BS: Anyone defend US gun law?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Lighter
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 08:46 AM

> That you can do.

Explain how. Bullets are naturally covered by the "right to bear arms," which would otherwise be an empty phrase.

> no claim to any any moral authority over the rest of the world.

No one here has made that claim.

> You made a big thing of the Twin Towers bombing, starting a war

Yes, I must acknowledged that we responded when attacked by a foreign foe that had already blown a hole in a US Navy vessel and had officially declared war on us in a 1998 statement by bin Laden, for which we'd also shown forbearance. Britain subjugated India and repeatedly appeased Hitler. That led to war and no end of other stuff, but likewise has nothing to do with strict or lax gun laws, or civilian homicides committed by (according to the cited figure) 1/10,000 of the otherwise very law-abiding US population?

What's more, according to the link there were 551 homicides of all kinds in England and Wales alone (never mind Scotland and Northern Ireland) in 2013 - a dozen times the gun homicides your post chooses to focus on. Still a very low rate, but showing once again that many murderers don't even need guns.

Gun homicides in the US are actually in decline. Nobody is sure why. And as Ebbie cogently notes, few Americans (the people affected) even want to "ban all guns." As posts on this thread show, the claim that we "don't even twitch" is laughably false.

Some countries need no more than a "twitch" to pass legislation that is far more dangerous than the laws of a slow-moving republican democracy. Fortunately I don't live in one of those places.

I notice too that the US doesn't even make the top-twenty list of nations with the highest murder *rates* per 100,000 population (2010-2011). Most of these nations are Third World countries inhabited by the peaceful "earth people" of New Age song and story.

http://www.statista.com/statistics/262963/ranking-the-20-countries-with-the-most-murders-per-100-000-inhabitants/

Just FYI.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Lighter
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 08:49 AM

Just to make my position clear:

Ideally, no one would have a gun. Ideally, everyone would have wings.

But these ideals have nothing to do with the real world.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Ebbie
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 12:03 PM

OK, BackWOODSman.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 12:16 PM

Thanks Ebbie! :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 12:49 PM

Just to clarify....

I did not claim, assert or believe that the UK is "governed by a monarchy" these days. Nor do any significant numbers of Americans believe "The idea that the monarch is the equivalent to your president ....
My point was simply that approval of continuation of the trappings of monarchy does not constitute approval of being governed by such a system.
The relevance of my attempt to draw parallels is that even in the US, disapproval of one or more aspects of OUR system does not and should not imply condemnation of the entire system as it seems to be in several posts by Brits.
We have one political group which is using the system in ways and to degrees seldom seen in our history. It IS possible for a situation to be exploited by lies, distortions and political maneuvers that were never imagined by the framers of the Constitution.
In a certain way, the process of the UK moving from a monarchy to a democracy allowed establishing specific safeguards against that older form of central power.
We began with one early attempt at a Democratic Republic that seemed at the time...(and for many years after)... a good way to provide fairness to all. This, of course, required several adjustments in the form of granting voting rights, abolishing slavery...etc. Now the very language that seemed so reasonable at the time is being twisted to the detriment of many.
Yet, I see post after post here that say: "Well, just go pass new laws & stop the stupidity!" and no explanations of the problems of that seem to get through.

I wonder if Scotland has any idea what THEY are in for?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Musket
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 01:44 PM

They are not in for letting semi domesticated rednecks carry guns for starters. Scotland may have interesting times ahead but you'll not see a gun battle between Akenaton and his gay neighbours.

Just ban them. It's easy. You are banning all sorts of things on ecology tickets, and at long last, this includes high emission engines in cars.

So why not guns? Politicians wring their hands in the prescribed manner every time a number of funerals of children from the same school take place. So why not ask them to do their job come election time?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 04:01 PM

Let's open Musket's 09 Sep 14 - 05:10 AM door a bit wider: does anyone else see a strange parity between the NRA fabulism and Putin's in Ukraine? Both have to paint a world image demonstrably different from reality to maintain their positions. It's called insanity, in passing.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 04:41 PM

Musket... you simply do not wish to comprehend the situation.

"Just ban them. It's easy."

You have had my explanation of the issue a dozen times. You either didn't read it or are just willfully ignoring it in order to perpetuate a view of the US similar to the way you remark on football games/clubs.

" So why not ask them to do their job come election time?"

Because at election time, there are more than that one issue in play! The &$@##**^% conservatives have also **Gerrymandered** the voting districts so that more & more semi-sane candidates are herded into small pens. Those sane ones are elected, but are in the minority! (I have a quite sane, competent Democrat as my Representative- and 2 decent Senators)... and even they are subjected to unfair pressures when votes on any controversial topic are laden with amendments which muddy the issue!

It's easy... bah....

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 05:49 PM

BillD, I quoted your exact words, cut and pasted from your post of 8 Sep 14 - 12:27 PM. In case you've forgotten what you said, here it is again, cut and pasted:-

"I just looked up the stats on UK monarchy, and there seems to be a disconnect between how many do not wish to be governed by a monarchy and how many want the entire system

Those words suggest that the writer believes that the UK is governed by a monarchy. I pointed out that the UK is not governed by a monarchy, and there is no system to disband.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 08:57 PM

Fine.. I did not take the time to phrase my comment in such a way that it was totally impossible to mistake my intent. mea culpa...

If you read it with a certain attitude, it may indeed 'suggest' that I was mistaking a clear fact about UK history. I am not an expert on it all, but I have known for 50 years that you have a bicameral legislature (different from many others, but still governed by debate & vote.

I just don't understand why my explanation of what I did mean and my disclaimer did not suffice.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Ebbie
Date: 09 Sep 14 - 11:44 PM

" But I think Australia said it best when they last looked at dropping the monarchy. The argument that won was "yes, but the alternative is someone who actually wants to be a president...." musket 8 Sept. 12:38

Now, just who is equating the monarch with a president? lol

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 03:28 AM

Bill, I didn't read it with any 'attitude', I was a proof-reader in a former life and I'm used to reading and understanding what is before me without bias or personal interpretation. I read your post literally, no 'attitude'. You wrote something that was factually incorrect and then got pissed off when I corrected you.

Your 'disclaimer' was simply wriggling to try to avoid admitting you were wrong. It doesn't wash. You fucked up and now you're trying to lay the blame on my 'attitude', and my 'failure' to 'interpret' and 'understand' something that you didn't actually say - more wriggling.

I prefer to admit my own errors. You should try it, honesty is very liberating.

The End.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Musket
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 04:35 AM

Equating monarch with president? Your point?

If you lose the monarchy you replace them with a president. See Ireland for details.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 06:48 AM

Leave the question of monarchy alone, Musket, it's a red herring allowing him to slide out the side door.

I suspect Backwoodsman's a bit like me, rather too high an IQ to be allowed to argue on sites like this: he's taken something of Bill's which is patently ridiculous rather literally. But then again, most of what Bill writes on this meme can't be taken seriously by anyone with either head or heart. OK, Bill has a decent heart on other things, but none of us is perfect, and I think this is an area where he's been brought up in a macho image he's going to find hard to leave behind. We can't help our parenting, but we can leave it behind: my old man was psoitively Edwardian, I left the world's mores go their own way in the late 70s (I have no detailed knowledge of anything in popular music since 1977, for example, as I got reet pissed off with the presumption I'd like hip-hop: I understand it, I just think it and virtually everything since excessively simple, rhythmn alone doesn't make music).

And in any case we're more likely to replace a monarch with a politician. A President should be a statesman - and I don't think we have any in the UK at the moment.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 08:10 AM

It's not my IQ (some would say the lack of it!) that's at issue here, it's that I called someone out on an inaccurate statement about the UK being 'governed' by the monarch, and they tried to make it my fault because I took their words at face value whereas I should have realised that what they said wasn't what they actually meant!

A simple "You're right, I fucked up" would have commanded far more respect from me than the energetic belly-dance that Bill performed to try to wriggle out of it.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 01:52 PM

"The End."

apparently not.

".. energetic belly-dance that Bill performed to try to wriggle out of it."

A background in proof reading can help one find all sorts of things that might not have been there.
I repeat... for the last time... I mis-PHRASED my comment, I did NOT mistakenly assert the UK was currently ruled by a monarchy. I knew better than that. (I suppose my mea culpa should have been in a larger font and red text.)

like this THE END



I still am lobbying for saner gun laws in the US.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Lighter
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 02:21 PM

> I still am lobbying for saner gun laws in the US.

Yeah, but aren't you afraid your unfortunate "bad parenting" and unconscious brutal machismo virtually insure failure?

Rather a shame, rilly. Er. Hmph!

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 02:35 PM

Oh, I DO worry about that! (Except the part about "insuring" failure. *giggle*. MY proofreading past wants to warn you that other proofreaders may be after you for not using "ensure")

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 03:26 PM

I was responding to rahere's post, but I see you're still wriggling eh?

You fucked up and tried to make it my fault for not successfully interpreting what you didn't say. That's dishonesty, wriggler, and beneath contempt.

Grow a pair of balls and admit it.

What a pity you don't employ that obstinacy in your 'lobbying for saner gun laws in the US', instead of wringing your hands and whining that 'it's too difficult'.

And yes, it's 'ensure'.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Musket
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 04:13 PM

They say the older you get the bigger your balls get.

From an anatomical perspective they just get lower.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 05:10 PM

♫"Do your balls hang low.
Do they swing to & fro?"♫

Nope... not yet.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Lighter
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 05:42 PM

Three dictionaries (including the Oxford English Dictionary, published in the very heart of Limeyland) agree with my own experience that "insure" and "ensure" in this sense have long been interchangeable.

Don't bother to apologize.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 06:56 PM

Jesus How many British does it take to win a war none the US has to do it for them get a firearm and grow some balls or you could blow your little police whistle when you are being killed

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 07:41 PM

Hi 'guest' (I'm sure I can guess who.).. you will no doubt get remarks from the local proofreader about your lack of punctuation....and a few other things, I'm sure.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Lighter
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 08:06 PM

> How many British does it take to win a war none the US has to do it for them

Well, they certainly made Hitler think twice - while US isolationists and pacifists were doing all they could to keep us out of the fight (1939-1941).

And it was the Brits who drove the Japanese out of Burma. There was that Afrika Korps business, too, and sinking the Bismarck and all. Not too shabby.

In 1918 the Brits had to teach the Americans how to fight. Quite well, in fact.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 08:58 PM

Oh oh bloody brilliant kind of thing like when fishermen and other civilians had to paddle your army home when hitler was driving them into the sea at Dunkirk was it wot bloody good show. How about patton having to wait for monty wot yea right fuck you

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 09:29 PM

Southern man don't need you around anyhow or your advice

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Sep 14 - 09:38 PM

Brits fought just fine in many, many situations. The US did pretty well when they realized that isolationism was foolish. There's no need to compare and debate 'better'.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 02:55 AM

Nobody likes a clever-shit Bill. I'd refer you to the comment commonly attributed to Oscar Wilde regarding sarcasm.

Sarcasm is also the final refuge of a moral coward who got caught out making an erroneous statement and hasn't the backbone to admit he was wrong.

Carry on wriggling and sniggering, it obviously makes you feel better about yourself.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Ebbie
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 03:02 AM

Bill D does not need me to defend him but oh, boy, are YOU wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 03:33 AM

Not on the evidence he's presented here, Ebbie.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Musket
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 04:38 AM

I don't see how discussing USA vs UK has any bearing on this.

The UK holds its head high in the field of civilisation as we don't need guns to compensate for personal inadequacy. Let's not forget, we are discussing letting people carry guns for personal protection, something civilised countries haven't felt the need for in a very long time.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 06:11 AM

True, musket.
Your phrase "Keep banging the rocks together" is so appropriate.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 09:03 AM

Truly, I don't think "civilization" is anything more than a very, very thin veneer that societies and nations break and cast aside when their interests are "threatened."

The Arabic civilization was light-years ahead of the European and in fact taught many things to Europe that had been forgotten during the "Dark Ages." The Celtic Christian church had its own ways, in many ways far superior to those of Rome, but was tossed when Rome demanded absolute obedience to its authority. In many ways Elizabethan England was quite civilized, but broke on the rocks of James I (VI), Charles I, and Cromwell.

No, I think it depends on whose ox is being gored...and who demands Power. As "Bath House" John Grogan to King Richard Daley I, "Seize the power and all else will follow."

"...to whet a stranger's lust for power and gold...."

When I took over in a job in top management, I was told that I'd have to take a turn at running a group that was spread across several counties (an area about the size of England). I replied that I didn't want that...I wanted to be the spider in the middle of the web. THAT'S power, and it can and will corrupt and can bring down empires -- see the USSR (I knew that and managed to avoid it).

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 09:07 AM

"Power comes from the barrel of a rifle." --Mao Tse-Tung

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Musket
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 10:45 AM

Ah but even rednecks in deepest Dumbfuckistan know he was a "commie!"

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 10:50 AM

This habit of quoting some statement by a famous name, in tones as if it somehow settles everybody's hash, has ambivalent [at best] effectiveness. I think Mao was mistaken about pretty well anything it is possible to be mistaken about. So why am I supposed to give a flying one where he thought power came from, Rap? & what, precisely, are you trying to demonstrate by quoting it?

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Ebbie
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 03:51 PM

One problem may be that for years many Europeans and others across the way thought of the US in terms of the Wild West as shown in the movies where the stalwart hero with holstered gun riding on his well-worn chaps (not the UK version!) rescued distressed damsels and sweet old ladies and then rode away with nary a scratch. Or at most, a superficial wound to his arm, which, incidentally, was never his gun shootin' arm. Only bad men were killed.

Perhaps now they think the mythical Wild West has suddenly turned its guns onto itself. We have let down the mystique - and the fantasies of generations of youngsters were obliterated.

:) This is a smiley, folks.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 04:20 PM

... and a


☺


right back to you, dear Ebbie...

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Ed T
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 04:41 PM

Well, now time for a little gun music interlude, to this gun-powder issue.

My favourite part:

""Time to get a gun
That's what I've been thinking
I could afford one
If I did just a little less drinking
Time to put something 
Between me and the sun
When the talking is over
It's time to get a gun""

Fred Eaglesmith 

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Musket
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 04:50 PM

Is that an Iraqi supergun in your pocket or are you pleased to see me?




Phallic symbolism. A load of cock.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 11 Sep 14 - 05:55 PM

I pop popcorn before looking at this thread. It's fun to watch the last vestiges of the British Empire dissolve while people cling desperately to the notions of "Western civilisation" and Greenwich Mean Time. Come to think of it, more clock towers is what We Yanks need.

Then, every once in a while, I throw my toys out of my pram and yell "Balls!" like Sterling Hayden in _The Long Goodbye_.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 13 Sep 14 - 09:42 AM

And it seems a gun isn't even an effective defence against a kid wielding a clarinet;

http://newsdaily.com/2014/09/12/gun-toting-colorado-woman-threatens-boy-over-clarinet-practice/

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 13 Sep 14 - 10:01 AM

That's the sort of thing that happens with promiscuous gun ownership.

As is the present tight corner that the gifted but eccentric athlete Pistorius has got himself into. I know it is not the same country — South Africa not USA — but the situations and principles involved seem not all that different.

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 13 Sep 14 - 02:53 PM

"... but the situations and principles involved seem not all that different."

Exactly... depending on a gun somewhere 'handy', like a bedroom drawer, for 'self-defense' in case of intruders, is FAR more often likely to be useless or lead to such tragedies.
If it happens in the middle of the night, most people are far more likely to be sleepy, confused, and in a hurry... leading to mistakes.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Musket
Date: 13 Sep 14 - 03:21 PM

Or you could be in a civilised country where the idea of owning a gun for self defence sounds uncivilised, medieval and dangerous.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,Troubadour
Date: 13 Sep 14 - 08:10 PM

"Oh oh bloody brilliant kind of thing like when fishermen and other civilians had to paddle your army home when hitler was driving them into the sea at Dunkirk was it wot bloody good show."

You really need to get an education mate.

A grasp of simple English for a start! Then you might be able to read and understand history (probably just the Primary School version).

Two minutes research would set you straight on the effect on an expeditionary force, of having both flanks (Belgium and France) collapse, leaving them exposed to a pincer movement by a much larger force.

Getting 350,000 men off the beaches under fire was the victory which ensured that the UK would not be invaded, and indirectly sealed Hitler's fate.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Ebbie
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 01:50 AM

Troubadour, don't tell me that you're taking the Guest Troll's (fake) view to heart! We all know better.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 03:35 AM

Quite so.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Musket
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 04:07 AM

Oh I don't know. Sometimes you have to eat swill to gain affinity with the pigs.

We gave you knives and forks and you can't even get that right... No wonder you misunderstood the role of firearms in society.

See ? Easy.