On Apr 24, 2013, at 3:46 AM, Mugsy Lunsford <[email protected]> wrote: > 've been interested in the gun debate, or lack of it, on FB, and although I > rarely post about it, my biggest annoyance with this, after our complete > inability to actually have a debate due to the extremely high level of > misinformation and reflexive screams of "GUNS! Their comin to tak r GUNS!" is > this bizarre idea that we're going to need small arms to fight off the > tyranny of our heavily militarized police and military forces. It's never > clear how this is supposed to happen, especially since, duh - drones, hello? > - but I ran across someone who's carrying on a fairly reasoned debate with a > few people who disagree with him but seem actually rational. He was trying to > clarify a point, and made some statements I wish I saw in the mainstream > media. I'm quoting him below: > > "I'm still trying to imagine how guns protect people from "tyranny". Aside > from an imaginary alternative universe where the US military gets deployed > against the US citizenry, and in which the members of our military are > actually *complicit* in this, I just can't see it. And honestly, if that was > to happen, what makes anyone think that their pea shooters would be any match > against a DRONE ARMY that can fire bunker-busting missiles with pinpoint > accuracy from miles away?
Because this is how many of them think: <http://littlegreenfootballs.com/page/296346_Chris_Nogy_Arkansas_Republican> (And holy shitballs, when did LGF become the voice of reason???) "The 2nd amendment means nothing unless those in power believe you would have no problem simply walking up and shooting them if they got too far out of line and stopped responding as representatives." Speaking as a constituent whose representative DID have someone walk up and shoot her, eat shit and die, scumbag. But yeah 'clinging to their guns and religion' was SUCH a horrible insult. Tangentally, riding into work today I realized that the single greatest refutation of the 'rational actors' theories about economics is the absolutely rail-straight consitency of the Republican base to vote against their own economic interests EVRY DAMN TIME, because gays, guns-n-'bortion. How could these people ever be considered 'rational actors' in economics? (then again, does THIS represent 'rational' actors instead of dumb, panicky dangerous animals? <http://ei.marketwatch.com/Multimedia/2013/04/24/Photos/MG/MW-BB866_fake_t_20130424074047_MG.jpg>) I really think we're moving fast towards another Oklahoma City kind of event. They're racheting up the rhetoric at an insane rate. Someone slaughters 20 kindergarten kids and our legislators cannot even muster the votes to make it harder for criminals and terrorists to get guns, and they're so batshit insane about it they've legally prohibited even STUDYING the problem of gun violence; prohibiting the government form even collecting statistics about gun crime. I don't know what to think. Every time I think thst Peak Crazy has arrived, and even higher wave of Crazy comes crashing in. I mean this isn't even '2nd Amendment Remedies' rhetoric, this is an outright call for political assasinations. THIS is what that brings about: <http://www.hbo.com/vice/index.html#/vice/episodes/01/01-killer-kids/video/full-episode.html/eNrjcmbO0CzLTEnNd8xLzKksyUx2zs8rSa0oUc-PSYEJBSSmp-ol5qYy5zMXsjGyeRalpmcWlxQllmTm51kplJTlJlopQMRSixSKM9PzdDPzOBkZ2aQTS0vyC3ISK21LikpTAeNtJUE=> You cannot run for office in some parts of the Phillipines without risking assasination, because they've adopted the attitude expressed by the guy from Arkansas. I don't think you CAN have a rational conversation about this, not when a US Senator rants against a law because of things that are expressly prohibited by that law, like Ted "New Joe McCarthy" Cruz did for the background checks vote. Not when editorial pages of prominent newspapers complain that Gabby Giffords was 'bullying' people because she was urging them to vote for the background check laws, on the grounds that she's unfairly using the fact that she got shot in the head by a deranged person who shouldn't have been allowed a gun. The Republican party, certainly most of it's base, and no small part, I think, of the elected legislators are stewing in a toxic combination of perceived victimhood, paranoia, projection, immunity to reality and an authoritarian bent towards using violence and mob rule to solve their problems that makes them really scary. I get the feeling that they're always just a moment and a charismatic speaker away from deciding that the Hutus in Rwanda had the right general idea, and the US would be better off without half their neighbors. -- Bruce Johnson University of Arizona College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "StrataList-OT" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/stratalist-ot?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
