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New Yes, I *get* the irony. The Irony is that you don't. :)
Your boy had *NO INTEREST* in pursuing the continuing.. non-self-policing AMA (talk about institutionalized oxymorons!) and the maimed and dead - resulting from this unregulated Corporation.

Speaking of only having guns on the mind.......

Ashton: this was the head of the AMA talking about a "danger that needs to be regulated" from his pulpit.

Turns out, that guns *by comparsion to doctors* (or even to buckets with water, for kids) *aren't a "danger"*.

The irony is you're still trucking along that this is some deep dark NRA conspiracy.

And you're insulting anyone and everyone involved.

Just like the AMA President did.

Nevermind the facts, you've got your mind made up. But its those OTHER IDIOTS who are closeminded.

*THAT'S* the irony here.

that we have created an unutterably Fucked-up place, in which to try to live sanely?

LEAVE!

I don't want to tell you again! GET OUT. NOW.

*I* am quite happy here, thank you very much. About the only time when I'm not is when some self-appointed close minded hoplophobe, wants to remove my rights under the US Constitution, and what I consider to be basic rights to determine my own fate, and replace them with a controlling, "protective" government.

And we are doing Zippo to un-Fuck it by attending to the evident root causes?

Action for the sake of action isn't progress, Ashton.

Passing gun laws (which historically have - in every case- made things WORSE (what was that you're bitching about about not fixing things? Isn't making them WORSE worse than that?)) just to do it, doesn't fix things.

And calling for said laws from a position of accountabilty and authority is just wrong.

Surely harder stuff to dare to face than say, increasing one's personal firepower? Instead.

Which didn't have a damn thing to do with anything.

appear to those who notice in detail,

Detail?

Ash. I had to explain to you why what you said wasn't "satire". I've had to explain to you why this became an issue.

You haven't noticed the "detail" that outlawing guns, restricting their access - in every case in history has caused an increase in crime. Nor the detail that these "deadly guns" are safer than bad doctors. (which was the point).

Or even that people opposing stupid legistlation aren't out to make things worse..

Don't try and tell me you're detail-orientated. Else you'd have noticed violent crime's been going down. Things are getting better, not worse.

Overall that is.

But lets not let facts get in the way of your stampede to crush the people into a Big Brother society, where only government gets to decide how to protect you.

After all, its those OTHER NUTCASES who have a penile fixation on guns, right?

Addison
New Polarization is so easy. Thus popular.
Not only in 'forums'

If you are suggesting that *any regulation* of guns is.. somehow "unconstitutional" (though you haven't exactly used the *any* word, I deem it implicit in tone, especially of the material you link) AND if you are somehow ascribing the lowering 'crime rate' to the proliferation of guns (!!) AND you are -are you?- deeming the scourge (which the AMA head was attempting to address) *contemptuously* as mere..

*COLLATERAL DAMAGE* (??) which we *must* all er just buck-up and bear, forever! as it is the Natural Order of Homo-Sap male fantasy -- that everyone Needs a handy projectile weapon in pocket, car, house:

While I OTOH - am a fanatic kook who imagines that this annual death- maiming- rate is an unacceptable way to reside on a planet, a soul-deadening attitude from which to view one's fellow inhabitants 24/7 -- and ultimately an indicator of a downward spiral promising even more mutual distrust and animosity among all:

Then we shall just have to leave the subject polarized - towards that meaninglessness ~ intractably opposed in our emotional sense of the matter. (Of course I do now appreciate that the logically fascinated - do not recognize that homo-sap possesses such any such attribute as emotional sense - but that merely deepens the chasm in our different views of the world.)

FWIW - I have no illusions that, were we to employ the Tampa let's just keep tabs on Everyone All the time method of providing us with comfort and safety.. then confiscated *all guns* over a 2 month period of Draconian processes (much like the 3-Strikes Draconian existing processes, that is):

That Muricans' behavior towards each other would suddenly grow vastly beyond its current adolescent state (!) Hardly. Which is why such a confiscation would have the opposite effect - high dudgeon and pry my Glock out of my cold dead hands yada yada would certainly be the native response to such a naive and digital-think program. (In case you thought that we kooks had something like this in mind?)

No, the culture of violence - so perfectly evident in our collective ideas of entertainment - the ubiquitous Action flic - demonstrates the amount of growing-up necessary before the level of instantly-lethal, no-effort-required weapons could be gradually reduced to some negligible level.

The new word postal encapsulates a mindset now being experienced more often: of the terminal frustration of dealing with a system of rewards/punishments gone horribly wrong, yet momentum is too strong for deflecting it. In time. Guns are quick 'solutions' in such situations. And they are Everywhere.

Meanwhile.. as we are growing up, the carnage too, is everywhere - unique in the so-called 'developed' (??) world -- save for those states now engaged in perpetual civil / nearby wars with neighbors. Whom we are apt to join about any time. We're always preparing for that Next war - (yes, I do read the Center for Defense Information's periodic reports; I even visited their office and talked with Adm. Carroll, when in DC)

You appear to be / say you are 'happy' with the status quo (collateral damage is OK - for Gun-rights \ufffdber Alles). Others of us are not. The polarized extremes: Instant confiscation of all guns / no regulation on distribution (with any chance of actually being enforceable, that is) - represent the difference in what is far from a mere intellectual exercise of 'facts' and statistics.

It is about, the quality of living - a metaphor which never can be resolved by mere logical process IF THEN NOT THAT BUT THIS, EXCEPT ...

So we'll probably end up on the barricades at some next massacre or other Shock! and its further devolution of the local species - for the war to end all wars. Again. (May as well settle the religion questions the same way - it is after all, a Popular approach to irreconcilable differences - and God seems to creep into the Guns R Good polemics about as often as the Flag, anti-Commyunists and Goodness. Hell.. when God is on your side - who can argue?)

This issue shall never come close to actual honest discussion in Murica IMhumblerO - until the picture of heaped maimed or dead bodies is a nightly phenom on color Tee Vee, with the euphemism-generator unplugged. (That seems to have been the largest catalyst for our finally exiting Vietnam: the nightly You Are There pictures. It wasn't the mere fact of the napalmed gooks/citizens and the other madness: it was Our Dead 'Boys'\ufffd seen in Livid Color) Some 58K on the Vietnam Memorial Wall - we surpassed that in local gun deaths (yes and Doctor-ignorance deaths) many times since. No, Murica has yet to bring anything resembling er Sweet Reasonableness to - this issue, or to many others. We Love the slogans. Instead. (Abortion, prayer, sex, - hey, it's Our Nature!)

So be it. I expect nothing better, "nobler" to occur. But always welcome surprises. (Thanks, Imric ;-)




Ashton Kook
don't listen to me. I don't know shit. either.
New Sorry, but that's not consistent
... AND if you are somehow ascribing the lowering 'crime rate' ...

While I OTOH - am a fanatic kook who imagines that this annual death- maiming- rate is ... an indicator of a downward spiral ...


If you classify a reduction in crime rates as a "downward spiral," then I have to suggest that we would want to accelerate that spiral. Or is that not what you meant?


You appear to be / say you are 'happy' with the status quo ...

I think implicit in his argument is that the status is not quo, so to speak, but is in fact improving. Excpet where this progress is halted -- according to certain statistics -- when guns are outlawed. The studies showing crime rates rising in the wake of increased gun control have not, that I've seen -- and especially not here -- been countered by any alternative explanations (backed by comparable statistics) suggesting a different interpretation.

I think a more logically consistent position for you to take, given the facts and your apparent inclinations, is to question whether the apparent "safety" brought about by widespread personal firearm posession is a safety you wish to endure. I think it should be easy enough to draw a parallel between the increased security of a surveillence state and the increased safety of a well-armed populace. This argument aligns pro-gun-rights advocates with pro-surveillence advocates in supporting a system shown to reduce crime, but which carries a perceived social cost.
This is my sig. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
New Downward spiral?
.. *that of, increasing numbers of gunshot wounds* and in other context too.

How could a decreasing (official) 'crime rate' be thought the referent for That?

(and that official 'crime rate' hardly even has a slot for 'Corporate crime' - does it? Maybe for the individual embezzler - but not the overall organization) SO is there ? a "decline in the crime rate" - or just in certain limited, older categories of 'crime'?

Downward spiral in quality of life, then. (despite upward spiral? in acquisition of toys? and hours worked/day, etc.) Lots of eddies in that whirlpool. No possibility of listing such in tabular form, is there?

When 30% (this AM's number - from no full recitation of the entire source database) of Murican workers are earning <= $8/hr, and Maquiladores are moving Norte: now around LA, around NYC and elsewhere - I would call that a significant component of a 'spiral' comprised of many more er 'issues'. A slogan won't capture "downward spiral" in its full complexity, natch.
I think a more logically consistent position for you to take, given the facts and your apparent inclinations, is to question whether the apparent "safety" brought about by widespread personal firearm posession is a safety you wish to endure.

I think it should be easy enough to draw a parallel between the increased security of a surveillence state and the increased safety of a well-armed populace. This argument aligns pro-gun-rights advocates with pro-surveillence advocates in supporting a system shown to reduce crime, but which carries a perceived social cost.
Rephrasing is always fun - but apparently not even with the aid of Ben Franklin's pithiest summary of all: is it clear that I have been saying that from the first. Pick the translation you like.

Or another: the social cost of 'this means of personal safety' is not only measurable in the bloody stats du jour - but it is larger IMO, in the not-so easily measured: social mindset of being eternally ready for Fight/Flight. From strangers, neighbors - All 'other' people.

Not impossible to measure the mental outlook, just not reducible to neat figures on spreadsheets: look at the 'social drugs' being pimped on the Tee Vee (in one - a crowd at a party morphs to grotesque Hostility = Buy Our Pill\ufffd). It is seen in the general and unprecedentedly high usageof chemicals daily, Rx and OTC and casual and home-grown.

Somehow I do not see how 'being armed' has much helpful going for it - as an even 'stopgap solution' - within a culture so mangled that, increasing numbers of people will take Anything to try and alter their daily emotional state, their experience of these living conditions. Hey! it's been on IWETHEY too. Lots over the years. Add-in young people suiciding at also accelerating rates. What's the opposite of healthy?

Unless: for those who have given up on it all, a la the Hollywood disaster flics - then of course, in (Escape From) THAT New York - best have a brace o'Glocks and also: get out quick as you can.

See? it's about the atmosphere not about the average weight of 9mm dum-dums. Logic helps - emotional sense or reason is ever so much harder to achieve, especially within the paranoid style of Murican politics (actual book title - dead-on too).


Ashton
New But which is the "reasonable" fear?
I believe most people are basically good. This is supported by the fact that of the hundreds of people I meet on a weekly basis, none yet have tried to rob me. (Talking physical "gimme your wallet" robbery, here.) Though many of them easily could, it just doesn't happen.

So which is the greater fear: That the rare bad seed will attack and you can't defend yourself; or that one of the multitude of basically good people, when newly armed, suddenly becomes a criminal? I believe the first is much more likely, but fear neither situation so much that I personally exercise my right to be armed. If I had to live in certain neighborhoods, though, that might change.

Thinking about this, I realized there a three situations where my thinking is roughly parallel: surveillence, gun control, and helmets. All three are limits on my personal freedom -- I accept the argument that pervasive surveillence infringes on my personal freedom, so Addison and I disagree on that point -- but with different secondary effects.

I'll tackle helmets first, because my position is most unambiguous. Helmet laws are intended to protect me from myself. I absolutely disagree with the intent. I should be free to risk my own safety in any way that doesn't affect other people. I don't accept that possible higher medical costs may be borne by society, as some studies indicate for every extra head injury as a result of not wearing a helmet, there is an extra DOA that would otherwise have been a head injury. (If we're going to do actuarial analysis, we have to include all the costs.) But, even though there is no helmet law here, in Ohio, or in my previous rsidence, California, I always wore one. Because I evaluated the risks and made my own choice.

Surveillence removes my sense of freedom, if not actual freedom. What I get in return is the (supposed) guarantee that the operators will protect me from harm, or at the least that many misdeeds will not be committed because the potential perpetrators will also know about the cameras. But then I have to trust the government and the police to be absolutley scrupulous in their use of the system, and to never use it to extend their power beyond what they already have. Needless to say, I don't trust the government that far, nor do I think I should.

Gun control -- or rather gun prohibition ("Gun control is hitting what you're aiming at.") -- is advocated in the supposition that I will be safer if no one has guns. Leaving aside the impossibility of totally removing guns from society, and completely ignoring that one of the purposes of the 2nd Ammendment was to allow the populace to protect themselves from the government, this still assumes that the police would be better able to protect me from unarmed (with guns) criminals than I would be to defend myself.

Most gun control advocates also point to the statistics of people who harm themselves with guns, or to children who gain access to them. All of these (that I have heard) have been cases of people improperly handling and storing guns. Yes, this happens, but not to me. If you want to play Russian roulette, or just store the gun under your bed, feel free.

You also point to the societal cost of the constant seige mentality. I live in the same world you do, but I don't have that mentality. I worked hard to get to a point where I can live in a fairly safe neighborhood. I know several of my neighbors have guns in their homes, but I'm not afraid of any of them. In fact, one of my neighbors shot two intruders in his home several years ago and there hasn't been a robbery on our street since then. Of course, that might also be because we have three police offiers living on our street, all of whom have weapons in their homes. I once lived on a military base, literally surrounded by weapons -- big ones, little ones, you name it. I never felt safer.

So if the only, or the main, argument against the right of individuals to carry guns is that some people are uncomfortable with the knowledge that someone they pass on the street may be carrying, I have to say that isn't compelling enough to convince me.
This is my sig. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
New Re: But which is the "reasonable" fear?
I accept the argument that pervasive surveillence infringes on my personal freedom, so Addison and I disagree on that point -- but with different secondary effects.

Hey hey hey, that's not what I said.

I said it wasn't unconstitutional, nor illegal. And that we needed legistlation to define "personal privacy" and "freedom"... And without that, I really couldn't produce anything that would show pervasive surveillance (of everybody, in public places) that was "wrong" or illegal.

I'm certainly *not* advocating it, and I wouldn't particularly like it. (But for instance, it wouldn't stop me travelling to England)

Helmet laws are intended to protect me from myself. I absolutely disagree with the intent. I should be free to risk my own safety in any way that doesn't affect other people.

Yes and no.

The issue with helmets, and seat belts, and such, is that you *aren't* just talking about yourself. That we live in a community, with shared resources, and you not using such safty devices puts a strain on said infrastructure, *and* impacts other people.

Which is a helluva argument. But that's the basis for it. (at least, IMO, the "legitimate" argument). (There *are* people who want to protect you from yourself, but right now they're busy trying to take our guns away. :))

I was in an auto accident about 10 years ago. Foggy night. I was driving 30, 35, on an unfamilar road, and went through a stop sign. Saw it less than 1/2 a second before I passed it, and hesitated just a fraction before hitting the brake (wondering if it would be better to go through). Too late. Another car and mine had their vectors converge and merge. The 2 people in that car weren't wearing their seat belts. They were doing 70ish.

As it turns out, when I was sued for wrongful death, the fact they weren't wearing seat belts didn't matter. Nor did it matter that they were going far faster than I. Because *I* went through the traffic control device, 100% of the accident was my fault.

But had they been wearing their seat belt (as I was), they wouldn't have been severely hurt. (The driver wasn't hurt badly, as he had the steering wheel to stop him).

And so everyone in my insurance pool helped me "pay" for that. The infrastructure was stressed (that night they were being run all over) trying to get rescue teams to our location. Had say, a fire broken out, a farther away squad would have had to made their way to it - through the fog.

*THAT* becomes the conundrum with safety devices. Its *not* merely a question of "it only affects you". It doesn't, it affects more people than that.

Additionally, with the legal system we have, blame MUST be assigned. Think about the opporunities you [could have] had, 100 years ago, to do the damage that you and I can do, on a daily basis now. (say, looking down for a second, and crashing into a school bus going the other way?).

I don't say that to say you're wrong, but to mention it as another topic of discussion (which really doesn't belong in this thread) :)

That its an attempt to provide accountability, and responsibility to people, such that they lessen the impact (no pun intended) on the rest of us. And its more complicated than saving you from yourself. (Another note of mention - apparently people drive *More unsafely* when they're buckled in - they feel safer).

Addison
New Heh.. find self in basic agreement with Both of you,here:-\ufffd
New Except...
is to question whether the apparent "safety" brought about by widespread personal firearm posession is a safety you wish to endure.

A reasonable question, to be sure.

But that's part of the reason that we have the 2nd Amendment. So that we would (not could) have widespread personal firearm possention...

But leaving that aside, sure, that's a reasonable question. But don't forget the total cost (most *ahem* people on the gun-grabbing side of the debate tend to).

But the biggest problem:

I think it should be easy enough to draw a parallel between the increased security of a surveillence state and the increased safety of a well-armed populace.

Most of the proponents of a populace not denied the right to be armed, such as myself, would also hotly disagree with the concept of such a state.

in supporting a system shown to reduce crime

With the cameras, I think that's not proven/shown yet. Pretty sure.

But most of us don't trust the government to protect us. :)

Addison
New Which has nothing at all to do with this subject.
If you are suggesting that *any regulation* of guns is.. somehow "unconstitutional"

Did I say that?

Ashton, you're the one with guns guns guns on the brain.

I said nothing about this, and you're on a Rossian rant.

I *said* that *yes* it made sense for the subject of "guns coming up" to point out something worse - because its the head of the AMA using his position to prosetylize for something that at BEST has nothing to do with medicine, and at worse, is the use of his position to institutionally lie, and make up facts.

Which, you're doing, as well.

that everyone Needs a handy projectile weapon in pocket, car, house:

This is your strawman. Not mine.

And if you don't stop trying to make me defend it, I'll start calling you the liar you are with it.

annual death- maiming- rate

Which is going down year by year, except in areas where civilians are disarmed.

Golly, you and the AMA President don't LIKE those facts, so you'll ignore them.

demonstrates the amount of growing-up necessary before the level of instantly-lethal, no-effort-required weapons could be gradually reduced to some negligible level.

I keep trying to point out to you that you've made assumptions. 1) that guns are bad. 2) that they're unneeded. At best, I would say that's arguable. "An armed society is a polite society". Its a cliche, but why? I've *never* seen a fistfight at a gunstore. Nor a shooting. Why is that? Could it be that people were *more mature* and *more aware* of their actions? I'll let you ponder on that.

You appear to be / say you are 'happy' with the status quo (collateral damage is OK - for Gun-rights \ufffdber Alles).

Technically? Yes. I'm happy. I live in a almost-crime free area. I've never been assaulted, I feel free to walk the streets. I notice that crime continues to decrease. I have almost no fear that my domicile will be invaded while I am home.

I would *like* to see crime decrease even more than it is.

And Ashton, until you find SOMETHING to hang your hat on, I'm OPPOSED TO DOING SOMETHING THAT HISTORICALLY HAS BEEN WORSE FOR EVERYONE INVOLVED.

Is that clear enough?

Guns aren't the problem, in my opinion. The AMA complaining about "gun violence" as a "epidemic" (which you've parrotted) - in the face of the hard facts, that's a problem.

I expect doctors to be calm, calculating, and utterly dependent on facts.

You accuse me of being hypersensitive to the gun debate. You then don't see a problem with the President of the AMA to stand up and argue (at best) a scientifically questionable position, and demand legistlation to support his opinion.

And then tell me I don't understand the irony when you rant and rave about how "bad" the situation is (when its better than its ever been), and that we must "do something".... and that its not a conspiracy, but don't mind the facts, just its horrible, horrible, horrible that I haven't turned in my weapons yet.

Ashton: When you have sitatuions like this.... Why do you SUPPOSE we're hypersensitive?

Could it be that people are irrationally ranting and raving and trying to outlaw guns, and since the facts aren't working, all these other attacks keep coming up?

Nah, we're just nuts, that's all.

So when are you leaving the country?

Addison
New While it all 'has to do with this subject' - our filters
are set differently. And it is about: direction not, where we are today. You believe that the collateral damage today is ~ OK for 'the benefits' of rampant gun carrying. Perhaps because the AMA offs more, in less visible ways, the gun-derived injuries are even more acceptable?

I believe that, as a goal - the reduction of any felt need to be armed - will produce a direction for a more liveable place than - an idea that ...if just every Good Citizen were armed: "we'd be more polite".
(Which BTW I do not argue with at all - but it would be the 'politeness ' of two pit-bulls, sizing each other up. Fight/flight. We Need to be armed: we be Muricans. Is that what you want?)

Now tell me which of us is the more cynical about homo-sap possibly.. growing up some day (with a little help from the inmates).


Ashton
New No, Ash, it doesn't.
But yes, our filters are set differently.

You saw this, and IMMEDIATELY launched on a screed against the "Evil, Lying" NRA. (nevermind they didn't have a thing to do with this). And the "fact" that only when the AMA attacked guns did the figures of malpracticing doctors come out. Nevermind that without some context, there's nothing really to comment on.

*You* saw "guns" and immediately started spewing about the NRA, and anything they say is a lie, and guns are bad, and how horrible Murica is and everybody shoots everybody.

That's not satire, its ludicrious.

Meanwhile I read this and said "that's asinine for the AMA President to do that, and I wonder if he'll bother to address the nasty facts, bet he won't".

Now, let me repeat, yet again: Your "filters" are set to reject facts you don't like. And set to immediately denigrate and berate and belittle. This is not my idea of a "good" society. I think its rather distasteful, myself, where when someone says something you don't like, and you attack them.

So yes, we differ. I agree with you.

And it is about: direction not, where we are today.

It is both. Where we are today. And where we're going.

Again, to put things back into perspective: the President of the professional association of doctors, who annually have inept members killing and maiming 3 times MORE people than guns do. And he spends his first address calling for controls on the guns - which are less deadly than his (inept) members.

And he totally ignores the effects of controlling guns. That historically crime goes *up*, assaults go *up*. More people are hurt. That an estimated 2.4 million crimes are *averted* due to private ownerships of weaponry.

And yes, he's supposed to be looking into those things. Would you want a doctor prescribing you a medicine without him having paid attention to the side effects, the contraindicated medications...? Surely not.

But its what you're advocating here.

if just every Good Citizen were armed: "we'd be more polite".

I started to say I haven't said that.. but you know.... Yes, I *do* believe that if every good citizen were armed, we'd be more polite, and we'd not have much crime. I do not believe everyone should be forced to be armed. But I'd like to see the criminal who'd attempt to victimize the average citizen. I think there are a lot more good guys than bad guys.

Which BTW I do not argue with at all - but it would be the 'politeness ' of two pit-bulls,

Bullshit.

Its the politeness of equals. Of people who know that actions have consequences. If you were right - there would be gunfights in every gunstore, daily.

I've got a *FAR* higher respect for my fellow man than you, apparently.

And a lot more experience being in places where everyone is armed. (are you saying our Armed Forces are like this, constantly battling each other?)I've *NEVER* seen this behavior between armed adults. And I've been around a lot of them.

Ashton: its *ridicolous* for you to keep spouting lies like this.

And *my* filters flag it, and say "Addison, go over there and counter those Big Lies".

Now tell me which of us is the more cynical about homo-sap possibly.. growing up some day (with a little help from the inmates).

You.

I'm willing to trust my fellow man with weaponry, the equality. Because there's NOTHING more equal than a weapon. It puts the smallest woman, the least strong man, equal with the strongest man. Its you who says that people must trust a government to protect them from their fellow man.

You're not willing to trust them. You're not willing to extend them true equality. And you twist any mention of weaponry in this distrust of yours.

Addison
New Let us parse, despite the 90\ufffd polaroid filter pair:
My original post, ANNOTATED:

[link|http://z.iwethey.org/forums/render/content/show?contentid=861|http://z.iwethey.or...ontentid=861]

Funny how..

The major incitement for fuckin *Anyone* to pay the slightest attention to the virtually Zero-Enforcement "Self"-policing (!)
traditional AMA performance:

NOTE 1: My first complaint is about the general obliviousness of, at least all media - to the 'stat-facts' claimed by the NRA rep - which may indeed be *unmassaged* re the 'Doctor deaths': but needs corroboration *next*: where he throws in that 'number' about "how many crimes were prevented by armed citizens", a much more clearly debatable assertion: THAT kind of 'number' is no more credible from the 'NRA' than is a number about server 'quality' by M$ - not without external corroboration, it isn't.

Is when the Chief Medical Corporation Officer notices how many Drs are injuring their hips from sliding on the blood on floors of most er
"city" ORs - because of all them guns er 'protectin* the peepul'.

NOTE 2: To the NRA-oriented, it was impermissible? for this Doctor to even comment upon the growing number of gunshot wounds his colleagues are treating? [which is a DIFFERENT MATTER\ufffd than: the Doctor's opinion about - what we might do to reduce those bloody ER floors.] On THAT you are bound to differ with his opinion. I remember no comment about the Doctor's basic complaint: growing bloody patients - just comments on how stupid the Dr. is! imagining it has anything to do with there being lots of guns everywhere.

*Stat-Facts o'course, brought by the er Gun Owners Foundation's bureau of comfy number massaging... Section of: Unbiased Interpolation.

NOTE 3: Excess hyperbole - guilty: the "doctor killings" numbers need not have been massaged. The "how many armed folk preserved justice?" numbers are indeed as stated above.

[??]

Hey: this farce has been institutionalized longer than slavery was -
and it don't seem to make no matter much - fuck the victims. Unless maybe, One More Time in chorus y'hear:

NOTE 4: Bad referent - guilty. "Which farce" - by which I meant the utter unaccountability of the medical establishment, whose victims don't count - for the immunity granted to all but the most egregious malpractice, since ~ civil war times. You are correct that - you could infer that I meant: the "farce" has been our EZ tolerance of gun proliferation everywhere. I apologize for its imprecision. That last is no farce, whatever else it means.

They Gonna Steal Our Guns !!!

NOTE 5: I will reiterate - YES! that fear was what prompted the person to mention the record of MDs AT ALL. And in the context only of a Gun-defense, did he pay any attention to the Doctor stats = a ploy (if also a correctly founded ploy) ABOUT GUNS. Not remotely any plea for reform of the AMA policies. That omission I deem, leads to another inference one could draw; and every speech implies many things:

""It was 'wrong' to complain about the blood and to suggest remedies! While it is also 'wrong' for you to mispractice as much as you do, at least *we* won't suggest any remedies!"" Or do you see the root of that inference at all?

Gotta Love Murican priorities...

NOTE 6: Priorities: 1-Save the guns. Save the patients? not 2- or 3- hardly a concern, certainly not a focus of his rhetoric in link!

Ashton
armed t'the teeth with e coli against th next shit-eatin dog

Anyway - you are right that my sloppy phrasing above, muddied the focus of my dudgeon. I also believe that the NRA rep missed an excellent platform for turning-away wrath BY addressing the sorry AMA record, as a concerned citizen FIRST! a Gun-partisan only SECOND. It is, after all *a rather important factoid*. Isn't it ???

THEN: he can make his necessary pitch that "guns don't kill people.. people.." and other reasons why - there can never be too many guns among Free Citizens, and stuff. (This gives at least the appearance that - he might give a fuck about some other aspect of Murican life than - his right to arm bears.)

I'd say the NRA can use all the goodwill it can muster, not only from Drs. But then, they didn't hire me as a PR consultant.

You aim for your Eden and I'll take another road, thanks. The topic of 'our direction as a society' isn't likely to go away any time soon. And that National Town Meeting on a variety of topics - just never seems to happen.. did you notice?

We two can't even agree if the patient is ill! - so I doubt we share much similarity of imaginings about what remedies are in order next.

Can't be helped. Different glasses. Different refractive index, thus vision.


Ashton
New 180 Degrees apart.
You're not even paying attention.

My first complaint is about the general obliviousness of, at least all media - to the 'stat-facts' claimed by the NRA rep

EARTH TO ASHTON: THE NRA DIDN'T HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH THIS.

I'VE POINTED THIS OUT MORE THAN ONCE.

THAT kind of 'number' is no more credible from the 'NRA' than is a number about server 'quality' by M$ - not without external corroboration, it isn't.

Fine. Corroborate it. ITS NOT FROM THE NRA.

because of all them guns er 'protectin* the peepul'.

Ashton: This is a lie.

Lie. Falsehood. Untooth. Summoning Godwin, I smite thee with the Big Lie. That's the only thing that makes sense for you to keep BABBLING on the same, refuted, point that doesn't have anything to do with this.

You've come up with this image of the US as a gun-battling place. Nevermind that's the opposite. That these shootings are going up (they're not). You've done NOTHING but insult, denegrate, belittle.

And you can't even keep straight who's involved.

To the NRA-oriented, it was impermissible? for this Doctor to even comment upon the growing number of gunshot wounds his colleagues are treating?

Comment upon? Ashton, did you READ the link?

IT WAS HIS WHOLE SPEECH.

If you can't be bothered with learning what the issue is (fer instance, that the NRA ain't involved with this), can you at least not keep posting after its pointed out 2 or 3 times?

I *detest* willful ignorance. I hate it in "rednecks". I hate it in "liberals". I hate it in "conservatives". So no, I don't like it now. I've explained, time and time again, and you just blithely ignore it and keep on saying what you were falsely saying.

*WHAT* can be the EXCUSE for that? (The NRA isn't involved, Ash. Explain how you don't know that by now).

just comments on how stupid the Dr. is! imagining it has anything to do with there being lots of guns everywhere.

AGAIN: This is a doctor. He's the president of the AMA. Who's calling for restrictive gun laws. Who spent a *whole speech* of his initial speech - let me stop and TRY AGAIN to get this across. THIS WASN'T A COMMENT. THIS WAS A WHOLE SPEECH.

Whole speech. Not a comment.

A misinformed, badly researched speech. I *expect* better from doctors. Perhaps I'm silly.

So.. You can't remember this is the Libertarian Party replying (using facts and stats from the FBI, among others). Can't remember its the whole speech.

You're distorting the whole argument, just so you can keep going on about some artificial construct in your head *that has no basis in reality, history, or the likely future*.

*Stat-Facts o'course, brought by the er Gun Owners Foundation's bureau of comfy number massaging... Section of: Unbiased Interpolation.

Ash.... Don't you DARE even TRY and attack anybody else's numbers whent hey're using KELLERMAN.

If you don't know why - then learn. Don't post, learn.

You are correct that - you could infer that I meant: the "farce" has been our EZ tolerance of gun proliferation everywhere.

Good call. I did until I read the explanation. :)

Ashton: have you noticed yet that the problem isn't the tolerance of guns, its the restriction of them from the people who need them? Ie - the law abiding citizens?

They Gonna Steal Our Guns !!!

WHAT DO YOU EXPECT?

Look at *your replies* in this thread. *You're trying to steal my guns!*

Its explicit - not even implicit!

YES! that fear was what prompted the person to mention the record of MDs AT ALL. And in the context only of a Gun-defense, did he pay any attention to the Doctor stats = a ploy (if also a correctly founded ploy) ABOUT GUNS.

Because that's what he spent his whole speech talking about.

If he'd talked about the number of cases of cancer caused by corn ingestion, the corn farmers would have been doing the comparison.

He picked the venue, and YOU'RE STILL BLAMING THE GUN OWNERS.

What was that about somehow being paranoid?

Not remotely any plea for reform of the AMA policies. That omission I deem, leads to another inference one could draw; and every speech implies many things:

Yes, the original (Libertarian) speaker suggested maybe he should worry about his own house.

That was the purpose of the comparitive statistics.

I also believe that the NRA rep missed an excellent platform for turning-away wrath BY addressing the sorry AMA record, as a concerned citizen FIRST! a Gun-partisan only SECOND. It is, after all *a rather important factoid*. Isn't it ???

Ashton. 22 people died last night. Is that important?

You can't tell me that. Until you know more. Were they in one building? In a city? Across China? Old age?

AND IT WASN'T THE NRA.

Do you realise you've been brainwashed by this meedja you constantly harp about?

The NRA doesn't even DO THAT MUCH with legislation. Its less than 25% of their efforts (and that only as the gun-grabbers have ramped up). GOA and other organizations were formed because the NRA *WASN'T AND ISN'T* set up for it.

But you have a PATHOLOGICAL hatred of the NRA. Why, I don't know. Because they don't fit into your utopia, I guess, where everybody gets along with everybody, and there's no conflict.

But neither does anybody else.

(This gives at least the appearance that - he might give a fuck about some other aspect of Murican life than - his right to arm bears.)

When the entire point of the speech was to outlaw/legistlate/fritter away that right, WHAT ELSE WOULD HAVE MADE SENSE?

Ashton, had that AMA guy stood up, and gone on about Cameras on streets, and how they should be put in, for his whole speech... the replies would be BASED ON THE NUMBERS he used, and ON HIS TOPIC.

Can't be helped. Different glasses. Different refractive index, thus vision.

Right now, no. Because your glasses are made of opaque glass. But you won't believe that the image painted on them isn't the real one.

You aim for your Eden and I'll take another road, thanks

I answered you before. You've got a problem with equality, and trust.

My Eden is the ability to trust my fellow man, not just the ones weaker and slower than me.

Your Eden is the eden of the T-rex. As long as you're the biggest, strongest, meanest, fastest - *you* can trust anybody.

But who can trust you?

Addison
New Uhh...
Addison writes:
You've come up with this image of the US as a gun-battling place. Nevermind that's the opposite.
Uh, no, it's not. Not "the opposite", I mean.

According to all statistics I've ever seen or heard, the USA *is* pretty much "a gun-battling place".
   Christian R. Conrad
The Man Who Knows Fucking Everything
New yup, dont see many fist fights
that loadmouth big guy walks a little small in places like texas nd the bronx cause the little guy who looks funny will take a punch then shoot you dead. Yup.
the great equalizer.
thanx,
bill
can I have my ones and zeros back?
New Re: Uhh...
Uh, no, it's not. Not "the opposite", I mean.

According to all statistics I've ever seen or heard, the USA *is* pretty much "a gun-battling place".


Statistics? Or TV shows?

Guns are rarely used, even in the US. Very rarely. (rarely is a relative term, yes, they're used more than in say, Sweden) And their rates of use are going DOWN. Not up. Down.

This isn't the popular image projected by the media, I realise.

There's not a showdown on Every Main Street, Every Day, as Ashton portrays, nor does the NRA (or anybody else) advocate one.

Addison
New Well Addison, you make your points here well enough that,
I'll concede a bit more of the 'appropriateness' of the gun-partisan's prioritizing; it's likely true that - had the CIEIO of Corp-Med lambasted the Tampa Surveillance Afficionados instead -

A) there would have been no putative cause - for unearthing the sorry AMA-stats on -at best- Unnecesary deaths and injuries due directly to: the proliferation of Incompetent Doctors within the body of Doctors.

B) there would have been no tie-in either; surveillance VS AMA Incompetence. It would have been a Red Herring (however a legitimate Herring, elsewhere)

As to my 'hatred' of the NRA. For the same reasons you despise such rednecks, liberals or conservatives - who immediately counter *any* earnest efforts to control some of the Collateral Damage *caused by* the ready-availability of ___ (Anything! potentially harmful, not Just Guns.. or Gins! for that matter)

Yes, I despise One-Note-Johnnys.

Always it has been within the purview of the NRA or the other orgs to Face-Up to: precisely! the growing er "issue" of the blood-slippery ORs - a daily phenom in any large Murican city, and to attempt to seek YES! *innovative* New Ways (!!) for preserving BOTH

the right to maintain an armed Militia *AND* fearlessly and non-BS-edly ALSO face the consequences of gun proliferation to such an extent that: literally ANYONE may easily obtain one, no matter what nominal 'laws' are on the books - most of these: to make some group or pol 'feel good about themselves\ufffd' in the passing of YAN toothless 'restraint'.

I will salute! your NRA when it er *bites THAT bullet*, ceases the preaching to converted doubletalk - and begins by acknowledging that *gun ownership is the essence of a TWO-edged sword* and it is NOT simply about: "some God-given inalienable Right of... yada yada". Because that last: just is all we mainly HEAR from these dudes

over and over and over (Thanks, Meerkat!)

Yes too: no matter what I think, imagine is possible if.. we Want it enough: in Murica Guns R Us. For the foreseeable. Yet to make their 'possession' a main focus of a 'life' is IMhO, the description of a narrowly circumscribed 'life', in the Grand Scheme o'Things available to homo-sap mentation.

Alas, the paranoid style of Murican politics nearly guarantees that.. the NRA-folk and their opponents - shall continue focussing upon the extremes -- precisely as the

Right-to-Life (but let's execute them older folk real Quick, before their DNA tests come up) VS the Right-to-Choose (let's have an abortion clinic available at recess for the 12 year olds) -- these *&%*&$ Caricatures! ARE the way Muricans deal with problems that cannot yield to simplistic slogans, as solutions.

We ever choose the stupid extreme slogan! and then emote about it, not for the duration of a political campaign (lasting interminably, if it's for Prez) -- but we do this forever. Exclusively (except in small never-media-reported! sane groups, that is).

We *were* smarter than this. The Federalist Papers were bloody serialized! in newspapers! Then, when the Constitution et al were nascent, debatable and, were debated!

Too bad, Addison - a pox on Both the houses: the One-Note-NRA\ufffd AND Let's-Confiscate-All Guns\ufffd. Neither POV is worth a bucket of warm spit (though we see that quote of John Nance Garner, re the Veep position, was in error: we now have a Veep running a Puppet)

So much for even *my* slogans about slogans about.. ;-)


Ashton
Recipe for Just Plain Goodness\ufffd GPL'd

Give Everyone a gun.
Ration *EVERY* bullet\ufffd.
Test every 'Doctor' - in Geneva, far enough away from er local persuasion.
Break up every massive News Monopoly to original varied components.
Billy n'Bally in public Stocks for One Week - as example for every Corp. Suit and Suite. (for a start, that is)

_____ (other Rules to Live By: available in the Professional version, $50)
New Thank you. Let me try to make at least one more.
Primarily: You've got to stop complaining about "Meedja" and "Murican peeple" if you're going to be part of them (or be hypocritical).

As to my 'hatred' of the NRA. For the same reasons you despise such rednecks, liberals or conservatives - who immediately counter *any* earnest efforts to control some of the Collateral Damage *caused by* the ready-availability of ___ (Anything! potentially harmful, not Just Guns.. or Gins! for that matter)

Yes, I despise One-Note-Johnnys.


The "meedja" has been saying that. The NRA is *not* a "one note Johnny". Lobbying and gun laws are a small FRACTION of what they do.

But the *US MEDIA* says that's all they say. So you've allowed yourself to be swayed by what you make fun of - bought into the popular viewing of the NRA as "Nuts".

(BTW, they spent more time and effort with Police Training courses than they do with lobbying, at least last time I saw the stats).

And I'll reference a comment you made on ezboard:
fringe groups like the Aryan NRA Brotherhood

Now, I don't know if you were making a "new" fringe group or not. But in any event, putting the two of them together is foul, in both the out of bounds and the smell sense of the word. You keep DOING that. (and you complain about "one note johnnies" despite the NRA's being completely, utterly silent in this scene).

The NRA, who, by the way, are among the STRONGEST proponents of freedom, equality, and legallity want nothing to do with any white supremacist groups. Insinuating that they are one and the same hurts *your* case, and your ability to claim that you've really thought things through.

So yes, you've bought into a "meedja myth" - and are perpetuating it. Not unusual, people do that all the time. I have to say it irks me when they then bitch a storm up about the unthinking masses who regurgitate what the "meedja" says.

Always it has been within the purview of the NRA or the other orgs to Face-Up to: precisely! the growing er "issue" of the blood-slippery ORs - a daily phenom in any large Murican city, and to attempt to seek YES! *innovative* New Ways (!!) for preserving BOTH the right to maintain an armed Militia *AND* fearlessly and non-BS-edly ALSO face the consequences of gun proliferation to such an extent that: literally ANYONE may easily obtain one, no matter what nominal 'laws' are on the books

Ashton, the NRA has been the *leading* proponent of laws to get illegal guns off the street. To require safe handling of weapons.

They're not against "any" law that defines guns. (Buying that is more "meedja bad mojo").

But often they get painted as such, due to their opposition of BAD LAW that's spun as good.

The NRA opposed legislation (for one example) to outlaw "cop killer bullets" (as it was called at the time, after all, who's going to oppose laws to "protect police officers"?). Because the laws were badly worded. Because they were open to wide interpretation. Several defined *any* projectile that could penetrate an "undershirt" vest as "armor-piercing"... and that includes *NAIL GUNS*. Much less *every deer rifle in the world*.

Not to mention these laws are written by these same politicians you like to lamblast for their venality and stupidity... so if they want to outlaw guns they suddenly are Nobel candidates?

Coating a bullet with Teflon (R) (TM) is illegal. Why? Because of the "cop killer buller" hysteria. Someone produced "Teflon-coated" bullets, 60 minutes ran a story.

The point that escaped most of the viewing audience, and most of the politicians was that the reason these rounds sliced through body armor *wasn't* the "teflon coating". It was the fact the projectiles were non-deforming STEEL. The teflon allowed them to "slip" down the barrel of the gun - without ripping the rifling out of the barrel. (previous weapons, mainly anti-tank, that use steel projectiles have VERY short barrel lives). Lead and copper are used currently, and they do adequately, but it would be better to use thse same tech to coat THEM.

And guess who's affected by this restriction the most? Police officers - who breath in lead vapors from the indoor shooting ranges they go to. :) (often to save money straight lead bullets are used in practice, non-copper coated).

(As a matter of science, teflon actually *retards* penetration into kevlar and spectra body armor... both of them are extremely strong in the direction of the polymer/fiber - and very weak laterally. (Which is why you don't see clothes made out of kevlar.. Nomex, an isomer of Kevlar, is used for heat-resistance, but it wears out quickly, as well. Its branched much more, and has much lower tensile strength). The *spinning* of the bullet against the fibers (which are usually knitted to "catch" it) shreds them. The less friction it can create, the less its able to shred them... lead projectiles coated in teflon experience a 30-40% *decrease* in penetration into Kevlar...)

I will salute! your NRA when it er *bites THAT bullet*, ceases the preaching to converted doubletalk - and begins by acknowledging that *gun ownership is the essence of a TWO-edged sword*

Don't wear out your hand. The "Eddie the Eagle" program is widely regarded as the *most effective* child-education program currently in production (Stop, run away, get an adult) - but since its from the NRA, and doesn't demonize weapons.

The problem of gun in BAD people's hands they've know of for years. And its not something that's ignored - they want the focus on the BAD PERSON. That's the problem.

Because that last: just is all we mainly HEAR from these dudes over and over and over

*drumroll* - because you're watching the Meedja. And that's all they WANT you to hear from them. (example., most Meedja outlets will refuse to accept NRA advertising - while running for free, or reduced prices - ads from the various groups pledged to completely outlaw guns).

Too bad, Addison - a pox on Both the houses: the One-Note-NRA? AND Let's-Confiscate-All Guns?.

Its a false comparision, but I've explained that enough, I think.

The NRA has the same thoughts about freedoms you have on the camera issue. (And most of us would oppose cameras, too). Once you give up something, its hard to get it back. And the opponents - such as the AMA president - are not opposed to outright lying, and ignoring the DAMAGE that they do (after all, its not THEM who's disarmed) (name me one major opponent of gun ownership who's not protected by armed guards).

Remember - we're talking about something that historically has in every case - raised assault, rape, and murder rates. (And you're saying that people who say "Whoa, wait a minute, why do we want to do something that's been done lots of times before with the SAME EFFECT every time?" are deviant?)

Additionally, the NRA wasn't greatly opposed to many gun laws - until it became obvious that people who wanted you and me and everybody disarmed for their great utopia - were using them to systematically do exactly that.

You've got to remember where you're getting your information from, and what bias they have.

Alas, the paranoid style of Murican politics nearly guarantees that.. the NRA-folk and their opponents - shall continue focussing upon the extremes

The NRA and their brethren are on the defensive. The battle was brought to them. Just like the AMA president - others picked the battle, and picked the context. To then blame THEM for the tone is somewhat ironic, I think.

Sure, there are lots of "You'll have my gun when you pry it from my cold, dead, fingers" around. (most of whom have left the NRA for their being not hard-line enough).

But that's because there are lots of people out there who are all in favor of confiscating EVERY SINGLE GUN.

I spoke to one today. I mentioned something, referencing the Microsoft sop to the appeals court's decision, that its "compromise" like in the gun debate. The gun-grabbers say "Give us everything". "No". "OK, we'll just take THESE then". Next year "Give us everything". "NO!" "Ok, we'll take THESE then".

Its the compromise of Europe of the late 30s... retreating and giving up - just not as much as was originally demanded. Whoo. What a "compromise". (Side note, in Chamberlain's defense, I read something interesting that said that rather than being Hitler's pawn, he was fully aware of what was going on, but was buying time, since the French and English weren't ready, and overestimated how ready Germany was.).

And this person got mad, and told me in no uncertain terms that every gun should be outlawed, every one confiscated.

(This person is jewish, and has relatives in Israel... and also 10 minutes later, was voicing a concern about getting raped. I was polite and didn't link the conversations).

And yes, what you see in the Meedja is usually strident, from the NRA - but usually its made MORE SO, by someone with the same notion YOU do, and who is saying - that the NRA says this, does that, etc.

I'll just ask you to actually look into it a bit more, because I can tell you that that's *not* the case. At best, its a gross distortion. Sometimes, more than you might like to think, its a outright lie.

And just like this latest case (which the NRA I've not seen mentioned in, yet) - when someone comes out calling for "more and more and more" gun restriction - on further review.. it doesn't seem to be the good, obvious idea that they claimed.

But calling for studies, and proof, and putting things in context... gets you branded as a "one note Johnny, who's nuts, and has a penile facination with guns".....

Look into the NRA more. I think you'll be very surprised by what you'll find. (Like they were a major force in the "three strikes" sort of laws. that they have no sympathy for felons using weapons...)

But you will also likely find that when 'Oh, don't worry about it' sort of things came up, that the NRA got burned. NYC passed a law requiring registration of handguns. "Don't worry, we're not doing this to confiscate them". Few years later: "Turn it it in to the police, prove you sold it before such and such a date, or had it destroyed, or go to jail"....

Fool me once, shame on you... Fool me twice....?

Addison
New En passant
No, re the Aryan NRA brotherhood quip - it's simply that a lot of lunatic fringe also imagines NRA is on the 'right' side - and just needs a little help.. from Them. Kinda hard to shoo away that friendly puppy with the ammonium nitrate keg on its collar. Not NRA's fault entirely - who coopts the name. But my quip could suggest - what you infer. OK: The North Dakota Aryan NRA-wannabe Posse Comitatus Marching Band then..

My sources are not just the talking heads either - but for the fortress mentation which NRA believes is necessary for them? - so Are the speeches often too close to the tired shibboleths, to ever evoke interest in the less polarizing activities you mention.

Still and all.."Like they were a major force in the "three strikes" sort of laws. that they have no sympathy for felons using weapons..." <<<<

I see this as no + at all, given the intent and actuality of the provisions passed: leaving judges no choice in tailoring the punishment to fit an Individual - his/her crime, previous performance, circumstances. Imagine: a judge in tears! apologizing to a young defendant he must impose a Draconian punisment upon because HE HAS NO CHOICE. And Muricans tolerate THIS !!! Baa Baa Baa == always choose the Simplistic over the merely Difficult but Necessary solution.

And if enough people imagine that judges are lenient? too lenient always? on this Particular case Ihappentohaveanopinion on? 'The Answer' (there is NO 'The Answer' EVER) is NOT to (very likely unconstitutionally = coopting via legislative branch!) REMOVE Judicial branch powers to er 'judge'. Perhaps there needs further ground for removing the aberrant extremist judges, as with the quacks perennially protected by the AMA (?) Maybe that isn't broken at all.

But we can't just bump Every judgment call up to a committee, or settle the problem of 'crime' by simplistic slogans like 3 Strikes. Even though that is the national style re all difficult topics.

(Remember: "3--Strikes" gained its largest momentum via the Polly Klass kidnap, prolly rape & certainly murder - by a recently released scum of the earth. This happened in my back yard. Via the accident of human frailty and poor cop-communications: a cop actually stopped this perp while the girl was left "up a hill" [Why Did She Not Then Scream? we will never learn]. It was a traumatic event, intensified for her being such a wonderful little girl (so.. are they all, of course - but some are more..) And it led directly to this nationwide hysteria justifying the crippling of the Judiciary in every state. I Vas Dere, Charlie. The place where they Almost saved the kid - is less than ~ 4 miles away.)

The entire idea - NRA support of 3-Strikes - merely bolsters my characterization of the NRA (too) as falling for just as mindless, simplistic 'solutions' -- as are ever popular with opportunistic pols and with people who have no sense of what individual rights might be. Or why we should care.

We won't 'get rid of the guns' and - we won't 'get rid of the criminals' via 3-Strikes: We Will and Are - locking up people for insane sentences (30-40 YEARS!) for ingesting 'illegal' substances in the privacy of their homes *(not cars, airplanes or boats). we are simply fucking hysterical about so-called illegal drugs. Evidence? lots. One - you cannot even use heroin in a Brompton cocktail for terminal cancer pain . Here! Despite it's being the most effective base ingredient known. UK uses the real thing - we settle for pharm-chem one-note-johnny single alkaloid derivatives (Heroin like Coca is a vast mixture of minor alkoloid variants).

* Yes, not only drug dealers - whom we imagine it's OK to savage out of all proportion: individual users caught with maybe a couple weeks' supply - on the rubric of.. "well, they Might want to use some and sell the rest".. That flies with DAs looking for Perfect Records to taut to the pols. Over and over. Pure sophistry institutionalized *now*.

Apparently - more than you do - I see a tissue of hypocritical laws around, drugs being the most overt: we are the largest assemblage of daily drug-users in history. Only the Pharm-Chem tax renders some street drug (same alkaloid with a twist) - OK for mom n' pop. I also see the clear thread of Puritanism behind most of our victimless crimes, from prostitution on. All my life I've observed this thread of 'causality'.

We are a nation of busybodies - believe we have the right to control behavior that some plurality deems.. immoral. That is how we act, though sanctimoniously deny that we do. (Somehow I imagine this last.. is a plank in the NRA framework too ?? Right to be fucking *Left Alone* ??)

The guns just let minor disagreements turn instantly into fatal ones - often played out by 13-year olds who wanna rap like that gangsta. (CD sold by that Mega-Corp which cares-Not what they do for $$ Nor doe we appear able to interfere with Any profit-making scam so long as: please to call it bizness. Then it is on hallowed ground and untouchable - the Murican Capitalist Creed, sub-\ufffd III)

Welcome to Bedlam USA. We'll sell Anything to kids. If there's $$ in it. For me. Is that the root of our idiocy: Puerile Mendacity In All Things in Life? No more simplistic a slogan than other Popular ones, I deem.



Ashton
Once ashamed of ~'my country's behavior' internally & externally.
Now: it ain't My country. Accidentally here, I try to live - even though 'here'.
New I believe your anger is misplaced.
The entire idea - NRA support of 3-Strikes - merely bolsters my characterization of the NRA (too) as falling for just as mindless, simplistic 'solutions' -- as are ever popular with opportunistic pols and with people who have no sense of what individual rights might be.

Wait. One of the very very few organizations who are willing to stand up FOR your rights - one of the most important, as envisioned by the writers of the constitution, enumerated.... and they're for eroding individual rights?

Ash, seems to me that the pot is calling the kettle black here, when you paint the NRA as some sort of idiot organization. (And they can't win with you, especially since you've decided to ignore everything but preconceptions).

The support of three strikes was done because we do have a problem with crime. And since it turns out that something like 80% of violent crimes are committed by the SAME PEOPLE, the solution, simplistic as it might be, was "OK, we'll give you 3 strikes. If you get convicted three times of violent crimes, you don't get a chance to hurt anybody else".

And I *like* this overall concept. Its a simple system. Its fairly immune to abuse (it would be hard to imagine someone convicted falsely three times) (Note for those outside the US, (usually) its not three violent convictions (say, at the same trial), but three seperate trials).

I prefer systems that are simple, have margins for error, and aren't politically influenced.

we are simply fucking hysterical about so-called illegal drugs.

Often, we are. But this isn't really relevant to the NRA. Remember, the issue I'm trying to point out to you is you've taken a "snapshot" of the NRA, *based on the media's reports*, and its not a "true" picture. They're not advocating a lot of what you ascribe to them.

it's simply that a lot of lunatic fringe also imagines NRA is on the 'right' side

Why aren't they? I think they are. I think the ACLU is, with the exception of being embarressed of the 2nd amendment, and doing massive tap-dancing to avoid the support of it, that they give the 1st and 4th, etc.

What's "wrong" about the NRA? Their insistance on *your* civil liberties, their concern about encraaching government, their fighting with the belief that once you start allowing the government in, you won't get them out?

My sources are not just the talking heads either - but for the fortress mentation which NRA believes is necessary for them?

I have to question you on this... considering you're stating as fact the mistruths those talking heads persist in.

I might can agree with you its a fortress mentality. Just a couple weeks ago you had one, as well, when we discussed police monitoring of public places via cameras.

I see this as no + at all, given the intent and actuality of the provisions passed: leaving judges no choice in tailoring the punishment to fit an Individual - his/her crime, previous performance, circumstances.

First off, it also prevents either a judge from letting a violent felon walk.

Secondly, the whole point is with "3 strikes" is that there's BEEN CONSIDERATION in the past. It didn't work. I have no problems with violent felons being tossed into jail to rot after some number of attempts to teach/rehabilitate them.

They see you and me as prey, Ash. They see your Eden as a lush garden to rape, and take everything. But they do exist.

(and if you're talking about drug offenses, that's another story. I'm talking about the murders, rapists, violent felons. I don't have a problem presuming they can reform. But *at some point* you have to say - YOU! OUTTA THE POOL! NOW!)

Every judgment call up to a committee, or settle the problem of 'crime' by simplistic slogans like 3 Strikes. Even though that is the national style re all difficult topics.

I agree. You may notice that that's what raised my ire - that the president of the AMA decided that "guns are bad" - against all supporting documentation - and wants them outlawed. (One presumes, except for the ones protecting HIM).

(3 strikes might be a "simplistic" view - but note that it gets the point across... Picking battles is important, and if people aren't listeng to the facts...)

And *my* problem with this sort of "oversimplifcation" got you ranting and raving about the NRA - with a vastly over-simplified view of them.

Ironic, don'tcha think? :)

Addison
New camels nose under the tent :)
two bad felonies 20 yrs in prison then a shoplifting charge, 3 strikes, now I have a shoplifter out on bail ready to kill to avoid spending the rest of his life in prison. OOPS. Should I be able to own a working Tank with all arms working? Yup. Until I have my 1st felony conviction (with violence) then I lose all right to own anything above a pellet gun. Simple, easy to enforce (but I need those instant checks with the fbi fsckers destroyng the checks under 3rd party non governmental oversight after 90 days.)
thanx,
bill
can I have my ones and zeros back?
New Could be, but I doubt it.
Addison writes:
"An armed society is a polite society". Its a cliche, but why? I've *never* seen a fistfight at a gunstore. Nor a shooting. Why is that? Could it be that people were *more mature* and *more aware* of their actions?
Seems more likely (to me) that they're just *more afraid*, because in that setting they KNOW that everybody ELSE is armed.

Outside the gunstore, where there's just a (finite, but non-zero) *probability* that they are, that's easier to ignore (or discount).



But even there, I'd think, most people are rational enough to be *somewhat* nervous, knowing that QUITE A FEW of the people around them are *likely* to be armed. How do you value that constant feeling, conscious or not, of being-on-edge? (I've asked this before, but got no answer, mr I'll-assume-unions-are-bad-then...) Looks obvious to me that it's non-zero, and pretty damn plausible that it's a negative "value", rather than a positive.

And that is a cost of *having* guns that "people on the gun-grabbing side of the debate" -- in the sense I first read it as, people who grab their guns at the slightest provocation (or none at all) -- seem to tend to ignore.
   Christian R. Conrad
The Man Who Knows Fucking Everything
New Its not fear.
I'm not *scared* walking into a gunstore, knowing the clerks are armed, any more than (At least I presume) with armed police around.

(In fact, less, because CCW-permit holders in the US have 1/10th the arrest rate of police).

In fact, I'm pretty reassured when the citizens around me are armed. (Gets back to that trust issue.... obviously, you don't trust the people around you with that degree of authority. (Another issue is why police, in the US a very low-paying job (if they're honest), and very low-education requirements get that degree of trust, but the average citizen does not))

The exact opposite of "being on edge". When I have to hope that my wits, whiles, and fists MIGHT deter someone (or ones) from making me a victim, *THAT* gets me on edge.

And I don't understand why people presume that all of us (gun owners) are lying all the time.

Addison
Expand Edited by addison July 11, 2001, 10:16:18 AM EDT
New A couple of points...
Addison writes:
In fact, I'm pretty reassured when the citizens around me are armed. (Gets back to that trust issue.... obviously, you don't trust the people around you with that degree of authority
Oh, come ON!

If people all around me are armed all the time, there is *some* larger-than-zero probability that someone will go nuts and start shooting.

If they aren't, it's zero. Nothing to do with how much I "trust" them; just a simple matter of what's *possible*.


And I don't understand why people presume that all of us (gun owners) are lying all the time.
Huh?!? Why the F are you telling *me* this? Have I accused you of lying, or anything???

(All I can imagine this being in response to, would be the "grabbing" thing -- which was no accusation against *anyone*, in either direction. It's just that when I realized I had read it backwards, I thought it was rather funny.)
   Christian R. Conrad
The Man Who Knows Fucking Everything
New The irony continues. :)
I'll have to start from the end and work forward.

Huh?!? Why the F are you telling *me* this? Have I accused you of lying, or anything???

Yep, you *DID IN THAT POST*. Allow me to point out:

Oh, come ON!
If people all around me are armed all the time, there is *some* larger-than-zero probability that someone will go nuts and start shooting.


This is after I told you that *I* don't have that fear. You just said "that's impossible [you're lying]".

I'm not. I don't have that fear. I don't see people "going nuts" around me on a daily basis. The likelyhood of that is *unchanged* if they have a gun or not.

*AND IF I, and EVERYONE ELSE AROUND HAS ONE, THEN ONE PERSON "going nuts" DOESN'T SCARE ME."

People don't start twitching in the gunstores, and eyes turn red.. and if they did, they'd be most likely VERY quickly dispatched.

Wheras, if I'm on the street (unarmed), and somebody's gone nuts, and has a weapon, a knife, their granddad's old goosegun... *THEN* I'm worried.

If they aren't, it's zero. Nothing to do with how much I "trust" them;

The odds that they'll go "nuts" is unchanged.

The odds that someone will go nuts, *AND* start shooting lowers (but you're presuming perfect knowledge, and that there are no guns to get to "zero") - but there are lots of OTHER things that crazy people can do. And ones bezerking out like that, running through schoolyards with a ninja sword, for instance..... Ramming their car into a daycare... there are lots of *weapons* out there.

But trust me, *I* don't have fear, That concern DOES NOT BOTHER ME. Please stop telling me that it does. :)

The likelihood of it is LESS than someone attacking me OUTSIDE. The odds drop dramtically when law abiding citizens are armed. The random abberation is more easily dealt with in that case, than running away (which is about my only other options if a guy starts waving a sword or knife at me)

And it is a matter of trust. You're scared that your peers are not able to control themselves, that they'll "go nuts". What is that, if its not lack of trust?

Addison
New Oh, bullshit.
Me: If people all around me are armed all the time, there is *some* larger-than-zero probability that someone will go nuts and start shooting.

Addison: This is after I told you that *I* don't have that fear. You just said "that's impossible [you're lying]".

Nope -- I'm saying, if *anything* like that, "that's irrational [you're stupid]".

Because, if you "don't have that fear", then you ARE being irrational: The probability -- however vanishingly low -- *does* exist.


Addison: I don't see people "going nuts" around me on a daily basis. The likelyhood of that is *unchanged* if they have a gun or not.

Don't preted to be so fucking stupid, please. The likelyhood of someone going nuts AND START SHOOTING is ABSOLUTELY changed by whether they've got a gun or not.


Addison: People don't start twitching in the gunstores, and eyes turn red.. and if they did, they'd be most likely VERY quickly dispatched.

But *if* they do, *before* they're "most likely VERY quickly dispatched", someone else is pretty damn likely to get hurt or killed.

And are you prepared to SWEAR that it has NEVER, EVER, happened? And that it *will* NEVER, EVER, happen (again?)?

No? Didn't think so... The probability *is* greater than zero.


Me: If they aren't, it's zero. Nothing to do with how much I "trust" them;

Addison: The odds that they'll go "nuts" is unchanged.

But not the odds that they'll go nuts AND START SHOOTING. Sheesh!


Addison: The odds that someone will go nuts, *AND* start shooting lowers (but you're presuming perfect knowledge, and that there are no guns to get to "zero")

Why, how mysterious... Not.

Not when I *postulated*, in this *example* of the *difference* between an armed and an UN-armed society, that there are no guns. Sheesh and double-Sheesh!


Addison: but there are lots of OTHER things that crazy people can do. And ones bezerking out like that, running through schoolyards with a ninja sword, for instance..... Ramming their car into a daycare... there are lots of *weapons* out there.

Yup.

And removing guns makes it one *less* kind of weapons out there.


Now, I never said it was a *high* probability, or that you did (or even *must*) fear everybody else... But this sub-discussion, you better just give up, Addison.

There's NO WAY IN HELL you're going to logically convince me that the likelihood of getting hurt by a gun is no bigger when there ARE guns around, than when there AREN'T.

Because that just isn't so.
   Christian R. Conrad
The Man Who Knows Fucking Everything
New No.
Me: If people all around me are armed all the time, there is *some* larger-than-zero probability that someone will go nuts and start shooting.
Addison: This is after I told you that *I* don't have that fear. You just said "that's impossible [you're lying]".
Nope -- I'm saying, if *anything* like that, "that's irrational [you're stupid]".
Because, if you "don't have that fear", then you ARE being irrational: The probability -- however vanishingly low -- *does* exist.


I said I don't have that fear, that the odds are so low as to not be worth worrying about.

You said that I was wrong, of course I worried about it. I don't know how else to interpret that.

The possibility exists, yes.

Are you worried that someone will bury you with a snowplow? Put poison in your vodka? maybe spike your chewing tobacco? What about that someone in your workplace will pull a gun in the next week and shoot you?

You *must* be, because those *are* possibilities, right?

That's the argument you've presented. If its possible, you must worry about it, or else be irrational.

Its irrational to worry (more) with probabilities of a LOWER ORDER of things that you accept on a daily basis, wouldn't you say?

I would. So no, I don't worry when I'm in a gunstore. I'm safer in there than outside. The likelyhood is LESS. So I worry less (ie, none)

Don't preted to be so fucking stupid, please. The likelyhood of someone going nuts AND START SHOOTING is ABSOLUTELY changed by whether they've got a gun or not.

Yes, and I said as much. You've created a false comparision. I worry about people going nuts. Secondarily, I worry with what they're packing.

Additionally - if they *DO* go nuts and "start shooting", and more than 1 person SHOOTS BACK, who wins?

But *if* they do, *before* they're "most likely VERY quickly dispatched", someone else is pretty damn likely to get hurt or killed.

And are you prepared to SWEAR that it has NEVER, EVER, happened? And that it *will* NEVER, EVER, happen (again?)?


Perhaps. But the odds are that LESS PEOPLE will be hurt/killed in that situation, than in a situation where there is just ONE CRAZY PERSON with HOMICIDE.

Additionally, and I can't find a link to it online, there was a incident of workplace violence last year I heard about. Guy got fired, few days later walks into the office carrying some number of weapons. Yells "I"m going to kill all you &*#@*". Someone was chatting with the receptionist. He pulled his CCW .45 and shot once.

Now, how many people would have been hurt/killed without that? What if he'd walked in tossing Molotov Cocktails? Fireworks with nails around 'em? pipe bombs?

The gun isn't the problem, the gun in the hands of the nut is, and more specifically, the *nut* is the problem.

No? Didn't think so... The probability *is* greater than zero.

Yes. But so's the probability that the sun will Nova in the next 60 seconds. So's the probability that I'll have a heart attack this week. So's the probability that a metorite will hit me in the head. They're *SO CLOSE* to zero that I consider them zero, and spend my time worrying about MORE LIKELY probabilities.

But I grant you, the probability is greater than zero.

What you're not granting me is your scenario is leaving a lot out.

And removing guns makes it one *less* kind of weapons out there.

At one point, I could reccall in debating, what you call it when someone says something factual, that's wrong. That was too many years ago. But this is the sort of thing.

Sure. And if you get rid of the guns, the likelihood of shootings disappears, you're absolutely right.

But the likelihood of *crime, assault, and violence* goes UP. And my ability to stop it also disappears. Well, diminished to near zero.

So if you've got a maniac running through a schoolyard with a ninja sword, or toward you, and no guns, how are you proposing to stop him?

There's NO WAY IN HELL you're going to logically convince me that the likelihood of getting hurt by a gun is no bigger when there ARE guns around, than when there AREN'T.

Nope. I didn't say that. I said the probability was so low it didnt' concern me.

Because there are guns out there. Lots of them. Billions of them. And criminals have 'em. You are ignoring this.

There are lots of other weapons out there. You ignore that.

You're worried about the low-order probability stuff, instead of the much more likely stuff. *THAT*'s irrational.

Sure, if you could get rid of guns, nobody would be shot. You're entirely right, but you can't, you won't, (the probablity is infintemsmal) and its silly to make your stand on a "fact" that's irrelevant.

You've created a false situation. I'm talking about the real world.

Guns exist. Crazy people exist, whethere there are guns or not. Criminals exist, guns or not.

The likelihood of me encountering someone crazy or criminal, and suffering at their hands GOES UP without me ahving a weapon. That's reality.

I don't care what you want to think, I'm not going into your imagined situation and telling you you're wrong. Go back and read what I said.

In situations where the populace is armed, I feel safer, because these false situations don't happen.

In short, its not me being irrational.

But to continue this, when you're being Brycian, attempting (and almost succeeding) to redefine the "debate" into "your terms" isn't worth it. (Go back and look at how you've progressed from reality to nitpicking on "close to zero", etc).

Hang loose, and keep the powder dry, bro.

Addison
New OK.. is it alright to change the scale, now?
Final er Concluding Unscientific Postscript (thanks S\ufffdren!)

Addison, I believe you have indeed made a rather sane exposition of "why you feel safer, armed - in America (!) and on 7/11/01". And too - Christian doesn't live here.

Nor am I in any way ridiculing your above 'weighing of the probabilities' as you deem them. This screed is about that which we have a dearth of in Murica: a generalized overview without the omnipresent Slogans. If I'm lucky, that is. (The Murican Peepul is however, so omnipresent a shibboleth here - I simply cannot dispense with it and its implications. See?)

In Murica the barn door is not merely open: all its contents have been dispersed to the masses, so long ago and ongoing - there simply is not the slightest hope of ever, restoring the barn's contents.

In Finland (?) or at least in - most other so-called 'civilized' and wealthy Western countries (not to mention virtually All Eastern countries.. not currently fighting a guerrilla war, or getting ready for one):

The barn door was never opened. Not that there haven't always been weapons, just - not a massive preoccupation of the populace that - somehow it is an Allah- Krishna- God- given Important Right. Thus not: a fixation on the idea, then a fixation on the getting.. and all which has followed *here* from both.

Both CRC and I assert (not his words - maybe he shall demur on my version) - to *Liking The Feeling* that, I do not need to consider the pros/cons of arming myself in the company of the Gaussian distribution of my fellow country inmates. Not yesterday, not today - hopefully (never Certainly!) not tomorrow.

Conversely: we two at least, would assert (in each's unique choice of words) ~~ For me to have to adopt a Feeling that I Should next be armed: would constitute a reduction, of both subtle and overt dimensions, but a palpable Reduction in what I deem the Quality of life I would experience, henceforth.

If you are correct that such a Feeling has now been lost in many, in Murica (as you argue persuasively IS the case on 7/11/01) - then I say: Yes, for certain definitions of 'a felt need for personal security 24/7 in all locations', this may be so. For some, as of today.

But if you are arguing - and I think you have been - that *this situation* is not a Bad thing, is ~OK; 'don't worry pretty-little head' about it ? Then I reply: Oh No! - it is a very Big Thing. And that 'Big' is on a scale which shall not yield to mere stats or rationalizations or arrest records. Nor homogenization of the Large idea of Quality of a Life.

Lastly: I want to see occur.. increasing recognition of the mess we have made, thus awareness of the dimensions of the many 'messes' so that as many as possible ~"face what this Feeling IS, which they walk around in the penumbra of.." Then I want, and for all good reasons following from realizing what this Feeling IS:

That we gradually, painstakingly reach enough of an awareness and thus (plurality?) such that: we use our homo-sap minds to begin restoration of, a saner less dangerous citizenry and thus - place to live in:

Like most of the other rich and equally intelligent citizenries in the world, who have not bought our rationale - nor want to emulate "how we live" (though they like our toys - perhaps Too much - thus may.. follow us in other devolutionary ways. Dunno about that last. Everything future is unknowable.)



Ashton
Who, living in Murica-2001, just might ought to keep..
that cute SS S&W Captain's Special buried in the closet.. handier?

There IS no telling when, the DEA and Mr. Ashcroft and that military tactician guy decide - maybe to test my Saab for 20-yr. old flecks of unPharm-Chem-Taxed substances? which might.. be left over from the days? of <40-year prison sentences for personal usage in the privacy of one's home. A mass spectrometer - wouldn't be so Large an invasion of my privacy. Would it? Just in case I have been deviant, of course.

After all, if I'm not guilty and can simply document the entire history of every occupant of that car.. (and it's too old for the DEA to Really want it er 'confiscated for my safety and protection' without due process - they Like new BMWS, actually) -- well,

For not bein guilty and stuff: what do I have to fear in Murica 2001?

(Nope: the above scenario is palpable and not even exaggeration, from actual cases read about. People ARE now locked up for 40ish years for the crime of carrying a week? month? supply of fav EvilSubstance not Trademarked\ufffd. 3X will do it. (Er, do you doubt the veracity of this report? Lazy as I am I could likely find links - the new Source of Truth, we see))

Does this overt, daily injustice by the Govmint Armed Troops and their ovine supporters of Safety from 'Crime' for All cause me, in Sonoma County, to feel a er 'need to pack'?

Not Yet. (Hope I'd move to Helsinki or Paris or Oxford the very day I decide: I Should. And that would be: my present plan for future exigencies.)

A.
Stop Lying at its Source:
Resign your Corporate Job for a genuine life, no matter what.
Bonus: a longer, more beauty-filled life..
New Precis:
You can't put the toothpaste back in the tube :-)

Although it's interesting to discuss what it would be like if you *could*.
--
Peter
Shill For Hire
Expand Edited by pwhysall July 12, 2001, 03:02:12 AM EDT
     LP Release: Doctors &amp;amp;amp; Guns - (Fearless Freep) - (46)
         Ain't that the truth. -NT - (bepatient)
         Funny how.. - (Ashton) - (11)
             Maybe I missed the joke. - (addison) - (10)
                 Er.. 'victims' Meant: of the non-policed MDs - (Ashton) - (9)
                     Noise levels - (mhuber) - (7)
                         Or maybe... Conspiracy!! to off gun-owners! - (Ashton) - (6)
                             When you say it like that.... - (addison) - (5)
                                 It's called______satire. - (Ashton) - (4)
                                     Believe me, I understand satire. - (addison) - (3)
                                         A couple of points - (ben_tilly) - (2)
                                             Why restrict to wheeled projectiles? - (Ashton)
                                             I rode that - (drewk)
                     Its a contextual issue. - (addison)
         The IoM report is here. - (Another Scott) - (1)
             Re: Nurses giving the wrong meds - (drewk)
         Reply from the DSGL - (addison) - (30)
             Swell.. yawn. But you still don't get the irony? - (Ashton) - (29)
                 Yes, I *get* the irony. The Irony is that you don't. :) - (addison) - (28)
                     Polarization is so easy. Thus popular. - (Ashton) - (27)
                         Sorry, but that's not consistent - (drewk) - (5)
                             Downward spiral? - (Ashton) - (3)
                                 But which is the "reasonable" fear? - (drewk) - (2)
                                     Re: But which is the "reasonable" fear? - (addison) - (1)
                                         Heh.. find self in basic agreement with Both of you,here:-\ufffd -NT - (Ashton)
                             Except... - (addison)
                         Which has nothing at all to do with this subject. - (addison) - (20)
                             While it all 'has to do with this subject' - our filters - (Ashton) - (11)
                                 No, Ash, it doesn't. - (addison)
                                 Let us parse, despite the 90\ufffd polaroid filter pair: - (Ashton) - (9)
                                     180 Degrees apart. - (addison) - (3)
                                         Uhh... - (CRConrad) - (2)
                                             yup, dont see many fist fights - (boxley)
                                             Re: Uhh... - (addison)
                                     Well Addison, you make your points here well enough that, - (Ashton) - (4)
                                         Thank you. Let me try to make at least one more. - (addison) - (3)
                                             En passant - (Ashton) - (2)
                                                 I believe your anger is misplaced. - (addison) - (1)
                                                     camels nose under the tent :) - (boxley)
                             Could be, but I doubt it. - (CRConrad) - (7)
                                 Its not fear. - (addison) - (6)
                                     A couple of points... - (CRConrad) - (5)
                                         The irony continues. :) - (addison) - (4)
                                             Oh, bullshit. - (CRConrad) - (3)
                                                 No. - (addison) - (2)
                                                     OK.. is it alright to change the scale, now? - (Ashton) - (1)
                                                         Precis: - (pwhysall)

A foaming baking soda volcano project set casually in front of a loudspeaker.
215 ms