BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together

Subject: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 02:43 PM

https://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/06/20/1308465/-New-Study-Ranks-50-States-By-Gun-Sense-And-Gun-Violence-Deaths?detail=emailcl

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 04:02 PM

Two points:

'Tain't necessarily so. Illinois (Chicago) has extremely tight gun laws but has a high rate of gun violence.

Washington, DC, the same.

As long as neighboring states have lax gun laws and controls access to guns is easy.

2nd Point

I am most awfully tired of the UK citizens' (subjects?) insulting use of the brainless 'banging rocks together.'

Unless and until you lot understand more of cultural and historical diversity in a huge country ya dun know what you talkin' about.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 04:09 PM

Is the USA more culturally and historically diverse than Europe ?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 04:09 PM

"Banging the rocks together" is one of those catch-phrases people keep using; but I can't find it defined in any dictionary of idioms &c.

What, please, does it actually mean?

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 04:15 PM

It's quote from a work of literature.

Try a web search.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Greg F.
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 04:44 PM

As long as neighboring states have lax gun laws and controls access to guns is easy.


And that is exactly why we need a Federal statute that applies the same regulations to ALL states, despite what the National Rifle Assassination has to say and/or which pols they bribe.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 04:44 PM

"We'll be saying a big hello to all intelligent lifeforms everywhere and to everyone else out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together, guys."

Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 04:59 PM

Also quoted as "the secret is to keep banging the rocks together, guys!" I wonder which is right.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Olddude
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 07:09 PM

Greg how many times do you and I have to repeat that. About every other week. Gun shows to get rid of and a Federal law consistent across states.. Problem solved

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 09:08 PM

What possible effect could this and similar threads have upon a problem with which the United States is already all too familiar? Do you seriously believe that anything you post here will have any effect whatsoever?

Contributing to divisiveness does not solve this or any other problem.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Jeri
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 09:14 PM

The article is over a year old.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Jul 15 - 10:48 PM

"It's quote from a work of literature.
Try a web search."
,..,
Whoever posted this at 0415 pm -- Do you really imagine I would have posted such a question without doing a web search first?! It was the fruitlessness of that search which induced the post, obviously.

Thanks for the pointer to Douglas Adams. But it sounds as if he is simply using an established phrase in dialogue, rather than coining one. Still can't make out what exactly it's supposed to mean. WHICH rocks? To what purpose?

Still puzzled ···

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 02:13 AM

Remember the old thing about keeping something at bay? Like, Why are you banging those rocks together?

Answer: To keep elephants away.

Response: There are no elephants here.

Answer: See? It works.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 02:49 AM

well fair enough, we know you've got this proud history and the right to bear arms.

but the figures do seem to suggest that if there were a few less guns, les people would get killed.

one of my best friends lives in Texas and loves guns. in fact he was lamenting recently that he couldn't afford to shoot as much as he would like. i said -why not get an airgun, with an airgun - you can go shooting all the time and it doesn't cost much and you can do it in your back garden.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 03:54 AM

Thank you, Ebbie -- a most convincing derivation & explanation.

❤·M·❤

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 05:14 AM

Whoever posted this at 0415 pm -- Do you really imagine I would have posted such a question without doing a web search first

Sorry, that was me. I got the quotes from Douglas Adams (both versions) as the first, second, third and fourth returns from Google. But Google knows I am in the UK.

I am fairly sure Adam's did coin the phrase, as he did many others amongst people who followed what was, at the time, a cult radio program.

Any how the explanation, which Ebbie and probably Rapparee, know, is THIS Adam's may have been making an oblique reference to an early scene in 2001- a Space Odessy.

To us in the UK it makes some of you look primitive (and dangerous) in your attitude to guns and others of you look primitive in your inability to change things. Except the term that follows from the Adam's quote is not 'primitive' but 'un-intelligent', which is unfair on the caveman.

I have been to the USA, I have stopped the car in a prosperous neighbourhood to read the map, had a guy coming back to his home pull up in front, take something heavy from the glove compartment (or whatever you call it) and put it in his pocket, come over with his hand in that pocket, find that I was a white guy with an English accent, give me directions, then go back and return the heavy object from where he got it.

I don't think the heavy object was a rock.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: bubblyrat
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 08:08 AM

Perhaps the activity in question is somehow related to primitive Man's attempts at fire-lighting by knocking lumps of flint together to create sparks ?? Not applicable in Tasmania of course, where the Aboriginals never did learn how to make fire by ANY means and relied on natural phenomena such as lightning strikes.In which case, it doesn't either apply to , or concern , them (because they are all dead !).

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 10:56 AM

And tool making.
The sharp jagged broken rocks are found to be useful.

The first weapons were created like that which led ultimately the the development of firearms, so perhaps not so appropriate in this context.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 12:30 PM

The process is called knapping. I did some while at university as part of an anthropology course. Made some edges that were quite sharp to help skin and scrape muskrat and rabbit--although rabbit can be skinned bare-handed. It's a bit more complicted than banging rocks together, something I see as a stupid expression to beging with. However, some people use it because they lack anything more intelligent to say.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Teribus
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 01:35 PM

Doesn't your right to bear arms depend upon you being part of a "well regulated Militia"?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 02:31 PM

No. See https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/second_amendment

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 04:00 PM

It's a bit more complicted than banging rocks together
They have to start somewhere.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: wysiwyg
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 04:51 PM

What Ebbie said up top. All of it.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Bill D
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 06:21 PM

Concur with Ebbie &Wysi

I have explained MANY times here about the 2nd amendment, the sad, ridiculous gun culture... and WHY it got that way and WHY it is so embedded and hard to dislodge.

Some of you Brits just do-not-care to have a clear explanation. You'd rather just make sarcastic comments and insinuate that "we", as a nation, are somehow primitive, stupid or unable to see the point. You cannot comprehend why the history, demography, geography and political structure of the US, as compared to the UK, is so very different. YOU don't have or allow many guns, so WE should just see how fine that system is and emulate it!

Get it thru your heads... guns and the gun culture here are a Catch-22! Many millions here hate the damn things, and many are attacking the problem within the system! What would you have us do...buy a bunch of guns and storm Congress and the NRA offices?
You don't need to tell most of us here at Mudcat... you are preaching to insulting the converted.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 06:29 PM

YEP. You are indeed as you describe. Devotees of a Wild West Cult. Time you grew up.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: gnu
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 08:55 PM

Another gun thread! Yippee!

As Ebbie and others have pointed out... stick it. Brits yanging? Fer fuck sake... you English Germans have shot more people world wide than anyone else and yer still at it every day. Including the fact that you control who the USA and the Commonwealth bomb the shit out of every day. You English Germans bomb and shoot and spill oil all over the fuckin planet every day. Piss off.

Guns don't kill people but English Germans do. Fix THAT shit for a start.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 09:30 PM

A quote from Winston Churchill:

What enterprise an enlightened community may attempt that is more noble and profitable than the reclamation from barbarism of a fertile region and large population?...The act is virtuous, the exercise invigorating, and the result often extremely profitable.

Oh, yes -- he was writing about the Battle of Omdurman, where the British killed or wounded some 25,000 Ottoman soldiers while suffering about 50 casualties themselves. The Brits had rifles and Maxim guns, the Ottomans spears and few old muskets.

As I noted earlier, whatever makes you think that whatever is said here will make any difference at all? Those in the US know the problem and are working to correct it. Bill D. is correct.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 27 Jul 15 - 09:30 PM

A quote from Winston Churchill:

What enterprise an enlightened community may attempt that is more noble and profitable than the reclamation from barbarism of a fertile region and large population?...The act is virtuous, the exercise invigorating, and the result often extremely profitable.

Oh, yes -- he was writing about the Battle of Omdurman, where the British killed or wounded some 25,000 Ottoman soldiers while suffering about 50 casualties themselves. The Brits had rifles and Maxim guns, the Ottomans spears and few old muskets.

As I noted earlier, whatever makes you think that whatever is said here will make any difference at all? Those in the US know the problem and are working to correct it. Bill D. is correct.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 02:16 AM

Whatever makes you think that here is the only place where people point out that its attitude to guns makes the USA look stupid ?

Thanks for the reminder of our past. The UK, and several other European countries, have stopped using superior technology against hapless natives AND have agreed, through democratic processes, that tools designed for killing people will not be held by private citizens.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 04:42 AM

America has this, you butthurt Britishers:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJlB5K6JXm4

Just because you're obsessed with the USA and yet Americans don't care about boring, stick-up-the-arse Britain is no cause to get your drawers in a bunch daily.

The new British Imperial Mission: colonize websites and kill them with utter boredom.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 04:47 AM

Do Americans care about any other country ?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: akenaton
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 05:35 AM

My tool kit contains a knapping hammer, square at one end and wedge shaped at t'other.
Used to chip and dress very hard stone.....its correct use is difficult and requires skill. I use it mainly on granite and dolerite.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 06:12 AM

well yes, but do ever feel a bit sorry for all these people who get shot. feel sorry for their families?

i really don't know how you live with it. its like a town the size of Boston in Lincolnshire was levelled to the ground every year and all the men women and children were killed.

i think its that, that amazes us. i'm really sorry if we seem boring and repetitive on the subject. but amazement that you put up with this - that is our attitude.

as for disarming the population. it wouldn't be impossible, but if you never start a difficult job, it will never get done.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 06:30 AM

another advantage if you moved over to airguns - i just bought a crossman bejamin that cost me £120 from a gunshop. you could buy it from Walmart for about $70. so it would be really cheap.

you could still shoot at each - but probably you probably would kill as many people. i can't hit a tin can with the damn thing...

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 07:16 AM

Some of us also find it odd that a main reason given for not changing is a document designed for a situation that existed 220 years ago. Banging rocks together is an exagerration but as a metaphor it works for us.

We may have constitutional anachronisms (monarchy, House of Lords etc) but one massacre related to assault rifles and out they go, then one related to hand guns and out they go. The design function of these things is killing people. Other firearms are designed for killing things ranging from rats to red deer and we still have those under fairly strict control.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: bubblyrat
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 09:54 AM

The problem in Britain is the hypocrisy of it all. When a guy went doolally a few years back, and murdered a number of people in the town of Hungerford, the IMMEDIATE reaction of our government was to BAN all semi-automatic rifles.Later atrocities led to a COMPLETE ban on hand-guns of ANY sort, and also semi-auto and pump-action shotguns were limited to 3 rounds only .Pump-action shotguns,by the way,are regarded with GRAVE SUSPICION in Britain.
I asked (politely) many police officers, over time, if the various murderers had chosen to kill by driving Landrovers or Jeeps Cherokee into crowds, or bus-queues,would the government have immediately banned these types of vehicles ? The answer, of course, is/was always "No, of COURSE not ! ! " .
Meanwhile , our Olympic pistol-shooting team have to travel to FRANCE every time they want to practice !! It is INSANE !!!
PS ; I used to own a Mossberg 20-gauge pump; it was DELIGHTFUL !!

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Wesley S
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 10:14 AM

One thing I've noticed over the years is that the disapproval of British citizens over American gun laws has no affect on the situation here. It will take American voters to change things.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 10:19 AM

well i think they did the right thing with Hungerford.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 10:26 AM

And I am appalled that Britain seems to export such problems as football hooliganism.

But if you wish to visit the US and are truly fearful of gun-related crime, remember that something like 80+% of the population lives in urban areas -- more than the UK. So, don't visit New York, Washington DC, LA, Chicago, Boston and concentrate on other places. Zion National Park in Utah, for one example, is quite lovely, and so is Bryce. And while no place anywhere is totally without crime, you might visit Seattle, or Portland (Oregon or Maine), or Memphis. Any of those should give you a nice musical experience and, as long as you avoid Certain Areas (much as you'd do in London or Manchester or Belfast or Birmingham, etc.) your chances of being involved in gun-related or other crime would be very, very slim indeed.

Or visit Canada. Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal, Quebec, Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton -- all great places, and for a real treat, try Whitehorse, Yellowknife, or Dawson.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 10:57 AM

Aaahh! Change the subject - the tactic of the defeated.

As we did with guns, we dealt with football hooliganism - very little here now. And such as there is is dealt with very promptly.

If you want to see REAL football hooliganism, try some of the Eastern European countries, or South America.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Stu
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 11:41 AM

"Meanwhile , our Olympic pistol-shooting team have to travel to FRANCE every time they want to practice !! It is INSANE !!!"

Alternatively, it's a small price to pay for avoiding the slaughter that occurs in the US. I'd rather have no guns than Sandy Hook.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,#
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 12:15 PM

The USA has a constitution which is the ultimate law of the land, and until such time the SCOTUS rules firearms are illegal to possess, people will possess them. That's it, that's all. I suspect many posters here have never read the Constitution, Bill of Rights (which is the first ten amendments) or the subsequent seventeen amendments. Getting nasty with each other accomplishes nothing, possibly other than to show your own degree of miscomprehension to do with how the American system of government (or lack thereof) works. If a court case to ban guns were started today it would take probably ten years to reach the SCOTUS. Fact.

I don't really give a rat's ass how much Yanks and Brits fight each other here or anywhere else. It's not my business because I spend most of my time in the music section. But all of you should at least argue from an informed position. Few of you are.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Jul 15 - 12:41 PM

if the various murderers had chosen to kill by driving Landrovers or Jeeps Cherokee into crowds, or bus-queues,would the government have immediately banned these types of vehicles

Those vehicles are not designed for killing people. Semi-automatic rifles and handguns are designed for killing people. Simple.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 02:29 AM

....and 95% of all forest fires are caused by trees!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Musket weighing in
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 02:32 AM

I could be wrong, I don't read every thread on account of having a life.

But I think I'm the one who tells our colonial ex subjects to "bang the rocks together" when we discuss items where third world countries such as The USA need to progress somewhat in order to keep up with the civilised world.

Guns and capital punishment are the main two to which I advise rocks and a loud banging noise.

Yeah I got it from Douglas Adams.

Yeah, it denotes how banging rocks together did so much towards prehistoric man progressing.

Live with it.

Oh and keep it in your own bloody country. If you start removing guns, make a show start with that sick dentist who cuts heads off lions in conservation areas. Let him near my teeth? I wouldn't let him near a bowl of mashed banana and a rubber spoon.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Aloysius Chuckabutty
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 03:14 AM

I always thought "banging the rocks together" refers to nuclear fission, the "rocks" being obtained from uranium ore. Although flint knapping may have been the starting point.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Will Fly
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 04:58 AM

Richard, I don't understand what motivates you to open threads which comment on some disagreeable fact or other about the USA. I don't understand your reasons for opening this one in particular. It deals with a topic which has been discussed over and over again, ad nauseam, ad infitum, with the same points made endlessly by the same people.

All it does is irritate those American 'Catters who know perfectly well what happens in their own backyard and are perfectly aware of the issues surrounding the topic. Do you pretend to some British moral superiority which you want to wave in the air? If you do, it's fucking tedious.

If you want to get worked up about social issues, there's a whole heap of shit in our own UK backyard - try concentrating on that for a change.

As if anything discussed here - no matter how hot the topic gets - will make any difference anyway.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 07:18 AM

Cutting the head off a lion is one thing, cutting the head off a person in the street is quite another. People in glass houses.....

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 08:19 AM

It is important to continue to condemn primitive stupidity and arrogance. And to note that in general those waving the most wholly unnecessary rifled phallic symbols are waving the most confederate symbols of racism.

What do I think of American civilisation? I think it would be a good thing.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 08:23 AM

PS - although POTUS has been doing well the last week.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,#
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 09:26 AM

"PS - although POTUS has been doing well the last week."

I'm sure he's thrilled to have your approval.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 09:44 AM

"What do I think of American civilisation? I think it would be a good thing."
.,,.,.

LoL. But if one is going to pinch a well-known mot of Mahatma Gandhi, minimally adapted to the occasion, would it not be civil at least to acknowledge its source?!

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 09:52 AM

Flint knapping is actually a very precise skill, whether it's done with two stones or by flaking chips off with a piece of antler. The result can be a very, very sharp tool, as sharp as a surgeon's scalpel. Volcanic glass, or obsidian, can be made that sharp rather easily; it can even be ground rather than chipped. In any case, creating weapons and tools out of stone is not done by "banging the rocks together," nor is using flint to create sparks for a fire.

You might want to visit the old flint mines in East Anglia (as I have) to learn more on this subject. It's really quite interesting.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 10:03 AM

Go further back, much further back.
http://www.livescience.com/50908-oldest-stone-tools-predate-humans.html

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,#
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 06:27 PM

Obsidian tools are sometimes used in surgery. Have been since the 1960s. Nothing to do with anything; just an observation.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 07:07 PM

my dentist must be an obsidian - I knew he was some sort of foreigner

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Modest Proposal
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 07:22 PM

Here's a thought. Let the guns be. Regulate the bejaysus the sale of ammo! Require a licence, limit the amounts, apply the rules to self-loading fans too. Make customers return used casings before buying more. Let them have their guns, but rigorously control the bullets. Works for dangerous pharmaceuticals~~no, wait. Ah, ¥%¡|!¿>^ it! Back to Adams' formula. It's a metaphor.
I'm not in the US or the UK, I'll just get me hat...   < ><>how many times must the cannonballs fly . . .

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 07:42 PM

I had a rather experience that taught me just how very sharp a piece of obsidian can be.

I gave a chunk of it to each of two little nieces of mine, because the rocks were beautiful and the little girls wanted them.

A few moments later I asked to see the rocks again and to my chagrin the little girls' tender little palms were crisscrossed with tiny little bloody cuts.

Even then they didn't want to give them up.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 09:59 PM

There is quite a bit of obsidian here, as this is the area of the Yellowstone Caldera and the track of the "hot spot" as the North American Plate moved over the past few million years. There are many spots of previous volcanic activity, such as Craters, a great place to see how plants establish themselves and eventually turn rock into soil.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Wesley S
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 10:32 PM

"Richard, I don't understand what motivates you to open threads which comment on some disagreeable fact or other about the USA. I don't understand your reasons for opening this one in particular. It deals with a topic which has been discussed over and over again, ad nauseam, ad infitum, with the same points made endlessly by the same people."

Will - I couldn't agree more. The assumed superiority of a small number of English posters here has always amused me. Life must be good indeed if one has to look at foreign countries for problems to solve. The sun has set on the British Empire indeed.

Thanks for the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and especially the Who however. That's one export we love. The superior attitude - not so much.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 01:01 AM

Rap, I found the obsidian in the central Oregon mountains. I used to spend a lot of time in those mountains. Found a lot of fools gold and quartz too.

Speaking of fools gold, I found a lot of it on huge boulders in the mountains. I like my idea of prying it off then dipping each strand in laminate to keep it from rusting. I would market it geared especially to lovers.

You are welcome.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 03:11 AM

I don't understand what motivates you to open threads which comment on some disagreeable fact or other about the USA

US Federal governement seems to have a job of looking out for the best interests of the American people. Is there something to that effect in the constitution ? From the perspective of most of the rest of the world it does that ruthlessly.

Its foreign policy (and some actions that don't seem to be publicly declared policy) get it noticed, including some of its internal affairs.

Maybe if they studied how other countries manage their affairs they could do something about this particular disagreeable fact. All countries have long and complex histories.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 09:36 AM

Central Oregon has its own history of vulcanism. Mt. St. Helen's is only one of the more recent examples. I collected some obsidian from the slopes of Mt. Shasta in Northern California quite a few years back; I eventually gave it to my brother for his rock collection.

My brother recently had some rock from a farm in West Central Illinois assayed to prove or disprove an old legend about a silver mine. While the location of the mine is of course lost, the rock assayed out for both silver AND gold: you'd need to move and smelt a fairly large sized hill for the gold, but only half of that for the silver. It was decided not to pursue the minerals not only for economic reasons, but also the prevent a wild, mad gold rush into the farmlands of Illinois. Chicagoans flooding the area every Fall to "hunt deer" are bad enough!

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Musket getting disturbed
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 09:48 AM

Bugger bugger bugger.

I'm supporting Bridge on this. You don't have to be in the cage to comment on the zoo.

Yes, he is possibly preaching to the converted to a degree and yes, his way of going about it does get up your nose. But U.S. Attitude to guns and the absurd stupid misinterpretation of a legal amendment from the country with more lawyers per square inch than The Old Bailey are worthy of a good old shake of the head.

Ok Wesley, you took on The Stones, Beatles, Who etc. we have other things to offer such as less gun crime, nobody has to carry a gun to make up for a small dick, we don't kill prisoners and we have a universal social safety net.

Perhaps you might want to see if any of their back albums are available on Amazon?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,#
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 11:14 AM

Musket is right. However just being right changes nothing. Nor does being rude, btw. The US is bound by whatever the SCOTUS decides is law in the US. Could it change? Yes. All it would require is a revision of the second and clarification of the fourteenth amendment. (The reason regarding the fourteenth amendment is that a section says Congress's enforcement power may not be used to contradict a Supreme Court interpretation of the amendment (which then extends to all other amendments.))

Blathering about how Americans are still in the stone age helps no one. They have a problem and recognizing it--which is beginning to happen--is the first step to solving it. It may require a totally disgusting/revolting event to cause an overturn of the second amendment. An event that makes things like Sandy Hook pale in comparison. Certainly the NRA as it presently exists needs a thorough house cleaning, and gun/ammunition dealers need to be barred from having the political-lobby influence they have at present, so while it is possible, I won't hold my breath. I wish the Americans well.

Media plays a pivotal role in how we think of things. And media is owned by rich rich people, people to whom an expenditure of a billion dollars means little. Much like spending a hundred dollars might mean to most of us. The scope and magnitude of media's ability to change and direct our thinking is well documented, long-studied and very scary. So while I agree with Musket's remark that some people have catching up to do, that also extends to people everywhere, including the UK.

Blair was a warmonger and British people voted him into power. That may sting because the self-righteous can claim "it wasn't me", when in fact though it may not have been 'you' directly, it was your countrymen/women that voted him into power and your taxes that paid to fuel the killing machine, and your children who died protecting rich people's investments. We can look back a dozen years and ask the question, 'What good came of it?' Looking at present-day Afghanistan and Iraq, I will have to leave the answer to people lots smarter than I'll ever be. Have a good day all.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 11:36 AM

Yes but -

Once we got hold of what a warmonger B.Liar really was, his star was no longer in the ascendant and eventually off he went (until, like a vampire, he rose from the dead to try to sabotage the people's desire for Corbyn to lead the Labour party - but I disgress). That it at the root of many of the disagreements between Mither and me. He's a Blairite. And possibly a Mandelbaumite too.

Further - we are in the beginning of the era in which the fourth estate Balkanises, and the barriers to entry in media are going down. If IS can use the new media so effectively to recruit and propagandise, so can we. The more people we can educate into believing that in some areas the USA is beyond the pale, the sooner change for the better may come.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 12:08 PM

Hi, Rap and Ebbie. Thanks for the info on obsidian. As a Midwesterner, I have never seen obsidian in the wild, not even on my trips out west.

Then somebody told me about Glass Butte in Oregon, clearly a good place to look, (but not the only place.) That would be interesting to see sometime.

http://northwestrevealed.com/2013/09/17/rivers-of-glass-glass-butte-oregon

#, that's interesting about obsidian for surgical use.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 12:10 PM

Although the US Supreme Court is allegedly non-biased and supposed to look at each case it rules on by the legal ramifications of each case, each member of the Court is a human being, and it is a given that human beings act and react upon their own beliefs and desires.

So it develops that sometimes we have a liberal court and sometimes, like now, sometimes we have a conservative court. Each member is brought in by the president currently in office, subject to ratification by the legislature at the time, a legislature also either predominantly conservative or liberal at the time.

Turnover of Supreme Court members is slow, since tenure is either life long or terminated only by a member's own decision to retire.

Currently we have a conservative Court, and their decisions reflect this, often by a 5 to 4 vote.

This won't change any time soon.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 12:26 PM

Since the USA is not a multi-party democracy I can see that some structural inertia provided by the Supreme Court might have its merits.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 12:44 PM

"The mills of the gods grind slow...", seeking balance,the pendulum swings both ways, all things come to those who wait, blar, blar, blar (to quote joHn), etc, etc, etc...

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,#
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 09:46 PM

"the pendulum swings both ways"

I seldom disagree with you, but in fact a pendulum just swings. Recall Foucault's, and it becomes clear. Until it digresses to inertia, it swings in ever-dimishing spirals until its motion dissolves to stasis.

BUT, if the planet should stop abruptly, all bets are off :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 10:18 PM

If the planet stops abruptly -- to paraphrase Phil Ochs -- I'll stand behind a bar dreamin' of a spaceship getaway car, headed for Mars or any other planet that has bars, like Gerde's Folk City.

I've also found obsidian in the slag heaps near blast furnaces and other very hot places. Not often, but I have.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: LadyJean
Date: 30 Jul 15 - 10:39 PM

The second amendment is part of The Bill Of Rigths, the first ten amendments to our constitution. In the U.S. this is a very important document. When I was in the fourth grade we had a framed copy on our classroom wall. One day, our teacher went through it and explained what each right meant. To her it meant she would never have to endure the kind of persecution her ancestors had as Russian Jews. When we got to the second amendment she explained that this was written when our country was a wilder and woolier place, like on the westerns we saw on TV. Doubtful she ever touched a gun.

In the seventh grade the Bill of Rights was in the back of our history book. Once again, our teacher went through it and explained what each amendment meant. Then she told us that NO RIGHT IS ABSOLUTE. The first amendment guarantees religious freedom. But Mormon polygamy is still illegal. It also guarantees free speech, though we do still have libel laws in this country, fairly liberal libel laws, but libel laws.   

So, it is possible to regulate gun ownership. It is doubtful, though it could be done, that we would scrap the second amendment.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Musket bridging the gap
Date: 31 Jul 15 - 12:05 PM

Oy Bridge. Just because I'm cultured enough, important enough and handsome enough to have been invited to No. 10 for the odd reception, does not make me a "Blairite." I'm a Musket, which means I have my own views but have always voted Labour.

So, when you were a Tory, were you waving your Union Jack flag at Heath, Th*tcher or Major?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Bill D
Date: 31 Jul 15 - 07:59 PM

Musket said: ". But U.S. Attitude to guns and the absurd stupid misinterpretation of a legal amendment ..."

The US is not an 'entity' in that regard... and it doesn't HAVE an attitude... and expressing it that way does poor service to those many millions who object to the stupid attitude SOME Americans have - which is furthered by the millions spent by and in the name of the NRA in order to keep the $$$$$ flowing and promote that ".absurd stupid misinterpretation of a legal amendment ".

There are flaws & problems about and within the UK, but I don't start a dozen threads about them, and I certainly don't assume that the UK as an entity should be held up for ridicule for any of them. Why is that so hard to understand?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 31 Jul 15 - 10:34 PM

I quite agree, Bill D. And I speak as both a gun owner and a (target) shooter. I have never had objection to rational gun laws, or any other type of well-considered law. But to harp upon a subject which is based upon media representation and the resultant personal opinions, for the US or any other country, is beyond a waste of time. It is as if I based my opinions of the UK on the actions of those men who broke into a house in Romford wielding crowbars and a shotgun.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Will Fly
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 03:43 AM

Bill D and Rap - my feelings exactly!

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Musket shooting from hip
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 12:28 PM

Rational gun law?

I thought you weren't interested in UK policies?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Chongo Chimp
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 12:38 PM

Just wait till I get elected president. You'll see dramatic changes in gun laws in the USA then. Yessir. And if Richard Bridge don't like it, he can kiss my coconuts.

- Chongo

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 02:58 PM

Some people (mostly some of the Brits) wholeheartedly agree with Adolf Hitler. He banned all guns, then attacked Britain. It's a good thing that the Yanks knew how to use those guns....it saved Britain's ass!

I VERY much agree with Will Fly's post:

From: Will Fly
Date: 29 Jul 15 - 04:58 AM

"Richard, I don't understand what motivates you to open threads which comment on some disagreeable fact or other about the USA. I don't understand your reasons for opening this one in particular. It deals with a topic which has been discussed over and over again, ad nauseam, ad infitum, with the same points made endlessly by the same people.

All it does is irritate those American 'Catters who know perfectly well what happens in their own backyard and are perfectly aware of the issues surrounding the topic. Do you pretend to some British moral superiority which you want to wave in the air? If you do, it's fucking tedious.

If you want to get worked up about social issues, there's a whole heap of shit in our own UK backyard - try concentrating on that for a change.

As if anything discussed here - no matter how hot the topic gets - will make any difference anyway."

Instead of promoting the use, or banning of guns, why not promote tolerance, and even love, and less stupid, useless opinions of divisions. How about promoting MUSIC.

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 03:16 PM

Clarification: "Some people (mostly some of the Brits) wholeheartedly agree with Adolf Hitler. He banned all guns, then attacked his own citizens, killed many innocent Jews, along with multitudes of others, after enslaving them in concentration camps...then attacked Britain.

Personally, I think that nobody needs guns....IF they felt secure that their governments were really up to the task of protecting their citizens. A lot of people in the U.S. feel that they need guns and stuff, to protect themselves from the government!!..or from those that the government refuses to protect them from. Many people feel that the reason they want their 'right to maintain their arms', to overthrow an out of control government....which is being brought about by the very same 'activists', on both sides('right' and 'left').
So, if you feel the need to rag on people for their gun beliefs, try ramping down the inflammatory rhetoric, that promotes and exploits hate, and divisions...and try lifting up those things which unite us, and demand honest government!!!!...(something that neither the Brits or the Yanks have!!!!!!!!!!...!!!!!

Regards, and Keep loving!!...(to some you may have to look that up!).

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 03:39 PM

"... Hitler. He banned all guns, then attacked his own citizens,"

Not so. Check it out. Only people still ignorant of the facts make that claim.

The Weimar Republic, the governing body BEFORE Hitler's regime, passed stringent gun restrictions. Hitler EASED them.

Except for Jews, mainly.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 04:09 PM

Ebbie: " Hitler EASED them.
Except for Jews, mainly."

Wrong!

However, I did agree with your very first post.

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 04:42 PM

No, GfS. You're incorrect. Please check it out -- Jews were banned from owning ANY weapons and those that they had were confiscated. Check out Halbrook's writings.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Don Firth
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 05:02 PM

A few decades back, a guitar student of mine was an ex-Marine, and in the Marine Corps, he developed an enthusiasm for target shooting with a pistol. He invited me to come with him to a local pistol range. I found trying to put a bullet into a 3" black spot on a piece of paper at 25 yards quite a challenge and a great deal of fun—sort of like golf.

Loren had a .22 target pistol (I forget which brand) and a fine-tuned Colt .45 automatic "Gold Cup," the target model of the slab-sided military sidearm. Kick like a mule!

I went to a local sporting goods store and bought a Smith and Wesson Model 41 target pistol (long barrel) and, on a whim, a Walther PPK, 9mm. short—this was nearly the same pistol that James Bond packed around. Small, compact, powerful for its size. Europe's answer to the .38 caliber snub-nosed revolver.

Interesting to note that when I bought these guns, there was no background check of any kind. The store clerk didn't even ask me for I.D. (!!)

For a couple of years, Loren and I, and a couple of other friends, would spend Sunday afternoons either at the Seattle Police Athletic Association's pistol range (Loren was a member, although he was not a policeman) blowing holes in paper targets, or out at a gravel pit "plinking." Filling empty beer or soft drink cans with water, setting them on a fence rail, and blazing away at them. A soft drink can filled with water makes a very satisfying geyser when hit square-on with a 9mm bullet!

I haven't gone shooting for a number of years, now, and my pistols reside safely under lock and key. I have no plans to join an unofficial civilian militia. Crazy! If the U. S. government turns into a dictatorship, I will simply move to Canada. If someone tries to break into my apartment, he will, first, have to deal with a secure building, then get through some efficient locks. My wife and I feel pretty safe in our snug little nest.

But--if someone does manage to break in, he may find himself being whipped about the head and shoulders with a sport fencing saber, left over from my days of emulating Zorro at my local athletic club.

I understand that, although private ownership of handguns is illegal in the UK, ownership of shotguns IS legal. If push came to shove, I'd prefer to face someone who is armed with a snub-nosed revolver than some nutter with a double-barreled shotgun!!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Don Firth
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 05:26 PM

Dozy twat, yourself, o anonymous one!

What's to prevent somebody bent on murder and mayhem from breaking into a safe and going out with a shotgun concealed beneath an overcoat?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 05:43 PM

OK, Rapparee, and Ebbie..but still, it amounts to much the same thing. What group of people, religious or racial would you suggest should be banned from owning guns?....and then call it non-discriminatory?? ...Maybe, traditionally married Christians?..White people?? Republicans? Independents?
It wouldn't work...because once you demand people to turn over their guns, and they say ,"No", then the next step is by force...and then the bloodshed begins!

...just so long as they don't try to take away my guitar picks, or ballpoint sword!!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 05:57 PM

What's to prevent somebody bent on murder and mayhem from breaking into a safe and going out with a shotgun concealed beneath an overcoat?

Civilisation

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Don Firth
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 06:13 PM

Get real, Goofus! Neither Ebbie nor Raparree said anything about banning gun ownership to specific racial or religious groups.

And for the anonymous one who criticized my suggestion that a Brit armed with a shotgun could be more dangerous than an American (or a Brit) armed with a snub-nosed revolver, you might take a good look at how the UK's gun laws are actually working. "Civilization," indeed!!

In 2009, twelve years after the Firearms Act of 1997 was passed, Daily Mail Online reported that Britain was "the most violent country in Europe." They also reported that Britain's home figures showed "the UK had a worse rate for all types of violence than the U.S. and South Africa."

Not quite the rosy picture that some of the Brits inhabiting this website and taking pot-shots at Americans would have you believe!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,#
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 06:45 PM

They still allow fox hunting in the UK?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Greg F.
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 06:46 PM

OK, Rapparee, and Ebbie..but still, it amounts to much the same thing.

No, Goofus, it doesn't. Go back to sleep.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 10:01 PM

Goofus, you mean like the Black Panther Party? The Huey Newton Gun Club? W.E.B. DuBois? Harriet Tubman? Frederick Douglass? The New Black Liberation Militia? The New Black Panther Party? Deacons for Self-Defense? Nation of Islam? Revolutionary Action Movement? Lowndes County Freedom Organization? The number of African-Americans in the US military (NB: an average of 106% of the total troops in Vietnam were African-American).

"Violence exercised merely in self-defense, all societies, from the most primitive to the most cultured and civilized, accept as moral and legal. The principle of self-defense, even involving weapons and bloodshed, has never been condemned, even by Gandhi," to quote Martin Luther King (who applied for a concealed carry permit, but was turned down).

Geez, Goofus, learn something before you make a fool of yourself!

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 10:02 PM

Excuse me, that should be 10.6%, not 106%

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 10:18 PM

Oh. Glad to hear it. Thought maybe Idaho measures things differently. :)

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Aug 15 - 11:46 PM

Gfs...we agree on more than a few things, but I want to correct some ahistorical, and oft-repeated, but untrue things in your statement below:

***** "Some people (mostly some of the Brits) wholeheartedly agree with Adolf Hitler. He banned all guns, then attacked Britain. It's a good thing that the Yanks knew how to use those guns....it saved Britain's ass!" ******

Okay, here we go.

1. Hitler did not ban all guns. Hardly. It's an apocryphal story endlessly repeated by American politicians, and it's simply not true. This has already been commented on by Ebbie and Rapparee.

2. He did not "then attack Britain". He attacked Poland in September 1939. Period. Just Poland. He did it believing that Britain and France would make angry noises about it, but not go to war. He was mistaken about that! Britain and France declared war on Germany within days, which was a stunning shock to Hitler and his diplomatic staff. Therefore, hostilities between Britain and Germany began when Britain (along with France) declared war ON Germany. This does not equate to Germany attacking Britain, as Germany did NOT initiate a state of hostilities with Britain or France, they responded TO a state of hostilities declared BY Britain and France. Germans, not surprisingly, considered Britain and France to have started the great power war that followed, since they declared war on Germany. There followed a lengthy period called "the phony war", because none of those three powers were ready yet for a major campaign in the West, and they all desperately needed more time to prepare. By spring of 1940 they fairly much were ready. Hitler had always envisioned the British as his most desirable potential allies in the new World Order that he had in mind, and he was very hopeful of avoiding war with Great Britain. Because of this he made many militarily odd decisions, such as not sending in the panzers to crush the British troops trapped at Dunkirk. He expected the British to reach an accommodation with Germany and seek peace after the Fall of France. Again he was utterly mistaken. He did eventually attack Great Britain when his diplomatic hopes got nowhere, yes, but a lot of fighting and time had gone by before that happened.

3. The Yanks' use of guns is not what "saved Britain's ass". The Russians saved Britain's ass when they stopped the German army dead in its tracks before Moscow in December '41, threw the Germans back, and inflicted upon them their first great defeat on land. It was the Russian Army that broke the back of Nazi Germany's military machine in huge battles of attrition from Dec '41 to May 1945. Nearly 8 out of 10 German soldiers killed in that war died on the Eastern Front. The fighting in the West was a sideshow in comparison.

4. Did the USA help the British fight the war? Certainly. And that help was quite significant. But it does not compare in importance or scale to what the Russians did. You won't get this in the Hollywood movies, because all they are ever about is promoting the USA version of itself as "savior of the world", and they have little to say about the Russian role in WWII.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Aug 15 - 12:11 AM

I should also add that the RAF saved Britain's "ass" in the late summer and fall of 1940, when they (just barely) held off the German Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain. It was a VERY close thing, could have gone either way but for one or two bad German decisions, but the British did it by themselves (with the aid of some very brave Polish, Czech, French, and Canadian pilots who also served in the RAF during that campaign. The USA played no part in that.

One thing the USA did that was quite helpful to Britain in the dark days of the early war was to supply about 50 old American destroyers to the Royal Navy as part of the Lend Lease Act of 1940. This did help the British significantly. It didn't win the war, but it helped. Credit where credit is due. The full story of that is here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destroyers_for_Bases_Agreement

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 02 Aug 15 - 01:37 AM

OK..I agree with most of that......however, Germany made the mistake of opening the war on TWO fronts..and that most certainly put the nail in the coffin for them.
BTW, I'm glad that when the Allied Forces invaded Normandy, I'm glad they used slingshots and bows and arrows!...maybe even banged a few rocks together in the process!
As far as Hollywood's version...Do you mean that John Wayne, didn't win that Battle of the Bulge by himself??..I thought Audie Murphy and him slaughtered the whole of the German forces...(BTW, John Wayne was a '4-F'..meaning he was turned down for the military for physical or medically unfit reasons...just a tidbit)....

As for, Rapparee's, ".....you mean like the Black Panther Party? The Huey Newton Gun Club? W.E.B. DuBois? Harriet Tubman? Frederick Douglass? The New Black Liberation Militia? The New Black Panther Party? Deacons for Self-Defense? Nation of Islam? Revolutionary Action Movement?"....You mean all of Obama's buddies???? His Justice Department seems to overlook those groups altogether...for any and every thing...like the drug cartels....
Just a thought... have you ever wondered WHY those groups haven't been reigned in???....I guess if the ideological mindset is 'useful', why go after them?
I was referring to those groups(the ones I mentioned who hold a 'traditional view' of America.

Look, I'm NOT promoting, nor defending the use or reasons that gun people like their guns...merely stating that IF a policy came about in gun confiscation, or over regulating them out of existence, that the backlash would be VERY bloody. Just imagine if someone came to YOUR door and demanded YOUR guns. I don't think your re-action would be quite the same as 'Trick or Treaters, at Halloween!

If you don't like guns, don't get one....if you want to get rid of their use, I'd suggest promoting calm, and unity, being a living example of Love, Peace, and tolerance. It worked for Gandhi, throwing off British oppression, and it worked for Dr. Martin Luther King. Blaming guns for all the violence, is like blaming Rosie O'Donnell's fork for her being so fat! Perhaps, we should focus more on people's values...and raise them, by example, rather than catering to the lowest common denominators in society! and passing laws to accommodate the stupidest, by forcing all those who aren't prone to be as stupid, into laws dictated by the needs of the stupid few...perhaps the need to feel like one needs a gun would subside.....and that goes for a whole lot of other things, as well!
The government, allegedly, bans illegal drug use...so, how's that going???

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Aug 15 - 02:14 AM

Quoting The Daily Mail and then using it to comment on The UK?

You should get out more.

I'll tell you what the difference is between pistols and rifles. Neither can be carried in The UK (other than cocked and empty certain types of rifles being carried between locked cabinet at home and licenced target range / game keeping etc) whilst either can be carried loaded as a penis substitute in a certain less developed country.

Let's hear those rocks.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 02 Aug 15 - 02:47 AM

Somebody hiding behind 'Guest': ".... whilst either can be carried loaded as a penis substitute in a certain less developed country.
Let's hear those rocks."

I think you've confused that with 'getting your rocks off'!...keep bangin'!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Matfelon
Date: 02 Aug 15 - 03:10 AM

"In my opinion, had it not been for the Eagle Squadrons extraordinary skill and valor, we most certainly would have lost the battle of Britain and possibly World War II."

I always nod when I see a hawk,
If you wave they'll think you silly

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 Aug 15 - 09:12 PM

GfS, how do you know that the Feds and other law enforcement agencies haven't been investigating these groups? Moreover, some of those I cited are historical, not current. I have known members of the BPP, I even sold a shotgun to one way, way back when. It was a bolt action shotgun with a very long barrel; he wanted it for hunting and it wasn't much good for anything else.

There are enough nut groups in the US to satisfy any argument. The UK, of course, doesn't have groups like the British National Party, Combat 18, the UDF, the Real IRA, and so on. Belfast doesn't have Memorial Gardens and murals, and no one found a mortar in a cemetery a couple days ago.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 03 Aug 15 - 02:06 AM

Yes but all the guns are held by criminals.

Just thought I'd point that out...

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Rapparee
Date: 03 Aug 15 - 12:09 PM

Don't be silly. I know many African-Americans, American Indians, Asian-Americans, and others who own firearms and are hardly criminals. In fact, I take it as a personal insult that you would say such a thing and I shan't post to the this thread again.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 03 Aug 15 - 01:03 PM

Rap, I read GUEST's post to be an ironic referrence to your comment about the UK in your previous post.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 03 Aug 15 - 07:17 PM

Rap, Well, I can't speak for all the groups, but the Justice Dept. didn't go after the Black Panthers, when they were obstructing voters at some voting places in 2008, nor did they try to 'investigate' or make arrests, for inciting riots at Ferguson, or any of the other places, where the Panthers were stirring people up to riot, and a few other examples...I don't think Obama's 'Justice' Dept., seems to move, in a non-partisan way. IF they were, (and being as this is a 'gun thread'), where is the 'Justice Dept.'s' investigation of Hilary's illegal gun sales to the Syrians, through the Benghazi consulate????? ...from which they're still playing footsie, and trying to hide that from the people?? I wonder if she deleted all THOSE related e-mails... She sure ain't volunteering them to clear her name!!....Sorta reminiscent of Iran/Contra and Mena, Arkansas, while Billy was governor, and the Bush's were running the operation!!!
So let's all look the other way, and then pretend that the NRA is a bigger threat! Maybe if enough fingers are pointed, we can all get caught up in the hysteria d'jour, and not pay attention to history.. nor ever go after the KNOWN felons and traitors!!

Oh no!!! you say, let's all vote for Hilary, because she's a woman, or Obama because he's black.... those certainly are top reasons!!!
If we focus in on that, we can forget that either of them weren't even fit, or experienced enough to run for office......

"By the time a man runs for President, he's no longer fit for the job!'--Adlai Stevenson

GfS

P.S. Watch all the Bernie Sanders supporters come to defense of Hilary...just because she's a woman and a Democrat!
Stick with Bernie.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Vashta Nerada
Date: 03 Aug 15 - 08:57 PM

It's Hillary.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 04 Aug 15 - 09:28 AM

Just reported on Sky News in the UK - a three-year-old has been shot and killed by an eleven-year-old while they were playing with a gun in a car in Detroit.

Come on, bullet-heads - tell us how more guns will prevent shootings.

Keep banging the.......oh, fuck it, what's the point?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 04 Aug 15 - 11:10 AM

Sure, guns are a problem, and more guns are a worse problem. But the other big problem (as shown by the story from Detroit) is the ever-increasing stupidity level.

That 11-year-old probably had a male parent who was planted in front of a TV or video game at a young age. By age, twelve that boy was probably on the streets, out with buddies, or playing soccer, and never had the chance to learn about younger kids. In short, his grasp of real life and real children is pretty slim.

If we don't do something about the stupidity level, kids are going to keep getting killed, one way or another.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 04 Aug 15 - 11:38 AM

True, Leeneia.

But if there hadn't been a gun around, no matter how stupid the parents were, nobody could have been shot. What don't the small-dick gun-nuts understand about that straightforward fact?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,#
Date: 04 Aug 15 - 11:44 AM

"What don't the small-dick gun-nuts understand about that straightforward fact?"

They haven't been taught to. People perceive guns to be the answer to a question that never gets asked, and when the only tool you have is a hammer then every problem looks like a nail.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Bill D
Date: 04 Aug 15 - 12:58 PM

" What don't the small-dick gun-nuts understand about that straightforward fact?"

What YOU don't understand is that they DO understand that! Their common 'reasoning' is that because there are already so many guns around...especially among their peers... they think their odds are better if they also have guns. It's a smaller version of the arms race among countries.
Once many peers in certain cultural communities have guns, it becomes a standard way to settle disputes that were once settled by fights. I once read an interview with a kid who had been convicted of a shooting. He just shrugged and explained that having a gun was a quick way to solve a problem-- and you didn't have to be BIG or get beat on (if you were smart & lucky). ... and if you wanted to compete in the drug business, or to rob & steal... a gun became the only way to be...ummm.. efficient at it.
   Yes... it's a circular argument. The more that others have guns, the more that 'they' feel they need guns.
   The same general reasoning is used by the 2nd amendment crowd who "don't trust the government". Why don't they trust the government? Why... because the government is secretly scheming to take away their guns! (It's more complicated than that, but you hear that constantly from the 'Militias'.)
And once so many bad guys...of various types... have guns, many good guys succumb to the idea that they need to 'defend themselves and their families'.....and there are now approximately 4 million AK-47s in private hands in this country. You all wanta come over here and help me take 'em away?

I once knew a guy who carried a .45 and thought he was being "good guy with a gun". We debated everything about weapons- and I once said (tongue in cheek) that I thought we ought to solve the horrors of war by issuing all soldiers a bag of marshmallows which they would throw at each other till one had a certain number of 'hits'... and they were then 'out'... winner was last one standing.
   My friend looked thoughtful for a few seconds, then said: "Yeah... that might be ok for awhile... but then some bastard like ME would come along and put a rock inside each marshmallow, and off we'd go again!"

   He made a certain amount of sense.

Guns ARE a stupid, horrible way to deal with life.... but once they reach critical mass, the common human mindset often kicks in that "I'd better be prepared". There are many arguments against that sort of reasoning, but the NRA and their $$$$$$ promote it constantly, and Congress runs on $$$$ from lobbyists.

Right now, the BEST we can hope for is small gains in background checks and campaigns by those of us who remain semi-sane to pass step-by-step laws to curtail ammunition sales and the worse types of guns.............we are banging small rocks at anyone who will listen.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 04 Aug 15 - 01:45 PM

Oh, I understand, Bill - probably more than you realise.

But the frequency with which we hear the old bollocks about 'guns don't kill people', and 'self defence', and all the other horse-shit these people come out with, persuades me that they don't understand that the only reason they fell they 'need' guns is because they, and pretty well everybody else, have them.

Further up the thread, some gun-nut or other trying to be a clever-shit by bringing up football crowd problems, WW2, the Irish issues etc., as if that somehow justifies US gun-lunacy - the usual red-herrings that bullet-heads use to try to deflect the truth that allowing anyone and everyone to possess guns is the route to madness. The simple fact is that we have an average of 70 gun-deaths per annum with a population of 65 million. Pro-rata that to the U.S. population of 360 million, give or take, and you should have around 390 gun-deaths per annum, whereas you actually have c. 11,000.

We don't have guns to defend ourselves, but we're not being murdered in our thousands - we don't need guns because our government is man-enough to keep strong control on gun-ownership, so people aren't going around with a gun stuffed inside their jackets,mor leaving them lying around in their car's glove-box for the kids to find and shoot one another.

I understand the difficulty you have with the vast number of guns in circulation, and I don't underestimate the difficulties that people like you have in conducting a campaign for the reduction of gun-ownership, and stronger gun controls.

But understanding that doesn't mean that I can't express how appalled I am by the situation over there with respect to firearms, and express horror every time an incident like the one today takes place. And I do not understand the mentality of a nation that meekly accepts this kind of incident as some kind of 'collateral damage' just so that gun-loonies can keep their stupid bang-bangs.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 04 Aug 15 - 01:46 PM

Fell? FEEL!

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Bill D
Date: 04 Aug 15 - 05:51 PM

" I do not understand the mentality of a nation that meekly accepts this kind of incident..."

Again... you have not framed the point quite right. A **nation** does not have a 'mentality'. Of course it is hard to accept that the damned killings go on & on... but "we don't need guns because our government is man-enough to keep strong control on gun-ownership," does not explain WHY the problem persists! Somehow, even with all good reason & intentions, you cannot take in the multi-faceted Catch-22 squared that we are dealing with.

The 'government' is bound by the Constitution. The Constitution is interpreted by the Supreme Court. It can only be changed by an amendment. An amendment needs to be introduced by some member(s) of Congress...or by a Constitutional Convention

Either of these require VOTES...first IN Congress, then by the states to ratify any amendment that does manage to pass. This can take years, and requires 3/4 of the states -38 states:

"To become an operative part of the Constitution, an amendment, whether proposed by Congress or a national Constitutional Convention, must be ratified by either:
The legislatures of three-fourths (at present 38) of the states;

OR
State ratifying conventions in three-fourths (at present 38) of the states.

"Congress has specified the state legislature ratification method for all but one amendment. The ratifying convention method was used for the Twenty-first Amendment, which became part of the Constitution in 1933.

Since the turn of the 20th century, amendment proposals sent to the states for ratification have generally contained a seven year ratification deadline, either in the body of the amendment or in the resolving clause of the joint resolution proposing it."


IN THE MEANTIME the NRA and all the nuts are throwing $$$$$ and/or threatening to start shooting MORE people with the guns they already have!

I suppose that IF the meek people who do NOT like guns were to GET guns, and our cowardly government which is already awash with supporters of the NRA, were to unleash the army... which is largely composed OF those who DO like guns... were to band together and start another Civil War, they could eventually quash the NRA-- proving, in the process to the gun nuts that they were right all along about having their traditional 'rights' usurped, we 'might' ...sort of... get some measure of control over firearms. Such an interesting 'victory'....

Solving our gun problem is as deep and complex as bringing peace to the Middle East or sorting out the Russian/Balkans disputes. You MUST understand that there are hundreds of thousands willing to use the many guns they already have to prevent any aspect of the government controlling those guns! It is as close to genetic as it can be! It is like religion... and indeed in many minds, it has been connected TO religion. "We God-fearing Christians came this country to escape tyranny! And we won't submit to having the 'rights' were were given in 1789 taken away!"

Again... it is a Catch-22³

You help us solve it and we'll explain to you how to end racial tensions AND end all the problems of the monarchy! Deal?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 04 Aug 15 - 06:18 PM

BWM - agreed again. Yanks - no guns=no shooting of people. Keep banging the rocks together.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Don Firth
Date: 04 Aug 15 - 07:21 PM

In other words, you've got nuthin'.

The problem is not as simple as some people would like to think it is. The gun freaks essentially have the law--an archaic clause in the Constitution, which made perfect sense at the time it was written--on their side. Changing the Constitution by amendment was deliberately made complex and difficult to prevent possible frivolous changes.

It's easier to think that Americans--all Americans--are just a bunch of ignorant savages. Makes one feel better about the irrationalities within one's own society....

Don Firth

By they way, while you're banging the rocks together, watch out for your thumbs!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 02:39 AM

Don, I'll take any number of sore thumbs over one kid shot to death.

http://gunwars.news21.com/2014/at-least-28000-children-and-teens-were-killed-by-guns-over-an-11-year-period/

And you tell Brits to keep banging the rocks together? Motes and beams, my friend.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 02:54 AM

I was reading comments on the 2nd Amendment on one blog or another and I didn't comment until one fine fella quoted the Amendment thusly: "A well-equipped militia..." Sheesh. I immediately corrected his statement; I didn't want some other ignoramus coming along and thinking that's what the thing says.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Musket listening
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 03:05 AM

Can't hear the bang from the rocks yet.

I can hear the bang from the guns, sadly.

I smile at the hypocrisy of those who shout USA! USA! when something (rarely) positive is said about their fucked up country but when you suggest they do something positive to make their society somewhere civilised people might enjoy living, they say we don't understand, that national laws to help people live better lives are impossible to enact.

Rather pathetic really.

Meanwhile, as The Empire State Building displays a beamed photo of Cecil the lion, I notice a few prominent black commentators in newspapers have advised young black people to dress up as lions. That way, if police murder them, people might just give a fuck.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 09:47 AM

"You help us solve it and we'll explain to you how to end racial tensions AND end all the problems of the monarchy!"

And of course the US doesn't have racial tensions, does it? Or are the riots over cops murdering people for DWB all a figment of our imaginations here?

And our 'problems of the monarchy' are very minor compared with your problems of presidents who start illegal wars on the basis of lies, simply to benefit themselves and their buddies in the oil and construction industries, and presidents who get caught with their dicks down the throats of young interns and......the list goes on!!

We know it's complex and difiicult. But WTF happened to the 'Yes We Can' nation that we admired so much fifty or so years ago - it's morphed into the 'Ah but it's too difficult' nation, AFAICS.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Bill D
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 12:10 PM

Backwoodsman...You and Bridge and Musket... and occasionally others... are substituting slogans and finger-pointing for useful comments.

"..do something positive to make their society somewhere civilised people might enjoy living..."

". But WTF happened to the 'Yes We Can' nation.."

You ignore detailed explanations of history and demography and legal structure, then just change the subject to "It's terrible... why don't you all just DO something?"

I didn't SAY that problems with the monarchy are **equal** to anything specific.. I merely drew an analogy to awkward issues. And whether or not some administrations do stupid things for selfish reasons (of course they have!) is NOT relevant to the gun problem! And sexual misadventures are **totally irrelevant**! You make no points just throwing in random laundry lists of errors about anything under the sun.

...and you wonder why some of us get P.O.d over continuous "America bashing" from those who can't comprehend the difference between important issues and minor issues and can't...or just won't... understand what issues HAVE direct & obvious solutions.

What is there about Catch-22 regarding guns that you don't understand?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 12:40 PM

You started it, Bill - YOU raised the subject of how you can explain to us how to end 'racial tensions' and solve the 'problems of the monarchy', as though you've already got racial problems and issues with executive corruption sorted out. I merely responded to those, nothing to do with your nation's homicidal tendencies.

Once again, as you didn't get it the other times I said it, we understand it's not easy! Nobody's knocking you and your kind, Bill - we understand that you and others work hard towards dealing with the gun issue - why do you always take it so personally when we, who live in a virtually gun-free society, express our astonishment at the apparent acceptance by American society of the dreadful consequences of universal gun-ownership there?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 12:59 PM

People who have never traveled the length and breadth of the United States may not recognize the complexities and diverseness of this vast land.

Yes. In a large city I imagine one might have a violent act happen within one's view- isn't the same thing true of London versus what one would expect in the hinterlands? Same thing is true here. Which is why when something horrendous happens in one of our backwaters people express such astonishment.

Because the astonishment is real. Meaning that normal life for most of us is sweet and predictable, based on one's own family and community. A place where distant government makes scarcely a ripple in our everyday life.

Everyday life for most of us consists of jobs we may complain of but go to anyway, families that bicker and celebrate and grow, schools that we suspect are not teaching our children everything they need to know and some of us think they are teaching things they should not, local governments that irritate us and that we sometimes despise but other times support and defend.

Isn't that pretty much true of where you live?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 01:28 PM

Backwoodsman, it's largely because you and a number of other Brits here on Mudcat seem to take such perverse satisfaction when Americans have a national problem that many Americans are working hard at trying to solve, and seem to be sitting back, pointing fingers, and smirking.

While you're looking down your noses at Americans, the vast majority of Americans are trying to change the gun situation. You seem disinclined to acknowledge that fact.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: akenaton
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 01:29 PM

Don't often agree with you Ebbie, but good post.

The trouble is that most of the Brits who hate America and Americans are blinded by ideology, of course we have diverse views here, Its just that these people try their very best to silence anything they don't agree with.
The gun issue brands all Yanks as "Rock Bangers" in their tiny minds

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 01:31 PM

By the way. I'd hate to be a "wog" living in Great Britain....

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 01:46 PM

Bill, Ebbie, for fuck's sake, I FUCKIN' GET IT! What don't you understand about that?
We're on the same side, but you keep rabbiting on about 'America Bashing' every time we over here say how terrible it is that every effort to make progress in reducing the dreadful toll of gun-deaths seems to be blocked by the gun-worshippers, and how ridiculous it is for those people to claim that a 200 year old amendment to the constitution cannot, under any circumstances, itself be amended.

We agree, something needs doing. It's pointless us kicking each other to death here. Let's leave it at that, eh? Pax?

Don - stop being a prick.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Stim
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 02:07 PM

I think it's because you've made it personal.

Perhaps you don't intend it that way, but when you say " why do you always take it so personally" it gives away the fact that you are repeatedly expressing your frustration about the same issues--keep in mind that when you post here, you're not addressing the American Public, American elected officials, American Media, the NRA, or whoever, you're just hammering awaay at the same small group of people, most of whom share the same astonishment that you do, with the small addition that we live with the consequences.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,Stim
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 02:22 PM

Incidentally, thank you for posting that link. The article brings out a lot of facts that are generally ignored in discussions of the problem.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 02:23 PM

"..do something positive to make their society somewhere civilised people might enjoy living..."

Yep, just like your country did to "civilize" the peoples of North America, Africa, India, etc., etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: An Pluiméir Ceolmhar
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 02:28 PM

Well, whoever commented recently that Mudcat has changed mustn't have looked in the BS section.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Bill D
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 02:36 PM

Ok... you get it.... but then you say:

"...the gun-worshippers, and how ridiculous it is for those people to claim that a 200 year old amendment to the constitution cannot, under any circumstances, itself be amended."


They don't WANT it amended! If it was amended, they 'might' have to give up a gun or two. The NRA doesn't WANT it amended... the business model of them and the weapons marketers is to keep the ambiguous wording from 200 years ago. It is very hard to tell whether they 'believe' that the wording is clear or, as I and many others comprehend, that a point about defense from 1789 makes little sense in the 21st century...or whether they simply are happy to lie thru their teeth about how 'clear' it is. And as long as we still have a virtual conservative majority on the Supreme Court, individual cases will be interpreted in favor of the status quo, and as long as we still have each state able to set laws to suit the gun nuts, no amendment is likely to pass. And to limit "states rights" would require another amendment, which would be even less likely to pass.
   We will keep chipping away at it all and hoping a few voting laws and general public outrage will gradually allow some mitigation.... and hope that background checks, mental health evaluations and heavy penalties will help. I don't hold my breath, 'cause I don't look good in blue....

   You are correct... " It's pointless us kicking each other to death here.".. but you can bet that more "rock banging" comments and their equivalent will get a response. Tell Bridge & Musket...hmmmm?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 02:48 PM

Well, on the subject of the monarchy, Miss Piggy has been a diligent and effective guardian of the constitution for a goodly number of years - which is more than one can say of many of our politicians and indeed more than one can say for many US politicians with the highly politicised shenanigans about the appointment of judges to SCOTUS. And although Big Ears can be a bit of a twerp, some of his favourite topics are good ones - human scale architecture - global warming (although he looks a tit when he takes a helicopter 68 miles to play polo) - the malign influence of vulgar money in historic settings. Anybody who drives a Lagonda cannot be all bad!

Oh, and on the subject of racial discrimination, yes, there is systemic racism still here in the UK - but much less than I saw on business trips to the USA when I was still seriously copyright lawyering. No black faces apart from parking valets and chambermaids. Non-whites (bad expression but useful) are underrepresented here in positions of influence, and some of those in positions of influence are not good ambassadors for the UK communities descended from their progenitors, but I've been spending a lot of time over the last two years (gosh, is it that long?) maybe on average two days a week, in places and with friends where I am the only or nearly the only oyinbo and it gives me a chance to compare what I see with what is felt, and I'd be pretty confident that it is petty racism here that irks - not the risk of death. It is the over-representation of BME people in prison - but to only about half the extent of the USA. It is the over-reaction of authority to assertiveness - I get away with being quite stroppy, but my G/F gets an adverse reaction from authority unless she is careful (careful to an extent that can frustrate me) - but she does not get arrested on trumped up charges nor does she get shot.

I've heard young Afrikans in the social circle of my friends saying "Road man will get him" - but it hasn't happened yet, and although I still can't dance I've happily been referred to as "this black white man" for my enjoyment of many types of music.

I think that apart from in the worlds of UKRAP and Duvid Scumeron the UK is making progress.

But back to the home of the brave and land of the free (which is neither).

You have widespread racism about POTUS. You have primitive religion. There's some of that in the UK but not all that much. You have some Afrikan plutocrats represented in the Republican party, but how many African-Americans and Asian-Americans have you got in the senate and congress (and would you like to take Keith Vaz and Priti Patel and Baroness Warsi please?)

Yes. I think that despite the UK's abysmal colonial record (but bear in mind that Benin was the centre of an African slave trade before the UK destroyed that country) and despite the eventual failure of our attempt to conquer Ireland (started in the 1300s-ish) we have not practised systematic torture since the abolition of the process called "peine forte et dure", we have since before WWII been generally (apart from Korea) reducing, not increasing our wars of attempted conquest (sorry Iraq, sorry Libya - but the USA was more to blame there than we were). We provide more support for Palestine from Israeli oppression. Yes. I think some moral superiority is justified.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 03:26 PM

So now we've descended to name-calling, Backwoodsman? The tends to indicate that I hit a nerve....

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 03:43 PM

Richard Bridge, it must have been a good long while since you came to the US on business, because you would most definitely find it different. No black faces except for valets and chamber maids? VERY different today.

It just occurred to me that the way for you chaps to make an actual difference in the USA would be if you went to NRA (National Rifle Association) web sites (they must have some) and engaged them in debate.

Do that and come back and tell us of your experiences. I do wish you the BEST of luck.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,#
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 04:04 PM

Sounds to me like you folks aren't banging rocks together; it's more like you're banging heads together.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Greg F.
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 04:28 PM

Ah, but the heads may be filled with rocks, so no diff.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 04:40 PM

Ah, I found the official NRA website: http://home.nra.org/

Enjoy.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 05:40 PM

The United States of America is a culturally diverse, multi-racial, multi-language country with a wide range of history.

It is also big. I just did some homework: In sheer size you in Europe could fit

The United Kingdom
Ireland
Italy
France
Germany
Austria
Poland
Luxembourg
Iceland
Portugal
and Switzerland
inside our borders and still have almost 2 million square miles left over.

Now. Tell me that Europeans could quickly resolve any divisive, controversial issue as explosive (no pun intended) as gun ownership and regulation is in the US.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 06:35 PM

Tell me that Europeans could quickly resolve any divisive, controversial issue as explosive (no pun intended) as gun ownership and regulation is in the US.

They don't need to. Despite being "culturally diverse, multi-racial, multi-language" and having spent much of the last 220 years fighting one another in various combinations at various times most of them disarmed their civilians decades ago. They don't need militias other than government controlled ones. France and Germany sorted out a far bigger problem between themselves after WW2. You folks don't seem to have got over your civil war yet.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: GUEST,#
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 07:17 PM

The magnitude of the problem and dilemma for people wanting peace.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 07:46 PM

At the time the Second Amendment was added to the Constitution, the "arms" that people were allowed—urged—to keep were quite different from arms today.

Firearms—cannon, muskets, pistols—were limited to a single shot, then had to be reloaded. That involved dealing with a powder container, often a powder-horn, a bag of shot, and wadding to hold the powder and shot in place, and manipulating a ramrod. Then you had to prime the pan with gunpowder. I have talked with those who fancy antique firearms and have been told that, if you are really fast and adept, you might be able to reload a flintlock musket or pistol inside a minute.

The first repeating rifles and pistols didn't start appearing until well into the 1800s. The first use of repeating rifles was in the Civil War, and initially, the Navy Colt revolver (five shot) was the precursor of the famous Colt "six gun" carried by your favorite John Wayne-type cowboy hero.   

When the Second Amendment was written, many people depended on the muzzle-loading flintlock musket standing behind the door or hanging over the fireplace for food. And if soldiers were needed, these people were the "Minutemen." In case of war, an army (militia) could be formed quickly, by citizens who could grab their musket, powder-horn, and bag of shot, and be ready for battle in a "minute."

Mass murder with a firearm, like some of the shootings recently, would have been impossible at the time the Second Amendment was written. It needs to be changed, but the National Rifle Association and its wealthy and powerful supporters—including the arms industry, which makes huge profits any time there is a war—has, so far, been successful in blocking the attempts of many of the citizens to make even minor changes in the plethora of laws that have sprung up around the issue. Such as insisting on background checks, including at gun shows, and making private sales illegal.

How about making the clerk who sells a gun without a background check an accessory if the customer later commits murder with the gun? Lots of good ideas. But the trick is to get them past the "gun lobby" and enacted into law.

So it's not the simple matter that our British friends seem to think it is!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Bill D
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 08:57 PM

Exactly Don.. the solution therefore is to invent a time machine, go back to the late 1700s, and demonstrate an AK-47 and a hand gun with a 30 round magazine to the Founding Fathers with an explanation of what we in the 21st century are up against, and 'suggest' some careful wording for the 2nd amendment.
   Failing that, we ummmm..... pray?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 10:24 PM

By the way, I have not yet heard from anyone who has visited the NRA website.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: gnu
Date: 05 Aug 15 - 10:40 PM

Or... just implement reasonable gun laws. But politicians won't do that because they are paid off. You can bang the rocks all day long. They won't do it... $$$ whether you count that in $$$ or votes. We had ALMOST reasonable gun laws in Canuckistan but that got fucked over because SOME of the laws were not reasonable. Now? Well, we are kinda back to square 0.5. I was supportive of most of the gun laws but, if you read SO MANY past threads, against a few of them (and for good reasons). Those few asshole laws destroyed all the good ones in the end.

Classic case of shoot yourself in the foot.

When are the anti-gun nuts gonna wake the fuck up and work with the gun nuts? Oh.. wait... I said the same thing on at least a half dozen gun threads that clocked up to a thousand posts in the Mudcat BS forum before. My bad. I'll just toddle off. Sorry to have bothered you. gnight yet again. I'll check back after another shitload of posts. I must say, not many posts... a gun thread used to draw a far bigger, and more ignorant and arrogant crowd. Sigh... ya can't go home eh?

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Greg F.
Date: 06 Aug 15 - 01:58 PM

Go back to sleep, Goofus.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns - keep banging the rocks together
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Aug 15 - 02:20 PM

I'll say it again, Backwoodsman:

"Backwoodsman, it's largely because you and a number of other Brits here on Mudcat seem to take such perverse satisfaction when Americans have a national problem that many Americans are working hard at trying to solve, and seem to be sitting back, pointing fingers, and smirking.

While you're looking down your noses at Americans, the vast majority of Americans are trying to change the gun situation. You seem disinclined to acknowledge that fact."

And I thought I heard someone break wind-- Oh, no! That was Goofus trying to add his two cents worth . . . poor inarticulate sod.

Don Firth