With the recent events in Newtown and the re-emergence of the gun control debate, the Supreme Court decision in Heller has taken on a very different meaning and the interpretation of that decision by the radical right has given birth to continuous and bellicose threats of armed insurrection. Now every attempt to enact safe and sane gun laws which would reduce the amount of bloodshed on the streets of America is responded to with statements which don't border on treason: they are treason.
Here are just a few examples:
March 9, 2009—NRA celebrity spokesman Chuck Norris writes in an editorial published at WorldNetDaily: “How much more will Americans take? When will enough be enough? And, when that time comes, will our leaders finally listen or will history need to record a second American Revolution?”
March 11, 2009—NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre speaks at the 2009 Conservative Political Action Conference and announces that “Our Founding Fathers understood that the guys with the guns make the rules.”
March 21-22, 2009—Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (R-MN) states that she wants residents of her state to be “armed and dangerous on this issue of the energy tax because we need to fight back. Thomas Jefferson told us ‘having a revolution every now and then is a good thing,’ and the people—we the people—are going to have to fight back hard if we’re not going to lose our country.”
March 31, 2009—On the program "Your World with Neil Cavuto," FOX news contributor Dick Morris says, "Those crazies in Montana who say, 'We're going to kill ATF agents because the U.N.'s going to take over'—well, they're beginning to have a case."
You can thank the famously brilliant but morally befuddled Scalia for working backward to meet his conclusion that the second amendment apparently provides the people with the right to impose their will by force upon their own government should they fail at the ballot box. This is a surprising statement from someone firmly ensconced within the belly of the tyrannical US government.
It goes without saying that conspiracist fear-mongering lunatics living in the fringes of society are storing fertilizer in their bomb-shelters and stockpiling ammunition alongside doomsday preppers. The same conspiracism that gives rise to Islamist movements, where we are all props in their elaborate fantasy about the imminent, apocalyptic battle between good and evil is the same one that drives them. The only difference is I don't live down the block from them.
There is a beautiful simplicity to this particular set of circumstances, however. It now shows the eternal conflict between the power of the pen and the power of the sword. It's safe to say that the gun "rights" advocates, who care little about their responsibilities to other and quite a bit about their absolute right to own a firearm, believe that the freedom stems from the barrel of the gun. Mao said the very same thing, I believe. How interesting that the righties and commies have this in common.
The circular firing range the gun crazies has created with their argument leaves them unfazed, a la Orwell.
It has been said quite often by now that there is little chance that a civil war which erupted would succeed with the kind of armaments available to these folks. I perhaps give them too much credit when I used the phrase "civil war" since domestic terrorists would be a better label.
A government armed with Narusinsight (a computer program that "sniffs" communications as part of a domestic surveillance program, formerly called carnivore) doesn't need gun registrations, so making certain we shred all registration records does one thing: protects criminals. A government that uses hellfire missiles, predator drones will just blow your house up. They aren't coming to get your guns. They will just kill you. And apparently being an American citizen won't stop them, as you can see here.
Honestly, if you weren't worried about a tyrannical US government who was engaged in domestic surveillance, who has built a gigantic spying system that could easily be turned on US citizens (and has been), which all happened under Bush, why would you be concerned about Obama? Granted, it's a little more chilling to have a guy who won the Nobel Peace Prize AND has a kill list, but come one. Who are you kidding?
The answer from the gun crazies, when you point out the US military would make short work of them and their stupid AR-15's doesn't faze them. They move right on to the argument that "well the military would side with us anyway".
Which is the gigantic, gaping hole in the side of their argument that sinks their ship. If the you need the military to side with you to win a revolution, than the second amendment is completely irrelevant, other than a means by which you can prevent safe guns laws from being enacted to protect American citizens.
Thus the only real defense to tyranny is the first amendment. Communicating to the military the importance of our democratic process and the need to fully engage it.
In the end you simply must pose this simple question to the gun crazies: if the voters voted in favor of a gun ban, and it was a majority decision by the majority of voters, would you honor it? The answer is a clear no. These treacherous, traitorous, deceitful terrorists would call themselves Americans, but they don't really believe in democracy. And they admit it by their actions and their threats. They are cowards, hiding behind their weapons, using intimidation and fear because they live in fear of things they do not understand.
Sunday, January 27, 2013
Saturday, January 12, 2013
There were eight of us on our way to the National Rifle Association's annual convention downtown, rolling past a domino-row of highway billboards advertising the event's "Acres of Guns and Gear." The banter suggested the minibus crew was microcosmic of the NRA's claimed four million members, more than 70,000 of whom made the election-year pilgrimage. There was a soft-spoken father from Long Island and his teenage daughter headed to the University of Akron on a Division-I marksmanship scholarship. There were retired New Hampshire hunters from NRA families going back generations. There was a Russian immigrant whose only hobby is fully automatic machine guns.
And there was a professional Second Amendment extremist named Stephen Burke. An Endowment Life Member of the NRA and an attorney from Springfield, Massachusetts, Burke specializes in getting guns into the hands of ex-cons whose licenses have been revoked or downgraded for criminal activity.
Burke is a loud and boastful retired lance corporal who displays a photo of himself with NRA Executive Vice President & CEO Wayne LaPierre on his professional website. The only thing he abhors more than gun control is silence. When a conversation about former New York Governor George Pataki's pro-gun record entered a lull, he asked the group what sounded like an American history riddle or piece of trivia: "What do Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, and Barack Obama have in common?"
The collective intelligence of the minibus was stumped. After a few beats, he delivered the answer: "Nothing. Yet."
This excerpt from the article by Alexander Zaitchik says it all.
These people call themselves Americans, yet they threaten treason and sedition at every turn. And it doesn't end there by any stretch of the imagination. Who are these people who call themselves Americans, yet proceed to threaten people because they differ with them on matters of public concern?
The NRA guns, fear and the Republican agenda
There are two main reasons that people often claim they require ownership of a firearm: 1) self-defense and 2) freedom comes from the barrel of the gun. I believe it was actually Mao who I am quoting in reason two. More simply put, people believe firearms protect from oppression.
Out of the two, I must confess there is a certain logic to number one. We are a geographically large nation with huge rural areas where people reside for whom a call to 911 is not likely to lead to good results. This is why there should be different laws for different places, and different people. The "one size fits all" model, which the NRA loves, ensures that our nation has guns everywhere. It is reason number one around which an authentic debate, and eventually more sane gun laws, will inevitably stem. The universal constant of change is not likely to allow the phony gun culture created out of whole cloth that resists every single sane attempt to prevent the carnage our nation witnesses to continue on this path of destruction.
Reason number two is worthy of only contempt. If you have read about Iraq and the fact that Saddam Hussein allowed Iraqis to own firearms (in fact, assault rifles like the infamous ak-47) and it did nothing to stop Hussein from murdering and terrorizing his own citizens, you should already realize this. And if you have read Bob Woodward's article on the tagging and tracking methods of the US Military, you are certainly aware that it would not take much to hunt down Americans here in the mainland US. Particularly when our massive domestic surveillance efforts have netted so much data on typical Americans already. I must confess that I find it humorous that the NRA and their ilk rant and rave about the draconian nature of a gun registration database, but seem completely unaware that their good friend George Bush already made short work of the kind of privacy that prevented the government from knowing who has guns anyway.
If you have never heard of Carnivore or it's newer version NarusInsight, then you probably aren't aware the government has the ability to "sniff" email traffic for emails that might be useful. This is not a conspiracy theory, it's public knowledge that the government has this capability. So if you ever mentioned you owned a gun in an email, it's game over already.
In answer to this argument, I always here the same rejoinder: "well, the military is going to side with us anyway..."
True or not, it simply does not dawn on the people making this argument that it shows precisely why guns don't protect Americans from tyranny. If the only thing protecting you from tyranny is Benedict Arnold, then you have a problem that guns won't fix.
But the point of this post is to describe what appears to me to be the dual purpose of the NRA fear-mongering. 1) it feeds American fears about violence perpetrated by criminals, and by creating and maintaining this fear, Americans will vote for the "law and order" candidates, who are quite often conservative and 2) feeds American fears about the oppressive, negro-run liberal commie/pinko gumnit which is determined to arm us all and enslave us.
Although democrats long ago sold out and became "tough on crime" clones of the Republicans, it's still a conservative mainstay. Liberals let bad guys out of jail and want take your guns. Conservatives will lock away bad guys and throw away the key, and let you make certain you have all the weapons you need. If you live in fear, who are you going to vote for? By substituting a fantasy solution to a fantasy problem, they are able to hold onto a big chunk of voting power and push other conservative policies.
It is this strain of conspiracism that generates a large amount of support for conservatives. So while they publicly denounce terrorism and rebellion, the advocate sedition out of the other side of their mouth, and preach treacherous and traitorous poison at every turn.
"It is very effective to mobilize mass support against a scapegoated enemy by claiming that the enemy is part of a vast insidious conspiracy against the common good. The conspiracist worldview sees secret plots by tiny cabals of evildoers as the major motor powering important historical events; makes irrational leaps of logic in analyzing factual evidence in order to "prove" connections, blames social conflicts on demonized scapegoats, and constructs a closed metaphysical worldview that is highly resistant to criticism.~1"-Public eye
Tim McVeigh was the most notorious conspiracist activist, murdering people at the Oklahoma Federal building in the aftermath of the botched ATF raid in Waco Texas that left cult leader David Koresh and his followers dead.
Yet modernly, there are no shortage of so-called Americans, who have no problem at all advocating outright treason.
So while the NRA claim to be mainstream, normal, guys, they are nothing of the sort. The NRA's belligerent, bellicose threats show that they believe the only way obtain freedom is to impose their will upon others by force of arms, and THAT is the cornerstone of our democracy.
Ask this simple questions to the pro-gun crazies. If the US people voted for a gun ban, would you respect that or would you engage in armed, open rebellion? If the answer is rebellion, then you can see it is not democracy that they really respect. In fact, you don't even get the concept. It is not surprising at all that conservative Americans don't understand that imposing your will upon others by force of arms is not the cornerstone of democracy. And after all, if the pen wasn't mightier than the sword, why would we be subjected to so much of their nonsense?
Only the fool, while milking the cow, denies the existence of the cow.
Out of the two, I must confess there is a certain logic to number one. We are a geographically large nation with huge rural areas where people reside for whom a call to 911 is not likely to lead to good results. This is why there should be different laws for different places, and different people. The "one size fits all" model, which the NRA loves, ensures that our nation has guns everywhere. It is reason number one around which an authentic debate, and eventually more sane gun laws, will inevitably stem. The universal constant of change is not likely to allow the phony gun culture created out of whole cloth that resists every single sane attempt to prevent the carnage our nation witnesses to continue on this path of destruction.
Reason number two is worthy of only contempt. If you have read about Iraq and the fact that Saddam Hussein allowed Iraqis to own firearms (in fact, assault rifles like the infamous ak-47) and it did nothing to stop Hussein from murdering and terrorizing his own citizens, you should already realize this. And if you have read Bob Woodward's article on the tagging and tracking methods of the US Military, you are certainly aware that it would not take much to hunt down Americans here in the mainland US. Particularly when our massive domestic surveillance efforts have netted so much data on typical Americans already. I must confess that I find it humorous that the NRA and their ilk rant and rave about the draconian nature of a gun registration database, but seem completely unaware that their good friend George Bush already made short work of the kind of privacy that prevented the government from knowing who has guns anyway.
If you have never heard of Carnivore or it's newer version NarusInsight, then you probably aren't aware the government has the ability to "sniff" email traffic for emails that might be useful. This is not a conspiracy theory, it's public knowledge that the government has this capability. So if you ever mentioned you owned a gun in an email, it's game over already.
In answer to this argument, I always here the same rejoinder: "well, the military is going to side with us anyway..."
True or not, it simply does not dawn on the people making this argument that it shows precisely why guns don't protect Americans from tyranny. If the only thing protecting you from tyranny is Benedict Arnold, then you have a problem that guns won't fix.
But the point of this post is to describe what appears to me to be the dual purpose of the NRA fear-mongering. 1) it feeds American fears about violence perpetrated by criminals, and by creating and maintaining this fear, Americans will vote for the "law and order" candidates, who are quite often conservative and 2) feeds American fears about the oppressive, negro-run liberal commie/pinko gumnit which is determined to arm us all and enslave us.
Although democrats long ago sold out and became "tough on crime" clones of the Republicans, it's still a conservative mainstay. Liberals let bad guys out of jail and want take your guns. Conservatives will lock away bad guys and throw away the key, and let you make certain you have all the weapons you need. If you live in fear, who are you going to vote for? By substituting a fantasy solution to a fantasy problem, they are able to hold onto a big chunk of voting power and push other conservative policies.
It is this strain of conspiracism that generates a large amount of support for conservatives. So while they publicly denounce terrorism and rebellion, the advocate sedition out of the other side of their mouth, and preach treacherous and traitorous poison at every turn.
"It is very effective to mobilize mass support against a scapegoated enemy by claiming that the enemy is part of a vast insidious conspiracy against the common good. The conspiracist worldview sees secret plots by tiny cabals of evildoers as the major motor powering important historical events; makes irrational leaps of logic in analyzing factual evidence in order to "prove" connections, blames social conflicts on demonized scapegoats, and constructs a closed metaphysical worldview that is highly resistant to criticism.~1"-Public eye
Tim McVeigh was the most notorious conspiracist activist, murdering people at the Oklahoma Federal building in the aftermath of the botched ATF raid in Waco Texas that left cult leader David Koresh and his followers dead.
Yet modernly, there are no shortage of so-called Americans, who have no problem at all advocating outright treason.
So while the NRA claim to be mainstream, normal, guys, they are nothing of the sort. The NRA's belligerent, bellicose threats show that they believe the only way obtain freedom is to impose their will upon others by force of arms, and THAT is the cornerstone of our democracy.
Ask this simple questions to the pro-gun crazies. If the US people voted for a gun ban, would you respect that or would you engage in armed, open rebellion? If the answer is rebellion, then you can see it is not democracy that they really respect. In fact, you don't even get the concept. It is not surprising at all that conservative Americans don't understand that imposing your will upon others by force of arms is not the cornerstone of democracy. And after all, if the pen wasn't mightier than the sword, why would we be subjected to so much of their nonsense?
Only the fool, while milking the cow, denies the existence of the cow.
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Thus the idea that an armed civilian would be in the right place at the right time, to repell an armed perpetrator, is pure fantasy. It's a fantasy solution to a fantasy problem. People seem to forget there was an armed guard at Columbine.
Law enforcement officers often express dismay at the idea of a heavily-armed populace, because upon arriving on scene, how would they know who the bad guys were?
I learned from my years of martial arts experience is that the it required time and commitment to learn to defend onself in that manner. One day self-defense classes, in my opinion, were worse than a waste of time: they taught dangerous ideas and while seeking to empower women and people of smaller stature, created more danger for the students rather than less.
One of the more successful myths developed by the martial arts industry is that size does not matter. My karate instructor put it as succinctly as possible, as was his style. "Big people beat up little people." So while it is true that skill can nullify size differential, in the end tends to be the defining characteristic of any physical struggle.
In the case of guns, I would say the defining characteristic is the element of surprise. I recall a "Verbal Judo" class I took from Professor George Thompson in which a law enforcement officer role-played a traffic stop and pulled his pistol. "I'm not quick but I am early" he said.
This statement spoke volumes. Although I have not studied the issue carefully enough to do anything but speculate, it does seem that gun violence does not lend itself easily to being solved by return fire. Keeping the firearms out of the hands of crazy, violent, and dangerous people seems a better solution, and not one that I think Harris necessarily would disagree with, though he has been soundly thrashed by a number of writers about his stance on guns.
Law enforcement officers often express dismay at the idea of a heavily-armed populace, because upon arriving on scene, how would they know who the bad guys were?
I learned from my years of martial arts experience is that the it required time and commitment to learn to defend onself in that manner. One day self-defense classes, in my opinion, were worse than a waste of time: they taught dangerous ideas and while seeking to empower women and people of smaller stature, created more danger for the students rather than less.
One of the more successful myths developed by the martial arts industry is that size does not matter. My karate instructor put it as succinctly as possible, as was his style. "Big people beat up little people." So while it is true that skill can nullify size differential, in the end tends to be the defining characteristic of any physical struggle.
In the case of guns, I would say the defining characteristic is the element of surprise. I recall a "Verbal Judo" class I took from Professor George Thompson in which a law enforcement officer role-played a traffic stop and pulled his pistol. "I'm not quick but I am early" he said.
This statement spoke volumes. Although I have not studied the issue carefully enough to do anything but speculate, it does seem that gun violence does not lend itself easily to being solved by return fire. Keeping the firearms out of the hands of crazy, violent, and dangerous people seems a better solution, and not one that I think Harris necessarily would disagree with, though he has been soundly thrashed by a number of writers about his stance on guns.
In other words, if our politicians were really concerned about gun-violence, they would discuss the issue of handguns. Not assault weapons, which Harris correctly points out are related to a very tiny minority of shootings.
All first amendment arguments aside (which as a lawyer, I continue to be embarrassed by the 5-4 decisions from SCOTUS and in particular Justice Scalia, who has been correctly identified by Posner as a fraud) the issue, at least in terms of personal safety, can be boiled down into a few arguments:
1. Can we prevent gun violence?
2. If we can, how do we go about it?
The first question begs the question as to what IS gun violence. How do we define it? More importantly, what actual form does it take?
This is the part where the "moment of truth" discussion I had as it relates to the martial arts is relevant, because handguns are also things in which our perceptions are guided by a mythology about how violence really plays out.
Central to our mythology is the "shoot-out".
There is not an American alive who has not seen thousands of exchanges of gunfire on the television or the movies. We vastly prefer watching such depictions to depictions of sex. Yet out of the vast majority of murders committed with guns, the same dynamic that makes BJJ not necessarily the best choice in a confrontation is the same dynamic that makes having your gun ready not the best choice.
Simply put, most gun violence, and most deadly violence, takes the form of an assassination, not a gunfight. That is why out of the 64 mass shootings in the US, not one was ever stopped by an armed person.
All first amendment arguments aside (which as a lawyer, I continue to be embarrassed by the 5-4 decisions from SCOTUS and in particular Justice Scalia, who has been correctly identified by Posner as a fraud) the issue, at least in terms of personal safety, can be boiled down into a few arguments:
1. Can we prevent gun violence?
2. If we can, how do we go about it?
The first question begs the question as to what IS gun violence. How do we define it? More importantly, what actual form does it take?
This is the part where the "moment of truth" discussion I had as it relates to the martial arts is relevant, because handguns are also things in which our perceptions are guided by a mythology about how violence really plays out.
Central to our mythology is the "shoot-out".
There is not an American alive who has not seen thousands of exchanges of gunfire on the television or the movies. We vastly prefer watching such depictions to depictions of sex. Yet out of the vast majority of murders committed with guns, the same dynamic that makes BJJ not necessarily the best choice in a confrontation is the same dynamic that makes having your gun ready not the best choice.
Simply put, most gun violence, and most deadly violence, takes the form of an assassination, not a gunfight. That is why out of the 64 mass shootings in the US, not one was ever stopped by an armed person.
It is cowardice, of a sort, but understandable. Who do we have out there in the public eye willing to sacrifice all for this issue, when there are so many others? Barack Obama has made a career out of knowing when to punt on issues that, while he probably knows are very important, also knows will make it impossible for him to move forward on other issues. Political capital has limits. And we live in an age where real leaders willing to risk everything frankly don't even exist. I say that while looking the mirror, by the way.
So when that false summit appeared, the democrats mapped it, photographed it, and announced they were heading that way. The false summit is the assault weapons ban.
Anyone who really knows anything about gun violence knows the real culprit in the US is the handgun. The easily concealed weapon of choice for criminals, and a quick extension of ones' anger. It lends itself very well to explosive impulses, the ultimate release of all pent-up frustration and rage.
Since 1962, more than one million Americans have died in firearm homicides, suicides, and unintentional shootings. Handguns were used in more than 650,000 of these fatal shootings.7
On the average, if someone gets shot and killed, four out of five times it will be with a handgun. In 1997, for example, handguns were used in 79.4 percent of all firearm homicides.10 From 1990 to 1997, handguns were used in a majority (55.6 percent) of all homicides; that is, they were used in murder more than all other weapons combined.11
Of all firearm-related crime, 86 percent involved handguns.5
In 1997 there were 15,690 homicides.
So when that false summit appeared, the democrats mapped it, photographed it, and announced they were heading that way. The false summit is the assault weapons ban.
Anyone who really knows anything about gun violence knows the real culprit in the US is the handgun. The easily concealed weapon of choice for criminals, and a quick extension of ones' anger. It lends itself very well to explosive impulses, the ultimate release of all pent-up frustration and rage.
Since 1962, more than one million Americans have died in firearm homicides, suicides, and unintentional shootings. Handguns were used in more than 650,000 of these fatal shootings.7
On the average, if someone gets shot and killed, four out of five times it will be with a handgun. In 1997, for example, handguns were used in 79.4 percent of all firearm homicides.10 From 1990 to 1997, handguns were used in a majority (55.6 percent) of all homicides; that is, they were used in murder more than all other weapons combined.11
Of all firearm-related crime, 86 percent involved handguns.5
In 1997 there were 15,690 homicides.
- Of these, 8,503 were committed with handguns.
- Among handgun homicides, only 193 (2.3 percent) were classified as
justifiable homicides by civilians.23
What Harris noted, probably more than a decade after I did, is that there are a lot of people out there claiming to know how to fight, but not all of them actually able to prove it. The "moment of truth" that arrived whenever someone who believed they understood how physical violence played itself out in the real world was a thing of beauty. I always loved it when the truth won over bullshit. I still do.
I loved it when Iraq dissolved into sectarian violence in that I turned out to be correct. I told everyone I knew that winning the war against the Iraqi army with an army designed to fight the Soviet Union would not be a problem. Winning the piece, on the other hand, would be.
When the housing bubble burst, I stood vindicated and nowhere could anyone find the millions of commentators who insisted that "nobody is making any more land". I predicted that, too.
I have been fascinated by the issue of gun violence for well over a decade, and it comes as no suprise to me that massacre after massacre ocurrs on American soil while the public maintains their collective delusion or indifference and the politicians watch the opinion polls the way a mountain climber watches the weather.
Gun control is the massive, dangerous mountain upon which many political careers have disappeared into the whiteout never to return. Politicians occasionally discuss climbing it, but none have the courage to risk what seems to be certain death.
The massacre at Sandy Hook was a moment where the clouds parted and for a brief moment there appeared to be a summit in sight. The summit being an authentic answer to this debate about public safety, and how to stem gun violence.
Instead, the democrats spotted a false summit, somewhat lower than the actual summit, which by the route they calculated would be easy to reach and have minimal risk.
I loved it when Iraq dissolved into sectarian violence in that I turned out to be correct. I told everyone I knew that winning the war against the Iraqi army with an army designed to fight the Soviet Union would not be a problem. Winning the piece, on the other hand, would be.
When the housing bubble burst, I stood vindicated and nowhere could anyone find the millions of commentators who insisted that "nobody is making any more land". I predicted that, too.
I have been fascinated by the issue of gun violence for well over a decade, and it comes as no suprise to me that massacre after massacre ocurrs on American soil while the public maintains their collective delusion or indifference and the politicians watch the opinion polls the way a mountain climber watches the weather.
Gun control is the massive, dangerous mountain upon which many political careers have disappeared into the whiteout never to return. Politicians occasionally discuss climbing it, but none have the courage to risk what seems to be certain death.
The massacre at Sandy Hook was a moment where the clouds parted and for a brief moment there appeared to be a summit in sight. The summit being an authentic answer to this debate about public safety, and how to stem gun violence.
Instead, the democrats spotted a false summit, somewhat lower than the actual summit, which by the route they calculated would be easy to reach and have minimal risk.
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