Democrat demands prison for those who don’t cooperate with proposed gun buyback
And people wonder why I call them fascists: A California Democratic Congressman has proposed a new federal gun buyback program that would also prosecute anyone who decides they don’t want to participate.
[Congressman Eric Swalwell]suggests the government should institute a buy-back program, which would take existing assault weapons out of possession. The congressman also advocates the prosecution of any individual who decides to keep their firearm. “Reinstating the federal assault weapons ban that was in effect from 1994 to 2004 would prohibit manufacture and sales, but it would not affect weapons already possessed,” Swalwell writes. “This would leave millions of assault weapons in our communities for decades to come.”
“Instead,” he continues, “we should ban possession of military-style semiautomatic assault weapons, we should buy back such weapons from all who choose to abide by the law, and we should criminally prosecute any who choose to defy it by keeping their weapons.” Swalwell notes that law enforcement officials and shooting clubs would be exempt.
Throughout his op-ed, Swalwell never defines what he considers a “military-style semiautomatic assault weapon.” Instead, he classifies an assault weapon as a firearm that is capable of “spraying a crowd” with “lethal fire in seconds.”
I am also not surprised this guy is from fascist California, where increasingly it is becoming downright dangerous to dissent from the leftist Democratic Party agenda.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
And people wonder why I call them fascists: A California Democratic Congressman has proposed a new federal gun buyback program that would also prosecute anyone who decides they don’t want to participate.
[Congressman Eric Swalwell]suggests the government should institute a buy-back program, which would take existing assault weapons out of possession. The congressman also advocates the prosecution of any individual who decides to keep their firearm. “Reinstating the federal assault weapons ban that was in effect from 1994 to 2004 would prohibit manufacture and sales, but it would not affect weapons already possessed,” Swalwell writes. “This would leave millions of assault weapons in our communities for decades to come.”
“Instead,” he continues, “we should ban possession of military-style semiautomatic assault weapons, we should buy back such weapons from all who choose to abide by the law, and we should criminally prosecute any who choose to defy it by keeping their weapons.” Swalwell notes that law enforcement officials and shooting clubs would be exempt.
Throughout his op-ed, Swalwell never defines what he considers a “military-style semiautomatic assault weapon.” Instead, he classifies an assault weapon as a firearm that is capable of “spraying a crowd” with “lethal fire in seconds.”
I am also not surprised this guy is from fascist California, where increasingly it is becoming downright dangerous to dissent from the leftist Democratic Party agenda.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Is it fascist to make ownership of some items illegal?
If you make ownership of something illegal is it better if the government “buys back” those items or if they just confiscate them?
If the government makes ownership of some items illegal and people are subsequently caught in possession of those items is it proper for them to face prosecution for their ownership of those items?
A man shows another man his new beautiful Benchmade Mini Griptilian Tanto pocket knife.
https://www.amazon.com/Benchmade-Griptilian-Plain-Finish-Handle/dp/B0012RD1ZQ/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1525377221&sr=8-11&keywords=benchmade
His friend recoils at the sight of the knife and says “Thats a weapon!”.
The first man says to his friend “No, its not a weapon, I use this 10 times a day every day in my work”.
The other man adamantly and vociferously still insists that the knife his friend showed him is a weapon.
So to prove his point the first man takes a sharp wooden pencil out of his shirt pocket and drives it through the second mans heart and kills him.
And the first man says to his now dying friend “I told you my new knife was not a weapon I use it at my work every day, get it?”.
(This discussion actually happened to me, sans the pencil through the heart and the friend dying. Get it?)
You want government to buy weapons back Andrew? Let let the owner set the price in the negotiation, we can start at $1,000,000.00 ea.
—————————————–
A man shows another man his new beautiful Benchmade Mini Griptilian Tanto pocket knife.
https://www.amazon.com/Benchmade-Griptilian-Plain-Finish-Handle/dp/B0012RD1ZQ/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1525377221&sr=8-11&keywords=benchmade
His friend recoils at the sight of the knife and says “Thats a weapon!”.
The first man says to his friend “No, its not a weapon, I use this 10 times a day every day in my work”.
The other man adamantly and vociferously still insists that the knife his friend showed him is a weapon.
So to prove his point the first man takes a sharp wooden pencil out of his shirt pocket and drives it through the second mans heart and kills him.
And the first man says to his now dying friend “I told you my new knife was not a weapon I use it at my work every day, get it?”.
(This discussion actually happened to me, sans the pencil through the heart and the friend dying. Get it?)
“You want government to buy weapons back Andrew? Let let the owner set the price in the negotiation, we can start at $1,000,000.00 ea.”
In NZ (and I assume this happens in other countries) if an outbreak of an exotic disease occurs in crops or farm animals, to eradicate it the government has the power to destroy the livestock or plants affected and then pays the owners market price compensation, do you think the owners should be able to demand whatever compensation they want and block the destruction of the affected animals/crops until they get it?
Yes, I do.
At what price do you surrender your rights?
$1,000,000.00 may be too low a price now that I am considering it further.
Yes, I do. At what price do you surrender your rights Andrew?
$1,000,000.00 may be too low a price now that I am considering it further.
Market price? What is the market price for your freedom? That is if you consider your right to ultimately confront your government when they have taken most all of your rights, as is governments tendency.
At what price Andrew W?
First you have to define what firearm you are banning. The term assault rifle was made up by the liberal media. Confiscating legally owned property with out due process is unconstitutional. The going rate for AR 15 style rifles (AR stands for Armalite Rifle for the uninformed) is any where from $750 to $3000 or more can the government afford to pay even fair market value. There are several million out there. If California and sanctuary cities can disregard Federal law why can’t the individual gun owner.
The first thing the historical fascists did before seizing total power was disarm the people. The total disregard for Constitutional rights and blaming a rifle for the acts of a fiend make those people fascists in my book.
“Yes, I do. At what price do you surrender your rights Andrew?”
In that case I’ll dismiss you as a member of the flaky fringe, diseases like Foot and Mouth have to be dealt with quickly to avoid their spread. Obviously this isn’t an attempt to draw an analogy with the situation regarding firearms where negotiations with gun owners over the value of their firearms is reasonable.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot-and-mouth_disease#United_States_1870–1929
Of course they are fascists, and they are something else; Clinical monmaniacs. Apparently the former liberals, who are now full blown fascists, have an unnatural fetish for firearms, revolving around their own inadequacies…I have named this pathology; “Autophalliphobia” this should keep the Freudians busy for years…I have never known an anti constitutional gun nazi that did not have several indications of underlying psychosis. Including, but limited to, anti-gun monomania, a psycho-organic need to “Set the other fellow straight”, and other things, like the total lack of any inner life, fetishistic focus on externals, no conscience of any kind, other than blind adherence to the fetish du jour…I find it quite revealing that none of this “penis envy” was on display during the reign of Barry Soetero, they would not do anything to disrespect the savior of their church…
I am a part of the “flaky fringe” but you equate an individual Americans rights to own a firearm with Foot And Mouth disease.
Your attempt to conflate the one into a conversation about the other is what it is, a non sequitur and distractionary and not relevant to anything other than your personal need to some how justify how you think.
And I am flaky?
Cotour, than you for recognizing that you’re a part of the “flaky fringe”, it’s always good to be able to agree on such matters, as I said: “Obviously this [discussing the need to address disease outbreaks like foot and mouth] isn’t an attempt to draw an analogy with the situation regarding firearms where negotiations with gun owners over the value of their firearms is reasonable.”
So now you just have to work on your reading comprehension.
This is the road you are on Andrew W:
http://dailycaller.com/2018/05/03/british-man-arrested-for-wielding-potato-peeler/
How do you feel about the dangers of a potato peeler?
Just like the pencil in my story, anything can be a weapon, get it?
This is the road of government permission you are on Andrew W:
http://dailycaller.com/2018/05/03/british-man-arrested-for-wielding-potato-peeler/
How do you feel about the dangers of a potato peeler?
Just like the pencil in my story, anything can be a weapon, get it?
This is the road you are on Andrew W:
http://dailycaller.com/2018/05/03/british-man-arrested-for-wielding-potato-peeler/
How do you feel about the dangers of potato peelers Andrew W?
Just like the pencil in my story, anything can be a weapon, get it?
You’re heading off on your own little tangent Cotour. Obviously I’m not suggesting that pencils and potato peelers can’t be weapons, I haven’t even suggested that some firearms should be banned, I’ve asked 3 simple questions at the top of this thread and no one has disputed them or their pertinence to the topic.
Andrew_W:
(hey) I understand your underlying point.
This is not however, the subject on which you want bring that nuanced point up. (I think you would be making the error of accepting the underlying premise as being legal in the first place. Compensating people for seized items would be a necessary component, but not a sufficient component to make this
As Tom notes, (well, in my words) this “law” is unconstitutional on it’s face, and isn’t even in ‘good form,’ for the precise reason, it doesn’t define what it is outlawing.
The more insidious and corrosive nature of these type of proposed laws, is precisely what Tom points out– the Rule of Law is twisted into absurdity.
When everything is illegal, nothing is illegal, and the arbitrary & capriciousness inherent in that, runs rampant.
What do you do now Andrew W?
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article210363554.html
When the government threatens armed action if the people do not vote correctly? After the government has bought all of the weapons from the people they get to do what ever they please.
Think it can not happen in NZ? Tell that to the Maori.
What do you do now Andrew W if you lived in Venezuela?
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article210363554.html
When the government threatens armed action if the people do not vote correctly? After the government has bought all of the weapons from the people they get to do what ever they please.
Think it can not happen in NZ? Tell that to the Maori.
What would you do Andrew W if you lived in Venezuela?
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article210363554.html
When the government threatens armed action if the people do not vote correctly? After the government has bought all of the weapons from the people they get to do what ever they please.
Think it can not happen in NZ? Tell that to the Maori.
Andrew_W asked: “Is it fascist to make ownership of some items illegal?”
Yes, it can be. In fact, the Nationalist Socialist German Workers Party banned and confiscated firearms, making its population at the mercy of that tyranny. It did not end well for anyone.
The intention is to create criminals of otherwise lawful individuals. Turning innocent people into criminals is the same basic strategy that we are seeing in the tyrannical attack on Trump and anyone associated with him.
But, I am not surprised that a New Zealand right-winger (left-wing in the rest of the world) would side with the left-wing tyrants.
Andrew_W wrote: “In NZ (and I assume this happens in other countries) if an outbreak of an exotic disease occurs in crops or farm animals, to eradicate it the government has the power to destroy the livestock or plants affected and then pays the owners market price compensation, do you think the owners should be able to demand whatever compensation they want and block the destruction of the affected animals/crops until they get it?”
But in New Zealand, you have the option of replacing those crops or farm animals with disease-free ones, don’t you? In California, you no longer have the opportunity to replace these bought-back (at the government’s price) items. In the meantime, the firearms are not diseased. It is the evil person who misuses the firearm who is, but he has not been banned, and once the rest of the population has been disarmed, only the evil people will have firearms. Including the tyrannical California State government.
Tom asked: “If California and sanctuary cities can disregard Federal law why can’t the individual gun owner.”
Because it is the government that has the guns. The individual gun owner is outgunned by the Tyranny, so the tyranny can enforce any law in any way it chooses, even non-existent laws.
Andrew_W wrote: “Obviously this isn’t an attempt to draw an analogy with the situation regarding firearms where negotiations with gun owners over the value of their firearms is reasonable.”
Because you brought it up, obviously it was an attempt at an analogy. There is no other rational reason to bring it up.
Now what?
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article210363554.html
Where is my gun? Oh yeah, the government collected all of them.
“Is it fascist to make ownership of some items illegal?”
The government has no authority to make firearms illegal. If the government did so anyway, then, yes, it would be fascist.
Andrew_W you always seem to forget that what is at play are our constitutional rights. Natural rights. Paying people to turn in their guns doesn’t make taking away our constitutional rights OK.
It is nothing at all like having sick animals or some other form of property.
Taking away one of our most fundamental rights and imprisoning those who refuse to have their rights taken away will lead to a revolution.
The lawless gun banners are not even going through the proper route, which is getting a constitutional amendment.
Wodun, amendments can be repealed, in a democracy even the provisions in the Constitution are subject to change by Congress or State Legislatures. I’ve got no idea what you mean by “natural rights” though I’ve heard the appeal of “natural rights” by SJW’s and the like many times.
Looks like my comments are appearing again, so:
Edward, the Nazi’s actually relaxed gun laws for most Germans, and as the gun laws under the Weimar Republic were fairly tight there was no mass confiscation of guns as you seem to imagine.
“Because you brought it up, obviously it was an attempt at an analogy.” I was illustrating the point to Cotour that there are situations where Governments should be able to act with haste and seize property, whether or not guns should be included is a mater of opinion, obviously even today the government can seize firearms from some people, it’s where you draw the line.
Cotour, you pencil and potato peeler stories are strawmen.
mkent: “The government has no authority to make firearms illegal.”
There are provisions in the Constitution that allow Congress to make amendments, are you also going to claim there’re “natural laws” (like laws of nature?) making the Second Amendment immune to provisions in the Constitution that allow a 2/3 vote in Congress to repeal it? Whether assault rifles can be banned and taken without rewriting the Second Amendment would be an issue for the SCOTUS to decide.
Andrew –
The Declaration re-asserted the long standing realization that humans have inalienable rights which are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” England, the king, had violated these rights. The Declaration later lists the many ways that these English citizens had their “separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitled them” injured and usurped. They, the Founders, and the other English citizens of the “colonies”, had seen many violations. They did not take their abandonment of their English citizenship lightly. However, they could not and would not allow their Natural Rights to be violated. They revolted against the largest, strongest empire of the time.
This is one of the founding principals of this nation – that Natures Rights are from nature not government and are to be protected; not granted; by the government and the laws of the government. Protection of Natural Rights it is the duty and the reason for governments to exist. These Natural Rights exist before any government existed and do not depend on the government for existence.
Although many think of the United States as a democracy we are not a democracy. The United States is a republic which uses democratic processes. The Founders recognized that a democracy is among other things a crowd chanting, screaming, demanding … the crucifixion of a Savior. They would have none of this. The United States is founded on the principals stated above and that the government shall be constrained so as to not injure and usurp the citizens natural rights – not a democracy where each vote changes the laws, and the very fabric of the goverment.
Do we have democratic elections? yes we do. Is this a democracy -no. We use democratic processes to elect officials within the limited government. There are issues with appointed officials having too much power – subject for another time.
But what of the ability through the processes within the Constitution to amend the laws, possibly even usurp the Natural Laws, possibly the very Constitution itself ? Yes, the amendment process (and possible convention process in Article 5) has set and removed the right to own or consume alcohol and then reinstated it, the right to own slaves and repealed that…etc. These changes require extraordinary steps (2/3 majority of Congress and 3/4 states ..etc.) But bad things CAN happen when the tools of limited government are twisted. We COULD see our Natural Laws infringed…
However,
When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation….
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness….
it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
I go back to the Declaration, for here we see stated that we are duty bound to throw off such government that may take or attempt to take away our Natural Rights. The right to bear arms is specifically listed within the Constitution (just below a bunch of other Natural Rights (religion, press, assembly, petition, and speech)). It sits as a (final) check against the overly powerful central government. The Second Amendment was put in place at the insistence of many states who had seen the British attempt to confiscate arms (Concord was an example of this attempted confiscation). In fact, the Constitution of my state Pennsylvania states in our first article, section 21: The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State shall not be questioned.
So our Natural Rights come from Nature and Natures God and exist before government.
Government exists to protect those Natural Laws.
We live in a republic, a constitutional republic that uses democratic processes to elect it’s officials – not a democracy.
The Constitution does have the ability through a series of extraordinary steps outlined in Article 5 to change the Constitution and possibly threaten our Natural Rights.
And if this occurs, we have the Natural Right and duty to throw off such government by force if required.
I think I’ll head to the range today to exercise my right to bear arms and work on my “long shot”
Andrew W:
You for some reason are just unable to understand the fundamentals of American rights and where they come from. And this is why the concept of “Globalization” or a New World Order / One World Government is a non starter for Americans and America.
“Natural” rights are something that is recognized by the Founders of our country as being PRE government, government is a function of the existence of the people. You can only see the people as being a function of a hopefully benevolent government.
Please comment on what Mr. Maduro is doing in Venezuela, he states that if the people do not vote correctly there will be blood! Now what? What does Andrew W do when this happens? Why did that put the breaks on your commenting on it? Crickets. (Thats a rhetorical question)
Your government model only reflects one potential, benevolence, and reality in governance is made of up many more potentials. Your model is solely based in a benevolent government structure model, when the government dictates that only they can have potato peelers and pencils and the people are not allowed them because only the government can have them because they can be used to intimidate and control. At that point you are only an owned piece of property. In your model the people are a function of government.
You are a slave in waiting.
Andrew W:
You for some reason are just unable to understand the fundamentals of American rights and where they come from. And this is why the concept of “Globalization” or a New World Order / One World Government is a non starter for Americans and America.
“Natural” rights are something that is recognized by the Founders of our country as being PRE government, government is a function of the existence of the people. You can only see the people as being a function of a hopefully benevolent government.
Please comment on what Mr. Maduro is doing in Venezuela, he states that if the people do not vote correctly there will be blood! Now what? What does Andrew W do when this happens? Why did that put the breaks on your commenting on it? Crickets. (Thats a rhetorical question)
Your government model only reflects one potential, benevolence, and reality in governance is made of up many more potentials. Your model is solely based in a benevolent government structure model, when the government dictates that only they can have potato peelers and pencils and the people are not allowed them because only the government can have them because they can be used to intimidate and control. At that point you are only an owned piece of property. In your model the people are a function of government.
You are a slave in waiting
Andrew W:
You for some reason are just unable to understand the fundamentals of American rights and where they come from. And this is why the concept of “Globalization” or a New World Order / One World Government is a non starter for Americans and America.
“Natural” rights are something that is recognized by the Founders of our country as being PRE government, government is a function of the existence of the people. You can only see the people as being a function of a hopefully benevolent government.
Please comment on what Mr. Maduro is doing in Venezuela, he states that if the people do not vote correctly there will be blood! Now what? What does Andrew W do when this happens? Why did that put the breaks on your commenting on it? Crickets. (Thats a rhetorical question)
Believe me you would better understand my point if you were a Venezualan.
Your government model only reflects one potential, benevolence, and reality in governance is made of up many more potentials. Your model is solely based in a benevolent government structure model, when the government dictates that only they can have potato peelers and pencils and the people are not allowed them because only the government can have them because they can be used to intimidate and control. At that point you are only an owned piece of property. In your model the people are a function of government.
You are a slave in waiting.
And like has been pointed out by many times here:
https://pjmedia.com/trending/la-antifa-group-hangs-trump-in-effigy-calls-for-revolutionary-violence-against-the-capitalist-state/
Democracy? What happens when Democracy degrades into some unhappy and violent Socialists come Communists. The Leftists are thee most violent people when they do not get their way.
And besides, do as you wish the bad guys (the definition of which is people who not obey the law) will still have guns.
But I guess that is ok because we can always pass more laws.
“Is it fascist to make ownership of some items illegal?” Usually, yes. firearms, certainly. see the Second Amendment.
And as far as repealing it, this guy is advocating doing it without a repeal.
Molon Labe
Ok Andrew, Fascist might be the wrong word. Advocating actions contrary to the Bill of Rights would be more appropriately labeled treason.
Readying Petersen for being banned in American media? (You know he does interview with Alex Jones)
http://checkyourfact.com/2018/05/04/fact-check-jordan-peterson-alt-right/
Petersen and his bullet proof intellect and experience in psychology and how the human animal thinks and why they act the way that they act and his many reasonable related arguments threatens the Leftist media’s un American and even anti American narrative and so something will have to be done about it.
Readying Dr. Petersen for being banned in American media? (You know he does interview with Alex Jones)
http://checkyourfact.com/2018/05/04/fact-check-jordan-peterson-alt-right/
Petersen and his bullet proof intellect and experience in psychology and how the human animal thinks and why they act the way that they act and his many reasonable related arguments threatens the Leftist media’s un American and even anti American narrative and so something will have to be done about it.
Readying Petersen for being banned in American media? (You know he does interview with Alex Jones)
http://checkyourfact.com/2018/05/04/fact-check-jordan-peterson-alt-right/
Petersen and his bullet proof intellect and experience in psychology and how the human animal thinks and why they act the way that they act and his many reasonable related arguments threatens the Leftist media’s un American and even anti American narrative and so something will have to be done about it.
Andrew.
Natural law is a subject that used to be taught up to about 100 years ago everyplace around the world.
Its a basis for huge parts of Christian philosophy. Read some of the works of St.Thomas Aquinas.
In American law it refers to the idea than all animals(and people) are born with inherent rights. Rights that can not be given but only be taken away by others including the government.
Roughly..
Life, Liberty, The pursuit of happiness.
In order to achieve these ends we need to have.
The right of association. In private, political and religious matters.
The right of self defense to the BEST of our ability. Every animal must be able to protect itself.
Security in our homes. All animals must be allowed to be safe in their homes.
The right to privacy, all animals must be allowed to hide and be left alone.
The American Bill Of Rights innumerates these inherent creator given rights.
Each one is protected by the succeeding one. To remove by either legal redefinition or a voted amendment would weaken them all.
We are not allowed to actually remove any or change the wording. no editing. We can only add one.
The first ten are actually the only ones needed. All the subsequent ones were just redefinition’s of parts of the first ten. Except for prohibition.
Beware of all of those who have good intentions… Especially when they are on first name basis with the crime underworld, and have connections with Russia and the Ukraine. The second highest ranking democrat in California in 2014.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2014/03/26/state-sen-leland-yee-indicted-on-arms-trafficking-corruption-charges-3/
Democrats want to take away guns so that no one can defend themselves. Only they will have the guns…
This bears repeating so that we never forget who they truly are and what their motivations, regardless of the consequences, are. S.O.M
From Wikipedia,
Awards:
Yee was named the California Legislator of the Year by San Francisco Women’s Political Committee, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME Local 3299), California Society of Certified Public Accountants, Associated Students of the University of California (Davis) [51] and the California Faculty Association[108] among others.[109]
Yee has also been awarded the following awards:
Gun Violence Prevention Honor Roll by the Brady Campaign.[110]
Freedom of Information Award by the California Newspaper Publishers Association[111]
Modern Day Abolitionist Award by the San Francisco Collaborative Against Human Trafficking[112]
Building a State of Equality by Equality California[113]
Distinguished Service to Journalism Education Award by the Journalism Association of Community Colleges[114]
Service Award by Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse of San Mateo County[115]
Scholastic Journalism Award by the Journalism Education Association[51]
Beacon Award by the First Amendment Coalition[116]
Leadership Award from the California Animal Association[51]
Special Friend of Children Award by the National Association of School Psychologists[117]
Public Official Award by the Society of Professional Journalists[118]
Who would ever think that a great guylike this, a outstanding child psychologist, “Brady bill” award-winning legislator could possibly be selling fully automatic weapons, grenades, shoulder fired missiles to gang members on the street.
( I call this “fast and furious 2” He did not do this alone, but he took the fall for the party and the president… A true believer)
Andrew_W you do not understand our system of government. I suggest starting with what our founders viewed natural rights and to stay away from the communists revolutionaries when trying to understand the American system.
I just read what the Constitution and laws actually say, they say that provisions in the Constitution are able to be changed by a 2/3 vote in Congress or State Legislatures.
You can claim that Americans that advocate for repeal of the Second Amendment are un-American or whatever but that’s just your perspective, there’s nothing natural about your “natural rights”, they’re man-made rights.
I just read what the Constitution and laws actually say, they say that provisions in the Constitution are able to be changed by a 2/3 vote in Congress or State Legislatures.
You can claim that Americans that advocate for repeal of the Second Amendment are un-American or whatever but that’s just your perspective, there’s nothing natural about your “natural rights”, they’re man-made rights.
Cotour seems to be under the impression that I’m advocating for various policies that I’m not advocating for, with him it’s just strawman after strawman.
Andrew_W,
You wrote: “Wodun, amendments can be repealed”
But not as easily as laws.
“I’ve got no idea what you mean by ‘natural rights’”
Which explains why wodun and everyone else here understand you to be a left-wing (New Zealand right-wing) liberal, not the conservative that you claim to be.
“the Nazi’s actually relaxed gun laws for most Germans”
No, they were relaxed largely for Party members and the military, not “most Germans.” They were relaxed for the friends of the Party and more restrictive for anyone that they considered “unreliable.” And they did confiscate guns. They did not want revolts in the occupied countries, just as US politicians are trying to prevent us from revolting over their increasing tyranny.
“ I was illustrating the point to Cotour”
Sorry. Apparently I took that out of context, but I will continue to comment on your discussions with other people, such as wodun and mkent.
I stopped reading Cotour last summer when it became clear that his ideas are a bit off and that it is impossible for even two of us together to help correct him in his misguided beliefs; he too easily sucks me into futile and time consuming arguments (I have a lot more time on my hands, now). I do, however, continue to read what other people say about his comments, so I do not understand the pencil and potato peeler reference, thus I do not comment on it; maybe they are straw men, maybe they are solid. Apparently, as with yours, there are more replies to his comments than I had previously believed.
You wrote to mkent: “There are provisions in the Constitution that allow Congress to make amendments”
You, Andrew_W, are conflating lawmaking with the amendment process. California is making a law, not amending the US Constitution. It is much easier to pass a law than to amend the Constitution, but that does not make the law constitutional or non-tyrannical. The Constitution is there explicitly to “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity” and to prevent tyranny.
You need to stop thinking of lawmaking as the same as amending the Constitution, because the latter is not what is proposed by the State of California and is not an appropriate argument for you to make in favor of this proposed California law. To say that any argument against tyranny is obsolete because the Constitution can be amended is to make any argument against tyranny moot. It reads as a “Shut Up” argument. http://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/essays-and-commentaries/what-ever-you-do-dont-shut-up/
mkent is correct. The Second Amendment explicitly protects our natural right (read: “God given right”) to self protection, hunting, target practice or just plain entertainment, and other activities.
“there’s nothing natural about your ‘natural rights’, they’re man-made rights.”
Which just goes to show how wrong you are about everything that you write. The right for birds to sing and lions to roar is not man-made. The right for animals — including humans — to self defense is not man-made. Nature (or God) created these rights. How do you not understand this?
“Whether assault rifles can be banned and taken without rewriting the Second Amendment would be an issue for the SCOTUS to decide.”
Actually, it was a tyrannical coup by the Supreme Court that created the myth that the SCOTUS had this authority. It is not in the Constitution. Even the coup by the SCOTUS declared that only individual laws could be declared unconstitutional, not entire concepts, so this part of the SCOTUS tyranny is a more recent coup. SCOTUS is only one of three branches that protect the US Constitution from abuse by the other two branches. If the SCOTUS were the last word, then there would be no protection from abuse by them.
By the way, the term “assault rifle” is not well defined. It looks like the California legislature is of the opinion that We the People should only have flintlocks (or maybe matchlocks) to protect ourselves from the well-armed evil bad guys, and that those flintlocks should be stored empty, meaning that when seconds count and the police are only minutes away, the clandestine loading of the flintlock (so the bad guy does not shoot us before we can load it) is also minutes away.
Andrew_W,
It seems that it is difficult for you to argue US Constitutional law from where you are. You get it wrong a lot of the time, apparently your left-wing (or “right-wing,” in New Zealand) friends are misinforming you.
Michael wrote: “And besides, do as you wish the bad guys (the definition of which is people who not obey the law) will still have guns. But I guess that is ok because we can always pass more laws.”
Which is exactly what California is doing! The previous laws failed to disarm the evil bad guys, so now they want to take our guns from the rest of us so that they, the legislature, can look like they finally did something useful. They seem to think that we will believe that the evil lawbreaker are not willing to break this law, too. The California legislature is a bunch of idiotic putzes who cannot learn from history or even from their past mistakes. This lack of learning ability is the very definition of low IQ.
Andrew_W:
I don’t want to get into details right now, but you should appreciate that ‘guns’ are quintessentially American, and fully embedded into our concepts of Natural Rights, which includes self-defense and short-circuiting tyrants.
Cotour–
Jordan Peterson: Am I Far Right?
(excerpt from the August 2017 Patreon Q & A)
https://youtu.be/D5fNu1d0iJw
10:22
Jordan Peterson: Am I Far Right?
(excerpt from the 2017 November patreon Q & A)
https://youtu.be/D5fNu1d0iJw
10:22
vonmazur,
I think I have a great example of what you are describing. Someone who passed laws making it harder to own guns in California, but had alternative motives. S.O.M. The ends justify the means.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leland_Yee
And
https://www.npr.org/2014/03/29/296022715/the-story-of-calif-senators-arrest-reads-like-pulp-fiction
Second highest Democrat in California politics, caught selling fully automatic weapons, shoulder fire missiles and grenades to undercover agents.
Weapons of war, sold by Russia to Muslims in the Philippines, to be shipped to America and sold on the streets.
This child psychologist had won an award from the Brady foundation for his efforts to remove the second amendment. He bragged he could get anything that his customers wanted, even murder for hire…
Many think he did not act alone, that he took this hit for the team so other Democrats would not burn for Obamas “fast and furious 2.0”
Andrew_W,
Natural rights, human rights, animal rights are not man made. Only man has capability of qualifying and expressing what is natural.
The deer and the cougar have the right to air, water, Food. The deer will defend itself, as is it’s right, by using it’s antlers to kill the cougar.
The 13 British colonies were subject (slaves) to the king. Natural human rights were being denied, which led to the declaration of independence, the cornerstone of our constitutional foundation. All men are created equal, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, all examples of natural rights.
The 13 colonies became 13 independent republics with the citizens becoming kings of their own castles, subject to no one. Royalty in their own right.
These citizens were afraid that the new constitution would be used to enslave them again, so the bill of rights was placed in writing to guarantee in contract that this new government would not violate the rights of the citizens. We the people created this new form of government “of the people, by the people” to hold as a common contract of law to bind what would become 50 independent republics. (not democracy, in fact the word “democracy” does not even occur in the constitution!)
You say 2/3 vote in Congress can remove the second amendment… Any such vote is treason and is a breach of contract. The right to defend oneself exist regardless of the votes of those who wish to enslave you.
Every citizen of the USA are kings and monarchs, we will never be defenseless and bow down before our public servants who have taken an oath to the Constitution and the rule of law. We have been keeping track of those who break their oath…
It does not say that they can be changed.
But it does say that they may be amended. they may be added to but not edited. We are to never forget what was written before.
The Constitution was written and agreed upon as a compromise.if you actually read the constitution and the Amendments you will notice that no amendment rewrites or contradicts those proceeding it. Except for the 21st repealing the 18th.
And you need to educate yourself on Natural Rights. They do exist.
They are one of the bases for Christian philosophy. Read some St Thomas Aquinas.
They are one of the bases for the US Constitution.
They used to be taught in schools around the world 100 years ago.
To start think of natural Rights as natures rules. The rules ALL animals are born with and live under out in nature.
The right to life. To live. This also means they have the ability to defend themselves to the best of their inborn abilities.
The right to liberty. The freedom to go about doing those things animals do unhindered like eating.
The right to happiness. The freedom to go about doing those things that give you satisfaction like reproducing.
Only other animals can infringe on or take those rights away.
No animal walks up and tells or grants some other animal that they are now allowed to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Man is just a very smart animal.
The article in question isn’t about a constitutional amendment. It is about sending in the police to jail people Democrats don’t like for exercising rights that are core to being an American.
Americans accept some regulatory restrictions on our rights but storming houses and mass arrests for exercising rights that are protected by our constitution isn’t something that will be tolerated.
You don’t understand American philosophy about where our rights come from.
What some of you are calling “natural rights” I’d call “instinct” (“The right for birds to sing and lions to roar”), in the real world our legal rights don’t always square with out natural instincts, and owning weapons is not instinctive. So as far as I can tell “natural rights” such as owning firearms are actually legal rights calling such ownership “natural” doesn’t make it so by any scientific definition, of course along with may other things defending yourself is instinctive, owning a firearm is not.
So the argument that God created firearms and so it’s Gods will that everyone who wants a firearm has a “natural” entitlement to own one is nonsense (as can be seen by the absence of the legal right of violent criminals in the US to own firearms.
I appreciate that the proposed law is not a change to the second amendment and have no position on whether or not the proposed law is constitutional, because the Second Amendment is open to interpretation – Is barring criminals owning guns contrary to the Second? Is barring good citizens owning fully armed and functional M1 Abrams constitutional?
I see “Locke believed in a natural right to life, liberty, and property.” That’s that supposed to mean? That homeless people with no possessions have had their rights infringed? That all inmates have had their rights infringed? That those executed have had their rights infringed?
Locke’s “Natural rights” are obviously rights that the state can and does remove as it sees fit, the trick is to make sure the state is a servant of “the people”, which is achieved through rule of law, representative electoral systems and a politically aware and active population.
I see “John Locke believed in a natural right to life, liberty, and property.” That’s that supposed to mean? That homeless people with no possessions have had their rights infringed? That all inmates have had their rights infringed? That those executed have had their rights infringed?
Locke’s “Natural rights” are obviously rights that the state can and does remove as it sees fit, the trick is to make sure the state is a servant of “the people”, which is achieved through rule of law, representative electoral systems and a politically aware and active population.
My summary from above:
So our Natural Rights come from Nature and Natures God and exist before government.
Government exists to protect those Natural Laws.
We live in a republic, a constitutional republic that uses democratic processes to elect it’s officials – not a democracy.
The Constitution does have the ability through a series of extraordinary steps outlined in Article 5 to change the Constitution and possibly threaten our Natural Rights.
And if this occurs, we have the Natural Right and duty to throw off such government by force if required.
I believe Andrew is correct that the Constitution CAN allow for ANY change that includes the curtailment of Natural Rights.
This is clear in Article 5. We have examples as I noted above -alcohol prohibition, slavery. The processes in Article 5 are extraordinary (2/3 Congress and 3/4 states – or convention and other votes) and imply a further check the CITIZENS who elect these officials. We must elect those who would enact these curtailments in a wide range of offices. But it IS possible.
It takes time, it does not happen quickly as in a democracy.
As a note, much more dangerous than this is the treaty clause in Article 2 requiring only the President and 2/3 Senate.
We are able to “commit suicide” by curtailing our own rights through extraordinary steps. This why we must be “forever vigilant” in both the actions of our representatives AND in the education of our children. If we do not and our Natural Laws are curtailed by government we would have to use our last resort Natural Law of fighting to restore these Natural Laws.
wodun–
don’t want to quibble with you, cuz’ I tend to agree more often than not with you, but any part of the Constitution can be changed.
ref:
The 18th Amendment and prohibition of alcohol. (although interestingly, it only banned the production, transport, and sale, but not the possession or consumption.)
The 21st Amendment then repealed the 18th in it’s entirety.
–Fast forward (roughly 75 years) to the Controlled Substances Act, which outlawed & regulated any number of substances, merely by administrative decree alone.
[Cannabis wasn’t outlawed in 1937, it was only subjected to Taxation, and the Feds just never allowed anyone to buy the Tax-Stamps. When the CSA was formalized in the late 60’s, that distinction had fallen aside and they just did whatever they wanted. REF: The Marihuana Tax Act of 1937, Pub. 238, 75th Congress, 50 Stat. 551 (August 2, 1937) was a United States Act that placed a tax on the sale of cannabis.]
None of our so called leaders, ever want to be on record again, as outlawing a specific substance so the legislative branch just abrogated their power and handed it to the DEA and FDA.
That being said, “guns” are quintessentially American and embedded into our history & culture, and as many have remarked, flows directly from our concepts of Natural Rights, which includes defense and tyrant-control. Personally, I’ll rise up and deal with our ‘leaders,’ if they ever tried to further restrict guns.
(tangentially— tried to post some comments yesterday, but they went into the memory hole and I just assumed there was a glitch at my end.)
wow…. just tried to post a comment, and it went into the memory hole…
Andrew W:
Until 2/3 rds of Americans and their law makers get together and modify the Constitution related to the Second Amendment or any other amendment for that matter, the document says what it says and means what it means.
Two things: 1. Just because the Constitution says something can be changed does not then mean that it should or will be changed. Your protestations imply that because YOU think it should be changed that it certainly should be changed. That is a bit too Andrew W centric, no? Typical of how a self righteous Liberal, who of course means well thinks. And 2. No straw men, there are no straw men only analogies in an attempt to get past your Southern Hemisphere upside down way of thinking and understanding how America came to be and what it means today.
In closing, be grateful that America does exist as formulated because the wolf would be at your door long ago otherwise.
Cotour–
just tried to post a comment (referencing the 18th amendment) but it disappeared after I pressed post comment.
A glitch, Zman working on it.
A suggestion: When that does happen just go to the previous screen and copy your post, because we know that you have not saved it. Then once again go to the story you want to comment on and paste your previous comment but alter it by adding or deleting some words or punctuation to change the post, this sometimes solves the problem of the “Duplicate message” page stopping you out and allows the comment to be posted.
Works 60 percent of the time.
An on going glitch, Zman working on it.
A solution: When this happens just revert to your previous page and copy your message and repost it slightly modified in its text or punctuation, this 60 percent of the time solves the problem.
(Probably some Leftist Soros funded web disruption operation attempting to frustrate the Conservative messaging on this web site? :) (Hey, wait a minute, I was kidding but who knows?)
An on going glitch, Zman working on it.
A solution: When this happens just revert to your previous page and copy your message and repost it slightly modified in its text or punctuation, this 60 percent of the time solves the problem.
(Probably some Leftist Soros funded web disruption operation attempting to frustrate the Conservative messaging on this web site? :) (Hey, wait a minute, I was kidding but who knows?)
Not being able to post is happening right now so I have added this tail to the text.
Been going on for a while, maybe a Soros backed plan to disrupt all Conservative minded communications?
C–
eventually….”they” get around to everyone!
Good news… the chocolate ration is going up…
https://youtu.be/oe9I0QhV08w?t=130
The problems with this Cali law proposal are many.
First.
They can outlaw a firearm. This will be fought in court for a year before it actually happens.
Second.
They will have to identify EVERYONE with a now illegal firearm. Damn near impossible without inspecting every single home in the shortest amount of time possible. You would also have to stop people from moving firearms during this inspection.
Third.
They will have to give fair market value for every single firearm. A very volatile market that can double or triple in price inside a week of a law passing. i cleaned up during the last assault weapon ban and subsequent ammo shortage. Essentially the “assault” rifles I have now were free and my ammo reloader paid for itself inside 6 months.
In order to do any of this they will have to break several of the constitutional rights. The first, The second, The forth…….
Up until 1986 we were allowed to manufacture and sell fully automatic firearms. We just needed federal permits. At that point a cheap MAC 10 would sell for 500 bucks. A week later they were selling for 5 grand.
We can still sell and transfer fully automatic weapons we just can no longer manufacture them for civilians.
There are only two murders with full auto legal firearms since 1934. One of them by a cop.
And that is with almost 500,000 registered legal civilian full auto weapons in the US.
No law passed by a state can go against the constitution. no matter how many people vote for it.
Democracy is just tyranny by the majority.
Yessss, it will be good, we all look forward to it.
Andrew_W,
You wrote: “What some of you are calling ‘natural rights’ I’d call ‘instinct’”
Once again, you are letting semantics get into the way, then you use it to create your own straw man argument.
But this raises the question of why you would consider some instincts to be man-made rights. http://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/democrat-demands-prison-for-those-who-dont-cooperate-with-proposed-gun-buyback/#comment-1050588
“So as far as I can tell ‘natural rights’ such as owning firearms are actually legal rights calling such ownership ‘natural’ doesn’t make it so by any scientific definition, of course along with may other things defending yourself is instinctive, owning a firearm is not.”
The right is self defense, among other things. The tool is the firearm. You have conflated the right with the tool. When the other guy has the tool, it is best to also have the tool in order to successfully counter him. Why is this not obvious to you? How many armies that did not have firearms won against armies that did?
“So the argument that God created firearms”
Another straw man argument on your part.
“Is barring criminals owning guns contrary to the Second?”
This is not the proposed law. Another straw man argument.
“I see “Locke believed in a natural right to life, liberty, and property.” That’s that supposed to mean? That homeless people with no possessions have had their rights infringed? That all inmates have had their rights infringed? That those executed have had their rights infringed?”
The homeless still have the right to property, and many of them still own stuff that they carry around with them. Inmates retain their rights to property, and many still own homes. Those that are executed is a different argument; many agree that their right to life has been infringed, but perhaps that is part of the tyranny of our government (another argument for another thread). However, our founding documents do not exactly follow Locke, as the founding fathers believed that property was a part of a higher right: the right to pursue happiness.
“Locke’s “Natural rights” are obviously rights that the state can and does remove as it sees fit”
And this is the problem that many of us are arguing. The tyranny of the state. This is why we politically aware and active people are arguing against the proposed action of our elected representatives. They are doing what we do not want them to do. This argument is part of being a politically aware and active population. Chris pointed out that “Government exists to protect those Natural Laws.” California is proposing to violate those natural laws, not protect them, leaving we the people even more at the mercy of the evil bad guys who break the law. We have a harder and harder time protecting ourselves from the evil bad guys, and government cannot adequately do it for us. When seconds count, the police are only minutes away, even in the big city, and even when an officer is in the parking lot at a school in Parkland Florida, he was minutes away from protecting the victims.
As for the ability for any amendment to be repealed, as wayne pointed out, the only one to be repealed, the Eighteenth, removed one of our natural rights. We the People got upset that a right was violated. What is more, the result of the Eighteenth amendment was the creation of a vast network of organized crime syndicates.
Stripping us of our ability to defend ourselves is not the answer. Even London has learned that the problem is not guns, but now they misguidedly blame knives. The real problem is the evil bad guys.
Turning law abiding citizens into criminals or defenseless victims is not the answer.
1. Just because the Constitution says something can be changed does not then mean that it should or will be changed. Your protestations imply that because YOU think it should be changed that it certainly should be changed.
When did I say that it should be changed?
My first point was made in my first comment, subsequent to that I’ve made the point that “natural rights” are nothing more than popular legal rights, including the provisions in the Constitution. The history of humankind demonstrates that for our species the natural state of our societies has not been liberty and freedom for all, these things come from political structures that limit the power of the most powerful, free speech, with the rule of law and with an educated and politically aware and active population that still has respect for other points of view.
” The history of humankind demonstrates that for our species the natural state of our societies has not been liberty and freedom for all, these things come from political structures that limit the power of the most powerful, free speech, with the rule of law and with an educated and politically aware and active population that still has respect for other points of view.”
Yes, and the concepts or the “political structures” you speak of come from what document? The American Constitution via the Magna Carta. Where do the limits you speak of come from in your mind?
What do you not understand about this? Your modern freedoms actually are derived directly from the American Constitution, specifically in the modern age. (Do you speak German? No? How did that happen?)
The American Constitution and what the Founders identified is the distillate of thousands of years of civilization, its the ultimate intellectual conclusion about civilization and all of that history that you site. Its not to be rethought of, it is to be recognized.
Is it perfect? Nothing is perfect but you do not throw the baby out with the bath water because there are some among us that are unable to understand primary concepts like human nature as it relates to power and governance and the history of it all.
You are arguing for the elimination of the rights of the people to bear arms aren’t you? Unless I have gone insane that is the general flavor of your argument that I am getting.
“When did I say that it should be changed?”
If you are then you are arguing that the American Constitution should be changed.
An appropriate commentary for you to ponder Andrew W:
http://www.theamericanmirror.com/video-hollywood-actress-attends-anti-gun-protest-with-armed-guards/
Good for me but not for thee.
My position is that it is not fascist for a government to make ownership of some items illegal.
If ownership of something made illegal is it better if the government “buys back” those items rather than just confiscate them.
If the government makes ownership of some items illegal and people are subsequently caught in possession of those items it is proper for them to face prosecution for their ownership of those items.
That’s my original position, since then I’ve gone to point out that laws around gun owership are made by men and can be changed by men – but the roper legal procedures must be followed, and that there’s no such thing as a “natural right” to own firearms.
Believe it or not I can say all that and not give a damn about whether or not ownership of assault rifles are actually made illegal in the US.
Andrew W:
Consider again that your model of governance is solely and and narrowly dependent on the eternal benevolence of that government. That narrow model does not ever exist and it can never exist and so ultimately the people must be at some level be empowered to take back the freedom that we all understand the government will come for with firearms. There must at some point be parity even though that parity may at some level be dangerous. Freedom is not safe.
This concept lies not above your benevolence model of governance which you propose is the foundation but beneath it and it sits on the bed rock of existence and life itself.
Now I can write these observations but only you can come to understand them. I encourage you to think hard about what lies beneath your narrow benevolence model of governance. Any benevolence in government is fleeting at best.
I say we make land ownership illegal.
Land should belong to the people and any profit made from the use of the land should be shared among the people.
Everything will be taxed 25%.
All rents, mines, farms, orchards and gardens. Don’t get caught trading vegetables without paying taxes.
You can build a farm or factory but only with permission. And you can only sell the buildings and business, not the land they sit on or the mineral rites under them. And remember that 25% tax.
And, like in China, as soon as your not producing a profit or not farming the land and paying taxes on the land it reverts back to the state in 2 years.
Wait. Wouldn’t that be the greatest way to slow down if not stop innovation and production?
Andrew_W,
You wrote: “My first point was made in my first comment, subsequent to that I’ve made the point that “natural rights” are nothing more than popular legal rights, including the provisions in the Constitution.”
Your first comment was a series of three questions. If you were making a point, it came out more as curiosity, on your part. You did not make yourself clear.
Point not understood.
“The history of humankind demonstrates that for our species the natural state of our societies has not been liberty and freedom for all, these things come from political structures that limit the power of the most powerful, free speech, with the rule of law and with an educated and politically aware and active population that still has respect for other points of view.”
I think what you mean is that the history of government demonstrates that governments become tyrannical, power hungry usurpers over time, as our founding fathers pointed out and as the United States is now demonstrating. The history of humanity demonstrates a struggle against the tyrannical governments for liberty and freedom for all.
“My position is that it is not fascist for a government to make ownership of some items illegal.”
Your position has been about guns, as evidenced by the topic of the post and your continual reference to them. Which items do you think it is fine for governments to make illegal?
You are not as conservative as you have, in the past, claimed to be. When you believe that possession of property can be made illegal, then you are becoming left-wing (New Zealand right-wing). The misuse of property — use in a way that harms another’s rights — can be illegal in order to protect the rights of others, but to make the possession of items illegal you have to show that such possession transgresses the rights of others. California has not done this, where any firearm is concerned, and buying back that property does not make it any more moral or right than confiscation; at best it can only make the fascists and their supporters feel better about their tyranny.
“That’s my original position, since then I’ve gone to point out that laws around gun owership are made by men and can be changed by men”
Which demonstrates your ignorance of the US Constitution. You have said that you have read it, but you have completely failed to understand it. The Constitution explicitly does not grant rights, it denies the government the right to infringe upon our natural rights. Even the Ninth Amendment states that just because the Constitution mentions some certain rights, that is not all that there are, and the government may not infringe upon those other rights, either. The Second Amendment tells us that the right to keep and bear arms is a natural right that may not be infringed; it is explicit about that.
By the logic that you are using, government could create laws about book reading or ownership then use that as an excuse to change those laws, restricting the right to read or own books. How do you suppose that would turn out? Here is an idea to ponder:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9iyKI2pJbE#t=114
Just because a good law (or Constitutional Article) can be changed does not mean that it should. When it means leaving people at the mercy of the evil bad guy, changing it is bad and is contrary to good governance. Turning law abiding citizens into victims or criminals is a bad thing. We have been seeing that with the US government over the past couple of decades with what has happened to Martha Stewart, Scooter Libby, General Micheal Flynn, and many others, even non-celebrity Americans who have been targeted, following “legal procedures,” by our now-tyrannical government. (Welcome to Obama’s America, land of the formerly free.)
In fact, you are now arguing that because the Constitution explicitly protects natural rights, that makes it acceptable (non-fascist or non-tyrannical) to use that explicitness as an excuse to remove that natural right.
“and that there’s no such thing as a “natural right” to own firearms.”
So, do you think that there is a “natural right” to own anything at all? Is property only something that is enjoyed by plants and animals and men have no right to property?
If property is a right, then why do you, Andrew_W, believe that firearms are an exception?
“Believe it or not I can say all that and not give a [Robert, is that word acceptable?] about whether or not ownership of assault rifles are actually made illegal in the US.”
Say it all you want, but your statements and the tenacity of your support for this fascism tell us otherwise.
By the way, Andrew_W, I have asked you a few questions in past comments in this thread, but you have not been answering them. Is there a reason for that?
No Cotour, not benevolence, once again: it’s dependent on “political structures that limit the power of the most powerful, free speech, with the rule of law and with an educated and politically aware and active population that still has respect for other points of view.”
No firearms required.
The pen is mightier than the sword.
If a country gets to the point at which armed insurrection is the only solution to bad governance those structural elements were not well designed from the outset (or else there was an uncatered for outside element that pushed the system past its breaking point).
Andrew_W,
You wrote: “If a country gets to the point at which armed insurrection is the only solution to bad governance those structural elements were not well designed from the outset (or else there was an uncatered for outside element that pushed the system past its breaking point).”
Gee, do you really think that we humans have enough experience with free nations to be able to design a governance that is so self correcting that liberty and freedom for all is guaranteed (except from external influences)? You were the one who pointed out that liberty and freedom are rare in human history.
http://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/democrat-demands-prison-for-those-who-dont-cooperate-with-proposed-gun-buyback/#comment-1050718
(I note that you believe that free speech is a right that is given to us by government, as though you think that we could not speak before we had a government to give us that right. I believe the opposite is true: we have the natural right to speak our minds, just as the animals do, and it has been governments that have stripped away that right in order for tyrants to protect their reigns from people banding together in insurrection.)
But now you expect that we should already have well-designed governments. Even America’s Founding Fathers expected that there would have to be additional armed insurrections in order for us to stay free. Since then, some people have proposed and experimented with less-free forms of government, thinking them to be superior to freedom and liberty (Venezuela is the latest disastrous attempt). Clearly, we humans are still having problems finding a system of governance that works, much less one that is so well designed that liberty is guaranteed without the need for eternal vigilance.
The US Constitution is called an experiment in self governance for a reason. We are attempting to find a way to govern ourselves in such a way that we don’t allow the tyrants to take over the government. We are failing, at this time, and that is what this entire discussion is about. California wants to take away our natural right to keep and bear arms, and We the People do not want to give up that natural right.
“The pen is mightier than the sword.”
Yes, the pen is mighty, except when someone or the government comes to put a bullet in your head because they disagree with what you are writing with that pen. Then what?
Benevolence in government is only a facade and is fleeting.
Please comment on the more realistic real world events unfolding in Venezuela and Mr. Maduro’s statements about how the people had better vote “properly” that you overlook. This is happening today and your model does not take it into consideration, as a matter of fact your reject this reality. That is a fatal flaw.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/07/18/us-warns-venezuela-no-option-table-goes-ahead-vote-new-assembly/
Please instruct me as to what Venezualen Andrew W does in this instance. Once again, benevolence in governance is only a facade and eventually when you do not do as proscribed they will be coming for you and they will be coming with firearms to ensure your obedience.
Ultimately for freedom of the people to endure there must be a fundamental undercurrent of fear instilled in government and they must fear the people. Why? Because the people and their rights are primary and the government emanates from them and not the other way around. And that can be dangerous for all involved, that is the nature of the beast.
Andrew W, I am sorry but your required government benevolence model is narrow, idealistic, short sighted and incorrect. Tell me what Senior Andrew W does today in Venezuela.
So Edward, you think laws against the possession of drugs like cocaine and heroine are fascist. Interesting. I’d argue that government making the ownership of something illegal does not automatically make that law “fascist”. Evidently all governments are fascist in your eyes.
Cotour, since you’ve become so good at Cathy Newman impersonations it’s a waste of time replying to you, I’d just be pointing out that you are not addressing the points I’ve made, but instead building strawmen.
” [Robert, is that word acceptable?] ”
Edward, I find it amusing that you should suggest that the most famous line in the movie Gone With The Wind should be banned as unacceptable, but consider the banning of private ownership of any items by government, evidently even nuclear weapons, to be fascist.
Jordan B Peterson:
12 conservative principles in 12 minutes
https://youtu.be/_MyduTaCh18
(12:29)
Andrew W;
Then I guess we are even, you are unable to understand my clearly written and direct counter points to your propositions, and I have not the faintest idea who ” Cathy Newman” is or her relevance to this fundamental discussion about governance and rights.
Straw men? Where are these straw men you speak of?
Andrew W:
I have a friend, he reads about history and we have in the past attempted to discuss the implications and in time I realized that all he is doing is reading about stories that interested him and he never absorbs the fundamental underlying lessons of history and he fails consistently to understand the nature of the human animal.
I have been at this for quite some time and I have refined and developed a particular style and ability to communicate my point in a fairly concise manner which I can understand to be a difficult thing to confront.
With that being said, please comment on what Senior Andrew W does who lives today in Venezuela. If you are unable to address this question in a competent and reasonable manner then you must consider that your thesis of how things operate related to this particular subject is faulty and is incomplete.
Once again, straw men? There are no straw men here.
The pen is mightier than the sword.
But only when free speech is upheld by the government.
What if the government wanted to stop your free speech, how would they do it?
Close down the printing presses.
Close down the internet.
Close down the public square.
Close down the houses of religion.
Outlaw public gatherings.
Outlaw books and pamphlets.
Quarter troops or police in your home.
Inspect your home at will.
Confiscate your papers.
Whats to stop the government from doing all of these things?
In the US what corporations institutions or groups are doing many of these things even now, all because they think they have some power.
Your nation can become fascist just by the government not enforcing the rights they are empowered to protect.
All by letting private groups oppress the minority. Or even over the majority if they have power over them also.
You have no real power unless you can have the same things the military has. And in America we can and do.
The overall point is: The people and their rights are primary and the government is necessary, but government is a necessary evil.
When it is thought that the government is primary and can reason away the people rights at will and the people are a function of that government then that is the road to hell. That is incorrect and incomplete thinking. This is what the Founders of America understood and were able to formulate and codify. Brilliant in its concept and execution.
Again. Andrew W’s model is entirely and narrowly dependent on the government being perfectly benevolent, always. And that is just not a sustainable nor realistic model.
Ask any Venezauelan.
“You have no real power unless you can have the same things the military has. And in America we can and do.”
No you don’t, once upon a time, in the 1860’s in the US there were militia that did have the same things the Federal Government Regular Armed Forces had: Horses, carbines and artillery. Today there is no parity of weaponry between the various militia and civilians on the one hand and the Regular Armed Forces on the other.
The idea that it’s the possession of personal weapons that has prevented another civil war in the US, that the reason the Federal government hasn’t imposed martial law is because they’re scared of gun owners is ridiculous, what’s keeping the government under (some) control are the established political structure with regular elections and a politically engaged and aware population. Ditto for other countries that live under functioning democracies, countries that don’t have the Second Amendment.
Firearm parity at some level is essential, keeping in mind that the the American military swears an oath not to a person but the Constitution and there in lies a problem for any strong man who would foolishly think to use the one against the other.
The people are primary, the government is a necessary secondary extension of the people. Its is easy to confuse ones self of this order because government insidiously inserts itself into the peoples business as to be perceived as being ubiquitous and essential. This is where abuse of power festers and grows.
You, Andrew W, once again create a model where perfect government benevolence must reign. And that is just a foolish thought.
Don’t feel that you have to respond to my comments, Andrew W, I am at least assured that you will at least read them and hopefully come to understand.
Cotour, where have I suggested that governments are benevolent? Go look through the thread, I’ve suggested or implied no such thing.
There is no firearms parity between the US Federal Armed Forces and citizens and citizen militia, in a throw down between regular armed forces and citizen militia the result is always the same, citizen militia was never going to stop the German Blitzkrieg charging through Europe, the Mujahideen could only go toe to toe against the Soviets when they had been supplied with real military hardware.
” the the American military swears an oath not to a person but the Constitution”
Which is one of those mighty pen, aware and engaged population, and right political structure things I mention. US soldiers know their allegiance is to their countrymen as written in the Constitution, not their political leaders (Trump is one leader that demonstrates little respect for this concept given his demands for personal loyalty).
Andrew W:
No, you have never mentioned that your model is dependent on a benevolent government. Thats the exact point. Governments are not benevolent and what you propose, government having a say in what are and what are not the peoples rights, exclusively depends on an eternally benevolent government. Your model is solely dependent on this non existent circumstance. Your model works only in a controlled environment.
And the Second Amendment asserts that at some level their be firearm parity because of the eventual need for the people to once again wrestle their freedoms back from what will always be in government, tyranny. That is the primary function of the Second Amendment. As hard as that is to believe whether your war gaming it says otherwise or not.
Understanding the Second Amendment is a two part process. 1. First it must be understood that the people have the naturally born right to ensure their freedom and that like it or not that right is based in the ownership of firearms because that in the end is what ensures and guarantees it. and 2. After that fact is understood and recognized then it can be discussed how and in what circumstances the government might limit or shape how and where the people might be limited in their right.
Once again, please comment on how your model of government essentially owning the peoples rights comports with the situation in Venezuela. The government has proclaimed that if the people do not vote correctly there will be blood. Taking into consideration that we are not talking about a real Democracy but a Socialist “utopia”.
Like I have pointed out your model is disconnected from the closest bedrock of logic related to this subject and is one step removed from it and therefore it can be usurped and is faulty and incorrect.
Andrew_W,
You wrote: “So Edward, you think laws against the possession of drugs like cocaine and heroine are fascist. Interesting.”
What is interesting is that you fell into a trap that I didn’t set. It is not the possession of such drugs that harm people, but the misuse of those drugs. What should be illegal is the misuse. Instead, these drugs are not much available for good purposes. Those who blame the object for the misdeeds of the person in possession of that object are the reason that we lose out on many benefits that would otherwise be available.
You seem to be having comprehension difficulties. Please be aware that there is a difference between possession and misuse. I went out of my way to be clear in that distinction in previous posts. However, I shall revisit the point. The possession of an item, such as a gun, can have benefits that should not be removed from We the People. News agencies do not often report when the benefits are seen, because of their philosophy, “if it bleeds, it leads.” A crime prevented is not so very interesting, and if it happens too many times a day it becomes even more boring.
Perhaps it is fascist to ban possession when the problem is misuse. Wouldn’t it be fascist to ban an item that is actually more useful than harmful? (Since you won’t answer, let’s just make that question rhetorical.)
As an exercise, please guess at how many crimes are prevented annually because We the People are allowed to possess guns.
I’m patient. I’ll wait for your answer?
…
You are wrong. Even the Clinton administration came to realize that it was one and a half million. We the People have the natural right to defend ourselves, and at least 1/2% of us use it each year. Here is an article that emphasizes a study that shows that two and a half million crimes are prevented annually due to the possession of guns.
http://thinkaboutnow.com/2016/06/study-guns-stop-crime-2-5-million-times-each-year/
Did you read the part where the police mistakenly shoot an innocent person at a rate five times higher than civilians do? When we consider that problem, the option of calling the police is even less desirable than personal protection.
Let’s add to that the difference between Detroit, Michigan, or the infamous Chicago, Illinois, both with very restrictive gun laws, and Plano, Texas, with strong gun rights. Chicago has a far higher murder rate than Plano.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pELwCqz2JfE (6 minutes)
Did you notice that all the cities at the top of the list have very restrictive gun laws?
Compare gun-nut Plano with safe, serene New Zealand.
But perhaps safety and crime prevention are not your priorities, Andrew_W. Perhaps control over the population is. Just like a left-winger (New Zealand right-wing).
So who is the fascist, the one who wants control over the population — even to the point of reduced health and safety — or the one who wants freedom and liberty for the population?
And here you are, advocating that We the People should be disarmed so that only the evil bad guys have the guns.
“Evidently all governments are fascist in your eyes.”
This use of hyperbole does not help your case. It informs me that you still do not comprehend what you are talking about.
“Edward, I find it amusing that you should suggest that the most famous line in the movie Gone With The Wind should be banned as unacceptable,”
Once again, you misunderstand. Robert has made very clear that he does not like the use of similar words on his site. “Gone With The Wind” went through a great deal of negotiation in order to use that word. The end result was that the story did not end on the correct note if there was not a very strong emotion tied to it. You, on the other hand, were not attempting to convey anything close to such a strong emotion, especially since the statement was so clearly false.
“what’s keeping the government under (some) control are the established political structure with regular elections and a politically engaged and aware population.”
You missed the word “armed.” If the population were as disarmed as Venezuela, the US government would be able to turn us into the same fiasco.
It was once said that no nation is more that three meals away from revolution. That is only true when the population has the ability to revolt, rather than have only the ability to go into the jungle to hunt rabbits (without guns, by the way).
http://money.cnn.com/2017/09/14/news/economy/venezuela-maduro-rabbit-plan/
“in a throw down between regular armed forces and citizen militia the result is always the same”
In the US, that result was independence.
By the way, you still seem to be unable to find answers to my questions. Are they too difficult for you or is your position that tenuous? (Oops. Yet another question that you won’t answer.)
pzatchok, wrote: “The pen is mightier than the sword.”
Until the government realizes that knives are deadly, declares all knives illegal (as London is doing), then realizes that you can stab someone with a pen, declares all pens illegal, and leaves you with neither the pen nor the sword.
I’ve no idea why you think the current situation in Venezuela contradicts my argument. The country has never had good robust democratic political structures that ensure government is answerable to the people through their electoral power. Like numerous other countries it has lurched from one form of autocracy to the next.
You again prove my point perfectly.
“The country has never had good robust democratic political structures that ensure government is answerable to the people through their electoral power.”
“Good” and “robust” Democrat and political structures, how do you find these things? Where do they come from? Do we wait for government to bestow them upon us?
Free people in charge of themselves and not subservient to government must be armed so that they can ensure their freedom. Period.
The people are primary and the government is an extension of the people and is secondary.
Andrew_W,
You wrote: “I’ve no idea why you think the current situation in Venezuela contradicts my argument. The country has never had good robust democratic political structures that ensure government is answerable to the people through their electoral power.”
Once again you prove to have uncomprehending eyes. This example was not in relation to your hypothesis, which is unrelated to both the the topic at hand and your arguments about the advantages of property not being a natural right of We the People but of being a man-given right (not that you could self-consistently believe that any man had that right in the first place in order to bestow it upon his fellow man).
Your political structures argument is a distraction from the topic at hand, and it is a straw man that you misuse.
And by the way, Venezuela’s previous political structure was able to answer to the people well enough to keep them employed, fed, supplied with sufficient beer and toilet paper, and relatively happy. Thus, the current situation contradicts your argument. How do you manage to fail to comprehend that?
Perhaps you deviate your arguments so that you can conveniently pretend that your points keep failing to be correct. You have done that quite a bit in the past. It does not bode well for our impression of you. Just how young are you?
Edward, those phone surveys on DGU incidents have a very obvious fault in them that’s easy to see when you actually have a good critical look at the data: The number of DGU confrontations with burglars is over 100% of the number of burglaries of homes in which there are guns. Think about that, what do you think would be a realistic figure? 1% might be reasonable 10% I think would be unrealistically high, but over 100%??
Where these surveys fail is easy to see: Because the number of people giving an answer in the affirmative is only about 1% of those surveyed it only requires 1% of the population to be (i), compulsive liars (I’ve known a couple and they do make up about 1% of the population, they lie to make themselves look brave or good in some other way, if they had been amongst the respondents they would almost certainly spun a good yarn about their heroism). (ii) motivated by political reasons to answer in the affirmative, for instance someone like you might be tempted to claim to have been the household defender in a DGU incident because you know that the more of such incidents reported the stronger the case for the retention of liberal gun ownership laws. (iii) If people were involved in a DGU incident they often misremember just how long ago the incident actually occurred, it seems quite recent, but it was actually a year and a half ago and not in the last year as the survey asks (this is called telescoping).
Other survey methods suggest a figure of around 100,000 DGU incidents a year in the US.
This problem with false positives is common in this type of survey in which the number of true positives is very low.
” “Good” and “robust” Democrat and political structures, how do you find these things? Where do they come from? Do we wait for government to bestow them upon us?”
They get created when leaders talk to each other, usually they don’t get created through the use of violence. Violent revolutions usually lead to violent autocracies, I can give you dozens of examples if you want.
“And by the way, Venezuela’s previous political structure was able to answer to the people well enough to keep them employed, fed, supplied with sufficient beer and toilet paper, and relatively happy.”
I’ve already explained that Venezuela has never had a robust democratic system, if you think that keeping “most of the population employed, fed, supplied with sufficient beer and toilet paper”, is proof of a country having a robust functioning democracy there are numerous countries today and in the recent past that meet your criteria – starting with the Soviet Union and China.
My position remains that political stability is achieved through good representative governance structures and a politically aware and engaged population.
That’s my last comment here because it’s pointless repeating the same thing over and over again.
Give US your guns… Or else.
There is a knock. A door to door search is underway by the ATF.
A woman answers the door and ask; where are the sheriff or police?
Arrested, he answers; all weapons are being rounded up including the “civilian” police force. no one is allowed to carry guns unless they swear allegiance to one of the many federal agencies. Only Federal government agents and military “outside USA borders” are allowed to have guns.
Do you have all your weapons ready for us to take? Yes, she replies, all three of them are right here on the table as the general order instructed.
Thank you says the ATF, but our records show that you own five guns. Where’s the 22 rifle, and the sigsauer 45 automatic?
The 22 was purchased for her son when he was a boy, as far as we know he still has it. But the 45 was too valuable so we sold it last year before it became worthless.
Thank you ma’am but… I don’t believe you. My orders are clear, the fact that you have weapons gives me authorization to search the house for the missing weapons and any other contraband or money that can be used to buy contraband.
According to my records, you voted for a tea party candidate in a prior election. This is self evident of mental illness. It is necessary to arrest you for your own good and the good of the community until you can be evaluated by a professional, you will be living in a concentration camp. If reeducation to cure you of your conservative ways is not successful… Well, that will be too bad.
But, But… we have complied with the law!!!
All of the guns that we own are right here!
It doesn’t matter, said the ATF officer, all you Anti progressive types need to be taught a lesson. Besides, it allows truly needy people from the Middle East, escaping from the horrors of guns, to have your home where they are safe.
What about my husband at work? Can I call him?
NO, I will not allow you to warn him before officers arrive to arrest him. Having guns is a crime, until he can prove that he did not hide guns from us, he will stay in prison until he rots. His friends at the sports club have given us all the evidence we need, in exchange for a lighter sentence, to put your husband away for life!
Now, where does your son live?
How many hundreds of millions died in the last century alone because the Democratic majority voted to annihilate and genocide the minority groups just so they can steal their stuff.
The question was asked; what happens when you run out of other peoples money? Death usually. Collecting the assault guns, assault knives, assault trucks, assault pitchforks just makes it easier. After all, modified tanks like Clinton used on Waco to kill 100 people (mostly children) is effective, but looks bad on TV. (I can’t even remember what evil deed the Branch Davidians did that signed their death warrant). Yeah, we can trust our government, because they are full of good intentions… like FBI Comey said; That Hillary Clinton did not commit a crime because her intentions were pure, then you can get away with just about anything. Clear conscience. No morality.
The last time a civilian force was raised to oppose the US government we ended up with the US Civil War.
Lasted years and was fought entirely with civilian weapons.
In fact the Confederates almost won if they had ignored Gettysburg and went on to attack the undefended capital of Washington instead.
I know of only two types of weapons outlawed to civilians in the US.
Nuclear and chemical.
Everything else is allowed. Including tanks and battle ships.
In fact the War of 1812 was actually fought by civilian Privateers who acquired and armed their own ships to fight the best British Ships Of the Line. And we won. In fact one of our Privateers actually sailed up the Thames river to attack and rob a port miles inland.
The British called it a tie but in the end they NEVER again took American civilians for service on British ships. Or stopped and searched them for contraband.
It was a wonderful war.
At the time the US Constitution was written it was common for civilians to raise armies arm them train them and lead them into war. Eventually gaining a rank appropriate for the number of men he lead.
http://polishamericancenter.org/Pulaski.htm
pzatchok: “The last time a civilian force was raised to oppose the US government we ended up with the US Civil War.
Lasted years and was fought entirely with civilian weapons.”
I mentioned the 1860’s for that reason, since then there has been a huge divergence in the weapons available to militia vs regular army, and since then regular armed forces have rarely had much difficulty defeating irregular forces in open combat.
“I know of only two types of weapons outlawed to civilians in the US.”
Good point, but there’s illegal under legislation, and then there’s restricted and taxed to the point of being impossible or almost impossible to acquire, NFA weapons are in the latter category, the few fully functional but obsolete tanks in private hands in America would not constitute a serious challenge to US federal armed forces.
“And we won.” Yeah, sure. /sarc. The American attempts to invade Canada failed, the British press ended with the abdication of Napoleon and the end to the blockade of France. The end result of the war was . . . nothing changed, no territory changed hands, and the reason for the initial dispute, the impressment of Americans into the RN, ended not through American efforts but through the end of the British need for so many sailors. With the end of the blockade on France the British were then able to increase the strength of the blockade on the United States coast, destroying American maritime trade and almost bankrupting the United States government. The war ended because neither side wanted to continue fighting.
“At the time the US Constitution was written it was common for civilians to raise armies arm them train them and lead them into war. Eventually gaining a rank appropriate for the number of men he lead.”
Exactly so, in past centuries armies were usually composed of part time soldiers, there were typically low levels of professionalism. Today armed forces are far superior in training, organization and weaponry to irregular forces. People claiming that it’s the Second Amendment that guarantees people control over government are not living in this century or even the last century because of that disparity between militia and regular armed forces.
Since Andrew W will not comment on this subject it will remain a mystery as to how his proposition here is accomplished.
“My position remains that political stability is achieved through good representative governance structures and a politically aware and engaged population.”
Where do these, again, “Good” governance structures come from? How do they happen? There is a rule of power that I identify in S.O.M., it simply states: Power is never surrendered.
Once again Andrew W: Where do these good intentions in governance emanate from?
In time you may see the folly of your model, your model depends on there first being civility and “Goodness” and “Good intents” related to power, a complete and entire fantasy.
I wish you wisdom in your continuing journey.
Andrew_W,
You wrote: “The number of DGU confrontations with burglars is over 100% of the number of burglaries of homes in which there are guns.”
Thank you for supplying that link to your sources. It might have been convincing if it weren’t so fictitious. I especially like the part where you declare that there are absolutely no incidents in which a crime has been stopped by an armed civilian. Of course, your unreferenced survey methods must be just as correct, because of their fictitious nature, too. But if you say so, it must be true, right?
“I’ve already explained that Venezuela has never had a robust democratic system”
Correct, you didn’t. But it was much more robust and responsive to the people than it is now. That was my point. That is why it disproves your point.
“My position remains that political stability is achieved through good representative governance structures and a politically aware and engaged population.”
For centuries, monarchies were politically stable, and that was achieved through divine right, not representative governance nor a politically aware or engaged population.
“Violent revolutions usually lead to violent autocracies, I can give you dozens of examples if you want.”
So that is a good reason to deny the rest of us, those with a tradition of freedom and liberty, to defend our freedom and liberty? Do you think about what you write before you hit send?
“The war ended because neither side wanted to continue fighting.”
But the US got what it wanted. Looks like a victory to me. By the way, the revolutionary war ended for the exact same reason, and again the US got what it wanted.
“People claiming that it’s the Second Amendment that guarantees people control over government are not living in this century or even the last century because of that disparity between militia and regular armed forces.”
So, you think that we live in freedom and liberty at the pleasure of the government? Yet you earlier declared that there were no governments that are that responsive to We the People, because “the state can and does remove [rights] as it sees fit“.
Or perhaps you are arguing that We the People need better armaments. (I didn’t think so.)
“That’s my last comment here because it’s pointless repeating the same thing over and over again.”
That is because your “thing” is so obviously wrong. You can’t even defend it, except to repeat it over and over again, but just as with Joseph Goebbels, it does not make it any more right than it was the first time.
Not only do you not know what you are talking about, you don’t even know how to talk about it.
But because I think that there is still hope for you (you seem to actually want to be a conservative, you just don’t know how), I will continue to comment to you.
A major problem that we are having in the US is that those whom we have elected to represent us in government are not doing as we want. They are no longer representing us. There was a time when they did respond to us, but not right now. What we are calling “the deep state” is a tyranny buried inside the government, beyond the elected representatives. We are now attempting to root it out by being a politically aware and engaged population, but we are all too aware that if we are disarmed, then as with previous tyrannies and monarchies, we will be subjugated by our own government with no political or physical recourse. Now California is trying, through abusive laws, to create criminals out of law abiding citizens. That is what Max’s story was about.
Because you have trouble with the concept of natural rights and think that all rights come from man, let me put it another way. Compare and contrast the US Constitution, especially the Bill of Rights, with the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Both specify rights for We the People. However, the US Constitution is written with the knowledge that We the People have rights just by being born, just as plants and animals do. It is the government’s rights, responsibilities, and duties that the Constitution limits, retaining the power with We the People. This is the (U.S.) right-wing, conservative, freedom and liberty, power to the individual rather than the government way of thinking.
The Declaration of Independence even states where these rights come from, all men “are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Although it lists three rights, it has specified that those three are not the complete list. Even the Bill of Rights states in the Ninth Amendment that those specified in the Bill of Rights are not a complete set of our rights. This is also conservative or (U.S.) right-wing thinking.
The United Nations is organized and thinks differently, declaring that We the People have certain rights. Please read through the UN’s list:
http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/
As you read the UN declaration, did you get the feeling that the UN thought that it could take away any of those rights at a whim? You should have, because they do not consider any of them to be inalienable or natural rights. They honestly believe that they have bestowed these rights upon their people and that they are allowed to remove them at their convenience. Notice Article 29, especially item 3, in which the UN is declared superior to our rights, that they may limit our rights as they see fit. This is progressive or (U.S.) left-wing thinking.
This is the difference between We the People being free and being subjects of the government. Governments were created to be subject to We the People — to protect us and our rights and to peacefully and impartially resolve disputes. Tyrants have seen the power of government and have taken control in order to subjugate the citizenry, and that is the reverse of the purpose of government.
Government is for all the people, not the rulers. That is why the US set itself up to be a government of We the People, governed by We the People, and that governance being for We the People. That is why the founders were visionary and why so many countries, when they became independent, attempted to emulate the US Constitution. Unfortunately, those countries failed, because they and their people, like you Andrew_W, did not understand that certain rights are natural, endowed, or inalienable, and not rights granted by man. Like you, those countries (and the UN) think that they have the right to limit or remove those natural rights.
Our rights are our rights, and they were not bestowed upon us by any man or government of men. They are our birthright.
Thank you for supplying that link to your sources. It might have been convincing if it weren’t so fictitious. I especially like the part where you declare that there are absolutely no incidents in which a crime has been stopped by an armed civilian. Of course, your unreferenced survey methods must be just as correct, because of their fictitious nature, too. But if you say so, it must be true, right?
If someone makes an assertion without supplying a link the first thing I do is go look to see if I can find support for their claim, that’s what I did above with regard to pzatchok’s “I know of only two types of weapons outlawed to civilians in the US.”
If I can’t find anything I then ask politely for a link (“Link please”). Now, I’m confident that Edward is perfectly capable of using Google to verify or refute my point, it’s not hard to do and it’s what an intelligent person would do, so I expect it’s what Edward did. Then upon finding that my point is sound Edward had a dilemma, he’s incapable of admitting he’s wrong so, rather that do so he launches a snide attack on me, so while Edward is certainly reasonably intelligent, he’s not a civil person.
For others who’re more interested in facts than strategy:
http://www.gvpedia.org/white-paper-frequency-defensive-gun-use/
Venezuela has never had a robust democracy, the fact that non-democracies are still often capable of feeding their people is a concept that evidently Edward finds hard to comprehend.
So that is a good reason to deny the rest of us, those with a tradition of freedom and liberty, to defend our freedom and liberty? Do you think about what you write before you hit send?
What like McVeigh did? What I suggest you do, rather than initiate a campaign of violence, is be politically aware and vote.
But the US got what it wanted. Looks like a victory to me. By the way, the revolutionary war ended for the exact same reason, and again the US got what it wanted.
Here you give a clear sign of you incapacity, a reasonable person would ask “Did Britain also get what it wanted?”
So what did Britain want? It wanted Napoleon defeated. This was achieved, which it why the impressment of sailors ended. Britain’s only concerns with regard the the US at the time was to inhibit trade between France and other countries where it could, the impressment of sailors who claimed to be Americans was of little interest, especially as it was very difficult to verify the nationality of those impressed (no passports), and at the time British sailors were trying to get out of impressment by claiming to be American.
It should be noted that there were Hawks in the US government that wanted to seize Canada, and the US launched an invasion attempt – which failed, so in that regard the US did not get what it wanted.
So, you think that we live in freedom and liberty at the pleasure of the government?
No, people have freedom when they live in a country with a form of governance in which government is under the control of the people. On this point your cognitive dissonance on what I’ve been saying all along is extraordinary, I’ve said the same thing over and over again, you appear to be incapable of the most basic reading comprehension on this point.
you seem to actually want to be a conservative, you just don’t know how
No, as I’ve told you on several occasions I’ve no interest in being a conservative – for the same reasons people like Jordan Peterson, Milton Friedman and Fredrick Von Hayek have/had no desire to be or been seen as conservatives. Conservatives almost completely lack capacity for original thought, they think along narrow lines and when someone points out anything that contradicts their narrow set-in-stone beliefs their minds go into the cognitive dissonance that you’ve so impressively demonstrated throughout this thread, I say that there’s no such thing as “natural rights” you immediately twist that to mean that I think people should be subservient to government when actually the exact opposite is true – people need to be politically aware and active so that they do not end up being subservient to government – BECAUSE THERE ARE NO “NATURAL LAWS” THAT PROTECT THEM FROM GOVERNMENT!!
I go over this again and again but, as a narrow minded conservative you’re unable to grasp this simple point, you’re too welded to your conservative narrative that there exists these “natural rights” when they’re actually just laws written in things like constitutions and legislation.
several paragraphs of drivel in which Edward illustrates he’s stuck on the accepted conservative narrative unable to think outside the conservatives accepted boundaries.
Our rights are our rights, and they were not bestowed upon us by any man or government of men. They are our birthright.
“birthright” How’s that defined? “Birthright citizenship, as expressed in the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution” ” . . the standard birthrights for citizenship to a nation”.
So you’ve just gone and described something that’s created by laws (including constitutions) and then assigned some super duper nonexistent quality to it.
What a persons “birthrights” are are determined by the laws of the nation in which they were born, such “birthrights” in any nation vary over time, once in the US you could be born a slave and your “birthrights” were determined by US laws, for a slave those “birthrights” weren’t great.
Earlier Cotour didn’t get the “Cathy Newman” reference, here it is, a spectacular example of cognitive dissonance in her interview with Jordan Peterson, in this thread you guys have topped Newman’s example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMcjxSThD54
Jordan Peterson/Akira the Don
“Tell the Truth” (or at least don’t lie)
https://youtu.be/iA8n9JTTM38
4:38
Sorry Wayne, 30 minutes.
Andrew W:
Your inability to comprehend basic philosophies of freedom and the American Constitution makes everyone who disagrees with you or attempts to reasonably explain it to you and where you are deficit makes them / us / me some kind of Liberal media tool?
Do you really believe that all of these words are written and time is taken and we do not know what we are talking about? Most here have thought long and hard on the subject at hand, do you really think that we are all mistaken?
Cotour, if “natural rights” are natural “basic philosophies of freedom and the American Constitution” would be irrelevent. It’s clear to me that this inability to understand each other comes down to your core beliefs. You’ve been brought up to believe that “natural rights” are natural because your Constitution tells you so.
The simple reality is that things that are truly natural are taught in science, not in law. And “natural rights” have as much to do with science as “Creation Science”, it’ll be a sad day when either is taught as “natural” rather than religious or ideological.
There is one further point that I think is worth mentioning, while life and liberty aren’t “natural rights”, I think “the pursuit of happiness” could arguably be seen as such because it’s a reference to a human desire, so if we were talking about “the pursuit of liberty” and “the pursuit of (continued) life” I wouldn’t have much to object to as such things are built into our DNA, and so are “natural” and taught in science classes. Similarly, if we go back to the natural world of the lion as someone mentioned earlier, while I don’t see “zebra” as a natural right of lions, I’m happy to acknowledge that the “pursuit of zebra” is a natural thing for lions to do, even if a particular lion isn’t very good at the pursuit it’ll still have the instinct to pursue. The lion doesn’t get to eat zebra as a “natural right” though, it has to earn it.
You write: “There is one further point that I think is worth mentioning, while life and liberty aren’t “natural rights”, I think “the pursuit of happiness” could arguably be seen as such because it’s a reference to a human desire,”
So you do not believe that your life and your liberty (your freedom) are natural and a right?
But you do see “Human desire” which is an expression of an emotion as being a natural right.
Once again your thinking is incomplete and does not rest upon the bedrock of logic, it hovers above it one or two steps removed. Its not so much incomplete but some how stunted and illogical and I can not tell if it by indoctrination or choice.
Q: Are you a function of nature? (If not I an curious as to where you in fact come from)
And if you are, what is the nature of your existence? Are you born to be owned or directed?
Andrew W:
I found this for you, please watch it and think about what it proposes.
Michael Sandel: https://youtu.be/5OsL3svQAJc
Human beings are primary (Human beings exist first). Government is a function of human beings existing and and so government is secondary. Government can not exist without first human beings inventing it related to their needs to organize and prosper, which is natural to them.
Its a matter of priority and order of existence that establishes the logic of this issue. You do not breath because you choose to breath it is a function of nature and essential to your survival and your freedom to do so is essential and so your freedom is a base part of your nature to exist. Government is a choice and a construction, an invention to further human relations.
Since human beings are a function of nature and the nature of life is to exist and there are certain base rules of existing, then how can government take what they do not give in the first place? If everything is equal and the right to own a firearm is primary to your freedom because that is what will be used to take it then to agree to surrender your right is to put your existence in jeopardy.
You would be correct if you could establish that government in fact did precede human beings, but I can not imagine how you might accomplish that.
“So you do not believe that your life and your liberty (your freedom) are natural and a right?”
They are not naturally a right, there is no natural law that says I or anyone else must have liberty, being written on a piece of paper does not make it a natural law. If you can show me some science that makes it a natural law that people have the right to liberty, great, do so.
“But you do see “Human desire” which is an expression of an emotion as being a natural right.”
Human desire is an innate urge with a genetic basis, so it has a well established natural origin established in science. I wouldn’t normally call an instinct based motivation a “right”, I’d call it a natural and instinctive motivation, but as I think it could be reasonably argued as such.
Regarding your link.
It was insubstantive and unconvincing, “where does it come from” Locke offered two answers: 1. “God” which doesn’t make it “natural” as far as any atheistic mind is concerned or 2. A sentence that has no scientific basis, none.
“Human beings are primary (Human beings exist first). Government is a function of human beings existing and and so government is secondary. Government can not exist without first human beings inventing it related to their needs to organize and prosper, which is natural to them.”
Here you are defining government too narrowly, the first people to define what freedom you have are your parents, there has been government imposing on liberty for as long as there have been families, or if you don’t want to recognize that there is governance in a family, as long as humans have been social animals, which is before there were humans. Even lions and apes have governance with some members leading and exercising power over others.
So your belief in “natural rights” is built on the same basis as your belief in God – faith, not science.
What if you had an “innate urge”, which by your own words is a genetic therefore scientific proof to be free or to protect yourself ?
(This may be the craziest in the weeds conversation I have ever participated in, and I have participated in many. This really is fascinating to me.)
You being alive is a genetic scientific proof that you are alive. Do you believe that you have a right to be alive? Being alive and participating in this conversation I will assume that you might. So you have a scientific therefore genetic right to be alive.
So if you believe that you have a right to be alive then wouldn’t it follow that you had a right to ensure through struggle and resistance your right to be alive against anyone or thing that might threaten your life?
If you believe that you have a right to exist then who is ultimately responsible to ensure your life? Government? What happened before formal government?
“Governance” refers to complex organized arrangements that humans fashion in order to exist in some form of organization and harmony for the good of the whole and the individuals. You incorrectly reference governance related to lions and gorillas which is actually dominance.
And while animals (Including humans) can have a hierarchy related to dominance and mating rights, they do not participate in governance in the context of this discussion. Governance is a complex human concept and is political and dominance is about pure strength and physical ability which are signals to potential mates of genetic worthiness to reproduce.
One is a complex human concept and arrangement and exclusive to humans, and the other is not.
Jordan Peterson:
Western Civilization Founded On Hierarchies & Competence
https://youtu.be/s6vEzTU7KAc
(9:23)
“What if you had an “innate urge”, which by your own words is a genetic therefore scientific proof to be free or to protect yourself ?”
You act to protect yourself, you have the natural right to act to protect yourself, you have the natural right to act to gain or preserve your liberty, you’re just acting in your own interests, you have instincts that motivate you to act in your own interests. That is different to a “natural right to liberty”, it’s a natural right to strive for liberty.
“You being alive is a genetic scientific proof that you are alive. Do you believe that you have a right to be alive?”
No, but I have a natural right to strive to remain alive.
It’s the difference between the having on the one hand and getting or fighting to keep on the other.
” “Governance” refers to complex organized arrangements that humans fashion in order to exist in some form of organization and harmony for the good of the whole and the individuals. You incorrectly reference governance related to lions and gorillas which is actually dominance.”
OK, I’ll drop the “governance” for animals, their “dominance” is the evolutionary prequel to “governance”
“And while animals (Including humans) can have a hierarchy related to dominance and mating rights, they do not participate in governance in the context of this discussion.”
No, I won’t agree to that, this discussion is based primarily on liberty and other things as natural rights, liberty is denied by those in power from the governments of nations all the way down to the chiefs of prehistoric villages and the parents of teenagers. Humans have always been social animals, where you draw the line between animal dominance and governance, that is where I draw the line between human and animal, and we are certainly talking about that line occurring long before the evolution of Homo sapiens.
“OK, I’ll drop the “governance” for animals, their “dominance” is the evolutionary prequel to “governance””
No. You imply that at some point lower animals will soon be equal to humans, that is not so and false. The one is not and will never be the other.
” That is different to a “natural right to liberty”, it’s a natural right to strive for liberty.”
So you do not believe that you as a human being have a right to liberty and in order for you to have it you must “strive” for it to be free. Your subservience to governance and to be overseen and thinking that government is superior to you and precedes you and your rights is clear to me know.
OK, I understand how you think now, you may be suffering from a Stockholm like syndrome where you have come to identify with your captors and givers of “freedom”. You are well indoctrinated.
They are not naturally a right, there is no natural law that says I or anyone else must have liberty, being written on a piece of paper does not make it a natural law.
This is why you don’t understand Americans or our system of government. There are a lot of philosophical writings about this that make up the foundation of western civilization and our form of government.
That fundamental natural rights have been abused throughout history doesn’t make them any less of a right.
Andrew_W,
You wrote: “If someone makes an assertion without supplying a link the first thing I do is go look to see if I can find support for their claim”
Thank you so much for putting the burden upon me for finding your obscure source. I’m not sure why you do not accept the Clinton administration’s report, but perhaps you think that the US government is sloppy, especially when compared to your obscure GVP “University.” Their data must be more perfect, of course, because they “track only verified reports,” whatever that means. I suppose the highest amount of verification that one could get is when there is a conviction of a perpetrator in a crime in which someone stopped that crime by use of a gun. That would be a very small number indeed, since so many crimes would not have occurred to the extent that the police or prosecutors would tenaciously follow through.
So just on your and their word we should accept that there are virtually no crimes prevented by the use of a gun? I will stick with the more reliable government study of 1.5 million per year, even though you know better because all the rest are supposedly surveys of liars — your “sound point” — despite the link admitting that the small number is the “floor” and only assuming without any effort at verification that the small number must be close to the true value, because of — you know — all that lying. Your sound point is based upon an assumption. Nice argument on your part.
From your link:
“What like McVeigh did?”
I don’t know what you could possibly think that McVeigh did had anything to do with liberty and freedom, and I don’t know what I said to “initiate a campaign of violence.” I think that you are now just making stuff up and projecting your own feelings and tactics onto me because you are the one who is “incapable of admitting he’s wrong.” Oh, the irony of you complaining of a “snide attack” in the very sentence that you launch the same on me. It is reassuring that at least one of us is civil.
““Did Britain also get what it wanted?””
So this makes me wrong and you right? Your arguments get more bizarre with time. Once again, you are the one who’s “incapable of admitting he’s wrong.” The point has been that an armed population is better off than a disarmed population, not that Napoleon should have been defeated. This is what happens when you forget what point you are trying to make or are trying to distract from the fact that you lost, not won, the point. It is irrelevant that there were some Hawks in government who wanted to seize Canada,because in reality the rest of the US got what it wanted: a counter-strike against the British invasion that came from Canada. You really should study history, sometime, not just look up tidbits on the internet thinking that you can win a point with some fact you find. I also love the way you justify Britain removing the liberty of U.S. sailors, just like a pro-tyranny, anti-freedom left-winger.
“Venezuela has never had a robust democracy,”
Another distraction, because I never said it ever had a robust democracy. The words I use are chosen carefully for your understanding, but it is difficult to communicate to you when you add unchosen words into my sentences to change the meaning to a straw man that you knock down. Stop it.
“‘birthright’ How’s that defined?”
I thought you had once said that you use dictionary definitions. I thought you said just above that you looked up references that had no links. Your lack of understanding of the English language explains a lot.
“BECAUSE THERE ARE NO “NATURAL LAWS” THAT PROTECT THEM FROM GOVERNMENT!!”
Duh. What do you think I mean when I say that we need eternal vigilance?
“So you’ve just gone and described something that’s created by laws (including constitutions) and then assigned some super duper nonexistent quality to it.”
Didn’t I just finish explaining this one to you in my latest comment? Yes. I did. But as usual, your left-wing mind is unable and unwilling to accept the reality of nature and how it applies to man.
I showed you the difference between the right-wing assertion that we have natural laws — and that the US Constitution is based upon those natural laws with the admission of their existence and the affirmation that governments are here to protect, not create them — and the left-wing assertion that only men who do not possess these natural rights are the only ones empowered to grant them — and that the UN is openly willing to deny us the very rights that it pretends to grant to us.
One of these governing bodies is far better at protecting our natural rights than the other one — which does not even consider any right to be natural.
How can it be liberty if government can take it from you at will?
With the Constitution requiring a lengthy public process to pass an amendment that removes a right, this is an unlikely thing to happen, and it has been shown to not last long even when an unpopular right finally does get removed (Amendments Eighteen and Twenty-One). But with the UN, all it takes is a small, anonymous group to declare that a right is or is being used in a way detrimental to the UN’s goals. Alcohol was banned for the same reason that the left-wingers want to ban guns; they only acknowledged the detrimental effects and not the beneficial effects and did not realize the futility and unintended consequences (the creation of organized crime) of the ban.
“You’ve been brought up to believe that “natural rights” are natural because your Constitution tells you so.”
You really don’t pay any attention. Natural rights are natural because even nature has these rights. Duh. As I asked before, how can man grant a right if it is not his to grant in the first place? Your left-wing position makes zero sense, and the conservative position is continuously seen in nature and is expressed in ecology all the time. One example is that birds define and defend their territories and make their own nests. Or maybe you don’t see it due to having uncomprehending eyes.
“No, as I’ve told you on several occasions I’ve no interest in being a conservative”
Now I understand why you are so adamant about your left-wing (New Zealand right-wing) position. You are hopeless after all.
Listening to Levin and he is referencing Alex Guiness who plays Col. Nicholson in Bridge Over The River Qui.
I realize, Andrew W and Col. Nicholson are one. The perfect analogy.
https://youtu.be/tRHVMi3LxZE
Andrew W, what have you done?
Cotour: No. You imply that at some point lower animals will soon be equal to humans, that is not so and false. The one is not and will never be the other.
No, I only imply that humans evolved from social ancestors that had social hierarchies whose structure was more “dominance” than “governance”.
So you do not believe that you as a human being have a right to liberty and in order for you to have it you must “strive” for it to be free. Yes, but that doesn’t mean there’s a right for those in power to subjugate others, so your next sentence: Your subservience to governance and to be overseen and thinking that government is superior to you and precedes you and your rights is clear to me know. Does not follow.
OK, I understand how you think now, you may be suffering from a Stockholm like syndrome where you have come to identify with your captors and givers of “freedom”. You are well indoctrinated.
This is typical of someone defending a core belief, when they can’t find a sound argument, attack your opponent. I’ve made it clear again and again and again that there not being such a thing as “natural rights” does not mean that people shouldn’t fight for their freedoms, in fact the opposite is true, they shouldn’t sit about going “it’s my right, it’s my right” until someone else takes their freedoms on the grounds that freedom is a “natural” right, it isn’t.
Wodun:
This is why you don’t understand Americans or our system of government. There are a lot of philosophical writings about this that make up the foundation of western civilization and our form of government.
That fundamental natural rights have been abused throughout history doesn’t make them any less of a right.
I had been a bit concerned that my definition of “natural” and that which you people were using wasn’t the same, but as no one has indicated that by “natural right” they were meaning anything different to the intrinsic natural characteristics of humanity that I’ve suggested, that you also are meaning such “natural” rights are “natural” as the word is usually used.
That being the case you pointing to Americans and their system of government or philosophical writings or Western civilizations is irrelevant because if it’s natural it isn’t ever going to be proven by politicians, philosophers or theists, it can only be proven through evidence that it’s a feature of the natural world, and that comes down to science.
So where’s your science?
Pamphlets from the universe will not be falling from the shy proclaiming that human beings have natural rights to fill your formal requirement in order that you recognize them. However the universe does communicate its intent in certain ways.
Lets look at it this way.
If human beings are a function of the universe and human beings in time through their intellect developed as a result of being a function of the universe come to understand that they have certain natural rights related to governance, then human beings have those rights.
Why is that? Because human beings are a direct function of the universe.
Wow, that’s one of the most ridiculous arguments anyones offered me in quite a while, it amounts to “if humans believe something it must be so because humans believe it. Not even a very good circular argument.
You obviously are in desperate need of help in terms of trying to build a coherent argument, so I’ve decided to try to help you out. What I think you need to do is start with the social contract, and try to build a case based on it. I don’t think that, even following the obvious line of reasoning that that approach presents that the argument that there are “natural” rights closes, but a least it’s a heck of a better argument than the “it says it in the Constitution therefore it must be so” sort of rubbish you guys have been offering.
You keep thinking about my point about how the universe or nature expresses itself and the nature of humanity as a function of the universe.
The distillate conclusion that the Founders have come to based in their understanding of the entire breadth of human history related to humans, governance and freedom is not insinuating that anything that humans think should be or can be.
Your thinking is incomplete on the subject, I understand that you do not understand.
Or look at it this way, the world is for the most part better off for the American Constitution and America existing, for the most part. Let that be enough for you even if you can not comprehend what underlies it.
For Andrew W:
Since we are unable to come to agreement on the more quantum nature of human life and the nature of freedom maybe you can understand something more base like this that is more visceral and real world.
http://dailycaller.com/2018/05/13/sao-paulo-gunman-wrong-pistol-packing-mother/
One way or another, no man (or government) has the right to threaten yours, mine or anyone’s wife or girl friend or child with a firearm.
To me you would argue that people like this young urban entrepreneur has every right to do what he is doing without the expectation of resistance or consequence.
“To me you would argue that people like this young urban entrepreneur has every right to do what he is doing without the expectation of resistance or consequence.”
Which just demonstrates that this discussion is about one of you’re core beliefs, that you are incapable of rationally considering what I’m actually saying because it’s in conflict with that core belief, so you rationalize all sorts of bizarre misrepresentations of my argument rather than go down the path of questioning that core belief.
Unalienable Rights, maybe that is a more acceptable term for you instead of “Natural rights” which seems to upset you so.
” The Declaration’s fourth and final self-evident truth is that when a government destroys rather than secures its citizens’ unalienable rights, those citizens have a right to revolution. This follows logically from the preceding principles. Government exists to protect rights; if it isn’t doing this, the people should get rid of it and set up a new one.
Two other rights arise from the right to revolution. These rights are unstated in the Declaration but were endorsed by the entire founding generation: the right to keep and bear arms and the right to be governed, in local affairs, by local governments. James Madison wrote in Federalist no. 46: “Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of.”
http://founding.com/whenever-any-form-of-government-becomes-destructive-of-these-ends-it-is-the-right-of-the-people-to-alter-or-to-abolish-it/