks and f-15's" That statement always seemed to me a threat. Essentially, our leaders are saying "If our own people are unhappy with us and want to revolt, we'll just kill 'em all.
That was my takeaway too. It seems we are getting dangerously close to the next shoe drop and the first move - which they desperately want the people to make. The list of "domestic terrorists" is already completed and all mapped. It's an interesting time to be alive, although, all in all, very sad.
There will be more false-flag events in the not-so-distant future.
The Vietnamese, the Aghans, and lots of other insurgent groups might tend to disagree regarding the necessity of tanks and F-15s...
Russ, I get you, and our own American Revolution was not so different. The origin of Rogers Rangers, a largely insurgent war.
Still, that our political leaders are so adamant! I believe they will certainly use such weapons against American citizens. Certainly, like @DogsLife suggests, because they label us domestic terrorists. How soon? Well...
Soon, I'm certain, we'll add our name to the list. Or, better said, re-add our name to the list of people who would not allow the Empire to take away their freedoms.
Yeah. Too many police will quietly enforce whatever illicit orders they are issued. And with the current purging of the military, we won’t be able to count on the remaining docile soldiers to stand up for freedom. They haven’t so far while it’s still relatively easy. If the last 2 ½ years have taught us nothing else, they’ve shown how tenuous our existence is and how quickly and readily everything can go to hell.
And when the UN is brought to bear, their forces will have no problem with sentimentality.
I remember "the list" of potential extremist breeding grounds disclosed during Obama's reign, which showed me I was among the number counted having attended "Christian schools and universities" and belonging to "Anti-abortion advocacy groups." That information was released a short dozen years ago. They compiled the list with a plan; they've been waiting for the right moment.
Come for the Covid red-pilling, stay for everything else. Well done.
Excellent article.
>>>>or worse, knows this full well but presumes that it is he and his who will be wielding the whip hand and doing the taking
I think this explains much of why even the apparatchiks of the deep state help implement big brother. They really have not thought it through and think they will somehow be immune from the Cubas and Venezuelas they are helping to create.
"Surely there's been some mistake! I'm a loyal Party Member! If only Comrade Biden knew what was happ......" *BANG*
Happens every time. How many got a bullet to the head in the basement in Lubyanka while screaming those exact words?
Read "Darkness At Noon" by Arthur Koestler. He was a member of the Communist Party in good standing under Stalin and then, during one of the purges, he was not. Was sent to the gulag and he describes how people would literally plead for Stalin to be notified that they were going to be shot, not realizing that Stalin was the one who sent them there.
Also, in this clip of a KBG defector talking about "Ideological Subversion" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bX3EZCVj2XA
he tells how the "true believers" in Communism in America are the first ones to be shot if/when the Soviets ever took over America.
That makes me smile.
Thinking it through is wasted energy; they know they will do totalitarianism better.
Hit me last night how insane it is generally that one man does something bad, which is in fact already illegal, and the state thinks the only way to deal with it is to infringe upon the freedoms of millions who did nothing wrong. What an insane way to run a society.
This is because they want to disarm the country, and every incident of gun violence is a new excuse to attempt to take away everyone's firearms. I don't think they care one bit about anyone who is killed through gun violence, they know full well that taking guns away won't mean the criminals won't have firearms. They sure don't care when 30 or 40 people are shot in Chicago each weekend.
Boxes are useful problem solvers:
1. The Soapbox
2. The Ballot Box
3. The Jury Box
4. The Bullet Box
And with Sussman we now fully grok that the Jury box isn't working, either.......
lil typo in the pp under the fairy dust graphic: "popular" instead of "poplar." i know you roll correct like that
nature arbors a crime against poplars.
Edgelord is one word fyi...;)
Poplar Mechanics--the magazine of tree huggers
And he used to be such a nice young man.
You know how we (and I, now former) city-dwellers were customarily sent to sleep-away camp for the experience of crude nature and brief respite from our superior urban lives?
We thought real life was just a sort of brief fantasy playtime before getting back to the reality of concrete and crowding and pre-cut chicken parts neatly wrapped in plastic in the shiny supermarkets that grew our food.
It's dangerous, I now know, that people raised thusly should have power over everyone else to the degree we now find ourselves in.
Bernie Sanders for example is Brooklyn through and through, as I am (or so I boast, I left there by four to be a Queens gal but there's no cachet in that...), and it's a real indulgence and fraud that he's spent his political life representing the people of Vermont (guess they ain't so smart). It's no wonder he doesn't understand the nature of a free people. I didn't either.
Now, you explain things clearly, and rationally, but unfortunately many of the people in this nation who also believe in the Second Amendment are as near to certifiable in much of their worldview as can be without literally wearing tinfoil hats.
I myself, perhaps only last week if I can remember clearly enough, only realized that that "well-regulated Militia" wasn't gonna have its arms handed out to them by govt. They already had them at home, for when they might be needed. They owned them.
And I've never ever seen anyone mention that before, ever. Why is that? Because the anti-Second Amendment people never ever stop screaming that it's only only only for that militia and for no other purpose.
You guys gotta up your game, because I ain't no legal scholar and yet, I think, I just managed to bite into the nutshell. Yeah, or nah?
"They already had them at home, for when they might be needed. They owned them." - Quite. Those rednecks out of the mountains showed up for good old George just in time. Their rifles and experience cost many British officers dearly allowing many British conscripts to join their enemy. They formed casual militias of the time to organize the rebellion. Let's hope we won't need to repeat the action.
If one cuts out all the soppy human interest bits, Mel Gibson's The Patriot is really a damned good movie.
And that remind me of the question I've never seen answered clearly anywhere. How is that militia regulated, well-ly?
"Well-regulated in the 18th century tended to be something like well-organized, well-armed, well-disciplined," says Rakove. "It didn't mean 'regulation' in the sense that we use it now, in that it's not about the regulatory state. There's been nuance there. It means the militia was in an effective shape to fight."
It meant . at the time it was written, that you had a firearm, ball flint and powder, and had the knowledge of it's operation. Most "able bodied" men, had the basics of marching and firing by volley taught to them at some point. What the new country of the US did not want, was a standing army that could repress the people, as they had just fought to shake off that yoke.
And yet here we are in 2022 with one of the largest standing armies in the world...
And an empire, of course.
"Our system of government depends on citizens being able to freely elect leaders who will represent their interests. Unfortunately, that doesn’t always happen. In a study published 2014, two political scientists found that, on average, the policies representatives pursue are not in fact dictated by public opinion. This is the mark of a flawed democracy/republic: election without true representation.
In 2021, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) classified the United States as a "backsliding democracy" for the first time."
Not exactly something to "like" but never mind...
Ludwig got here first so I'll thank you second.
And see--Republican politician defenders of the Second have been really, really, hopelessly feeble at this. You guys are the only people, so far, in my whole life's experience, who've explained this so clearly and competently.
Well, there's a reason many of us hate the GOP so much. :)
Utterly loathsome vermin. They piss me off, way more than the libtards.
We wouldn't be in this position if we didn't elect GOP enablers.
One of my most shameful mistakes,in my life, was sending Lindsey Graham a campaign donation.
I should've donated it to an organization that would've surreptitiously dropped him of in Ukraine for a "peace keeping delegation"...and then leaving him there to be a "freedom fighter "
Yes, you deserve to hang your head in shame. But I'll admit, as someone who loathes him almost entirely--he was a good brother and that counts in my book for something. You can't take care of family when they need you, nothing else will ever matter.
And all of 'em, on both sides, with really bad hair. Disheartening to be sure.
I thought people loved Rand Paul's hair. (Personally, not so much, but I hear it all the time)
Ah, the history of that phrase is telling. "Well-regulated" during the period before and after the 2nd was passed meant "well functioning" as in a "well-regulated timepiece", or a well-regulated machine. Something that was well maintained so as to perform its function smoothly and accurately.
So, as you note, those who owned arms were expected to both keep them well functioning and to keep their own proficiency with whatever arms they owned honed and up to snuff...
Ah, the magic of shifting word meanings...
As well, we as citizens have failed in the duty of organizing locally to provide regular (well-regulated) security, instead leaving that, just like education, up to the State. And you know, if 200 or so million Americans were armed and willing to protect their God given rights, tanks and F-15s and a million State owned soldiers would be meaningless.
I am now your neighbor, and, I swear, this is a true story, during the 2016 primary I walked from my apt. to the polling station with my little mouth trembling, trembling I say, thinking of my grandma and all the rest of my ancestors who had fled the Ukraine of the Russian Empire, and it was for them, for them I say, that I was voting so gladly for the first Jewish candidate for President. And I did the same Godawful dumb thing in 2020.
And he turned out to be a craven coward with no principles and supported by some of the most Godawful scummiest political allies, like, ever.
And this is a lesson to myself. Every time I actually do go and vote for someone, I regret it ever after. Every single time.
We remedy this by impoverishing, to the extent possible, those who lobby govt. Every less dollar to Facebook and AT&T and Verizon and Comcast and unions etc. etc. etc. is less influence they have to support those who are now unresponsive to us.
I'm not asking anyone to pass a purity test. I have cable and Netflix.
But see how fast Netflix snapped back from the abyss when their stock price crashed? Unwoke 'em in an instant.
I kept my darling little dumbphone for almost 20 years until they "upgraded" i.e. shut down its network. I replaced it with one only slightly less dumb and it's only for emergencies if I'm out walking, say, and zombie wolves start trimming my ankles.
If you have a mortgage, do you pay the minimum or, if you're not hamstrung by its terms, do you pay every two weeks, rounding up as much as you can?
We have lots and lots of power but we never use it. They ain't gonna give us theirs for free.