Saturday, May 05, 2007

A response to a critical comment to some of my posts.

Although ludlowlou said he did like my puppy, he made a pointed comment about what he saw as a disconnect about my position on guns and my fear that the government is being taken over by right wingers with an agenda that does not match the founding fathers. I was originally going to just reply to his comment, but the answer got so long, I might as well make it into a post.

Like I said, I will admit to being a bit irrational about guns, just as the NRA people are irrational on the opposite side. They aren’t willing to listen to much reason about the insanity of some of their positions. I’ve rather made up my mind as well. I won’t go into that debate here, but I find it incredibly the same group of people who can be so concerned and passionate about doing away with abortion can also just close their eyes to the 30,000 gun deaths every single year in this United States. It doesn’t make sense to me.

He also dinged me on Jefferson, who said something to the effect “sometimes it is neccessary to spill a little blood to maintain your freedom”. True stuff, indeed. I fully support having this country strong enough to defend itself from all threats. World War II, of course, was a great example of this. World War I was helping out our allies, which could be seen as defending our country, when they were on the verge of losing. Korea and Vietnam, I don’t know if I have yet made up my mind. I don’t know much about the reasons for the Korea conflict. Vietnam at least had a stated lofty goal. But that goal got away from us. My main point here is that this devastating military force needs to be used well, used intelligently, and used with reluctance. None of that has happened with this war in Iraq. We were lied to in order to get Bush and Cheney’s war of choice, and when we were there, it was handled just about as incompetently as anything this country has ever done.

But I don’t think that was ludlowlou’s point. He was asking how I would propose that the populace protect itself from an out of control government. I guess that’s a good question. I also said in one of my posts that I was not in favor of the government trying to round up everyone’s weapons. Wouldn’t work for several reasons. So, I am not in favor, from a pragmatic point of view, of the abolition of guns. Personally, I hate guns, but I am not advocating that.

One point is that protecting themselves from an out of control government is definitely not why the gun people in this country really want guns. I haven’t heard that argument in quite some time. But if that is true, where is the outrage about what is going on right now? From what I see, the gun people are the ones who are most supportive of Bush and actually support a lot of the stuff he is doing. The Constitution of this country is being ripped to shreds by Bush, Cheney, and their crack (I mean, as in “on crack”) staff of legal beagles, and no one on the right seems to give a damn. In fact, it all seems to be the “liberals” fault, along with the “liberal media”. So, from what I am observing, the pro-gun folks are asleep at the wheel, if that is the reason they want a huge cache of guns.

My point that I was making in this post was the fact I never hear the “liberal media” report on possible terrorist attacks from within this country by the ring wing white whackos that go around bombing abortion clinics or government facilities. It is always “the other” (currently Arabs of all persuasions) who is the enemy. We never look within to do any sort of self-checking. Why is the media not widely reporting the possibility of a large-scale terrorist attack by these loons in Alabama. That is surely what they had in mind. Or else, someone had spent a huge pile of money to sit on a weapons cache to supply a small regiment just so they could feel good about their manhood.

I suggest that we do a better job of it, protecting ourselves from the possibility that a tyrannically government might be able to install itself in this country UP FRONT. We are doing a crappy job of it right now. If we do that, we don’t need a population that is armed to the teeth to protect itself from its own government.

Thanks for making a good point, though. I did have to think about that one. Yes, I might be being a tad hypocritical in my thinking on gun control. But what I am proposing, making it much more difficult for people with criminal records and good “precursors” to get guns, just like the nutjob that killed those innocent people at VT. Why was he allowed to buy guns, with the background that he had? I am definitely not proposing to outlaw guns. Cars and drivers licenses are more regulated than guns, and guns, especially small handguns, are made with the expressed purpose of killing people. Why is that? I don’t know if there is a rational answer, other than the NRA and a significant (but not overwhelming, by any means) percentage of people want it that way.

If we are willing to put up with 30,000 gun deaths a year, including the predictable mass killings by out of control kids or lunatics like at VT or Columbine High School, then so be it, I guess. I makes absolutely no sense to me that we are worried about brown skinned Muslims trying to come over and do us harm (which some no doubt are), but we don’t care about 30,000 gun deaths a year. Makes no sense to me.

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