Debate about Gun Control

[Eric the Green]

It's not a values-lock question. We all share the value of safety. The disagreement is over the means. In my opinion, guns endanger safety, not protect it. Guns destroy life; that is their purpose. Those who disagree claim that guns are a means of self defense.

You call it the "Jim Crow interpretation" of the 2nd amendment, that says that the 2nd confers the right to bear arms on the militia. I call the Scalia ruling the "right-wing extremist third-turning-era interpretation" of it. The right-wing movement that currently rules our country and took power in 1980 is the most extreme faction in our country in history, save perhaps for the Dixie hotheads of the mid-19th century.

I understand your analogy about the free speech amendment. Of course, it's just an example; it's not in the constitution. The 2nd is the only amendment, I believe, in the US constitution that has such a clause. So, it's significant.

I understand why the late 20th century 3T right-wing interpretation focuses on the 2nd clause. I would interpret it this way: since the militia refers to all men, and all men were whom the constitution applied to in those days, and only white men at that, the "people" and the "militia" were effectively the same thing, originally. So the right of the people to bear arms is subject to the regulations of a militia. Even the extremist right-wing Heller ruling allowed for gun control, perhaps partly for this reason.

[Bob Butler 54]

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: It's not a values-lock question. We all share the value of safety. The disagreement is over the means. In my opinion, guns endanger safety, not protect it. Guns destroy life; that is their purpose. Those who disagree claim that guns are a means of self defense.

It is because survival is at stake that it is a values driven question.  One answer or the other, there is a deep emotional element in saying how the world works and how one achieves one's goals.  As much as I distrust the red perspective, as much as I think they have gone too far for too long in many respects, some of their basic perspectives have merit at a values level.  Individuals have responsibilities and need the freedom and tools to make their own choices.  The world is a dangerous place.  Citizens needs the tools, skills and attitudes necessary to thrive.

There are some aspects of the gun debate where meaningful debate is possible.  The basic question of whether one can protect one's self, one's family, one's community is a values thing.  Someone who takes the responsibility seriously just isn't going to give it up.  I don't need to tell you that some are just as firmly committed to the opposite point of view.  "Claim that guns are a means of self defense"?  They are clearly the most effective way to prevent an immoral person from practicing his immorality with impunity.

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: You call it the "Jim Crow interpretation" of the 2nd amendment, that says that the 2nd confers the right to bear arms on the militia. I call the Scalia ruling the "right-wing extremist third-turning-era interpretation" of it. The right-wing movement that currently rules our country and took power in 1980 is the most extreme faction in our country in history, save perhaps for the Dixie hotheads of the mid-19th century.

Both the "Jim Crow" and "Scalia" labels are emotionally loaded spin, perhaps pejoratives.  "Individual right," "collective right" and 'standard model' are more neutral terms, but those not long in the conversation might not know them.  I think 'Jim Crow' is an accurate and descriptive label.  There is no hint of the collective right theory until the end of Reconstruction, the beginning of Jim Crow.  The collective right theory began with the Jim Crow supreme courts.  At the same time they neutered the Second, they took out most of the Bill of Rights.  Familiarize yourself with the supreme course case load of Thurgood Marshall and the precedents and cases that he worked in the days leading up to Martin Luther King.  He restored the notion that individual have rights and it was the job of the federal government to protect these rights.

Of course, getting you to read something that conflicts with your world view is nigh on impossible.  You are too values locked in general to consider a point of view conflicting with your own.

Scalia did write a key decision that enforced the standard model.  The standard model was well established and mature in both the academic press and lesser court cases before Scalia wrote his decision.  You can give him more than his share of credit or blame if you like, and use liberal dislike for rule of law as a tool to push your values, but Scalia was a very small if highly visible part of the standard model legal and academic history.  He confirmed everything that those following the academic standard model discussion expected.  He did nothing that many academics and lower court judges hadn't been advocating for years.

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I understand your analogy about the free speech amendment. Of course, it's just an example; it's not in the constitution. The 2nd is the only amendment, I believe, in the US constitution that has such a clause. So, it's significant.

The justification phrase was a common legal structure of the times.  Other than the Jim Crow interpretation of the 2nd, no one interprets  justification phrases as limitation phrases.  The result is so obviously counter the intent of the authors that it would be absurd to do so.  Is there any other right with a justification phrase that you would wish to interpret as a limitation phrase?

Again, if you are trying to honestly interpret a right with a justification phrase, you've got to work under the assumption that the writers of the right believed the justification true and accurate, and thus the interpretation of the implementation phrase must reflect the goals and methods of the justification.  In this case, the authors of the right believed a well armed and trained general populace was necessary for security.  A lot of people in an pretty large part of the country still agree with these revolutionary era values.  Interpreting the Second in conflict with these values requires blatant and obvious values lock.

Do you disagree with the answers to those three questions?

Congress can specify training for the militia, all males of military age.  They could require training and doctrine for good handling and storage of weapons, how to act in an emergency, and what is the chain of command.  It might not be an entirely bad idea.  I don't think the blue folk want to require everyone to train in weapons.  I have my suspicion that many red leaning people care more about protecting their rights than meeting their responsibilities.  There is something to be said, if not for a well regulated militia, but at least a mildly regulated militia.  Still, a lot of blue politicians and gun advocates are trying to continue the confusion about just who the militia is.  Training all adult males and calling them the militia could change perspectives.  Anyway, I doubt bringing back any real organization of the true militia, all adult males, will happen until and unless some threat arose that it would take an awful lot of people to resolve.

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I understand why the late 20th century 3T right-wing interpretation focuses on the 2nd clause. I would interpret it this way: since the militia refers to all men, and all men were whom the constitution applied to in those days, and only white men at that, the "people" and the "militia" were effectively the same thing, originally. So the right of the people to bear arms is subject to the regulations of a militia. Even the extremist right-wing Heller ruling allowed for gun control, perhaps partly for this reason.

The Heller decision was written to resolve the individual vs collective right aspect of the Second, not to resolve all aspects of the gun policy debate.  The Supremes are taking the standard model and 2nd Amendment is small chunks. 

A second question is whether the right effects the state's power to regulate guns.  The standard model (and all of Thurgood Marshall's mid 1900s cases) said yes, as did the Chicago 2nd Amendment case that followed shortly after Heller.

A third question is whether the right to keep and bear arms can be infringed.  Can magazine size, rate of fire and similar limitations be placed on guns?  The standard model suggests, that as the militia is mentioned in the justification phrase, the authors of the 2nd intended the keeping and bearing of state of the art military weapons.  A lot of people don't like that part of the standard model.  Heck, I don't really care for that part of the standard model.  I do see the scholarship as solid.  The founding fathers wanted a population armed and trained with military weapons. 

Anyway, Scalia put a few paragraphs into Heller that make it clear that while he was declaring the individual right, he was not endorsing the entire standard model.  There are questions unresolved.

[Galen]

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Obtuse Wrote: You call it the "Jim Crow interpretation" of the 2nd amendment, that says that the 2nd confers the right to bear arms on the militia. I call the Scalia ruling the "right-wing extremist third-turning-era interpretation" of it. The right-wing movement that currently rules our country and took power in 1980 is the most extreme faction in our country in history, save perhaps for the Dixie hotheads of the mid-19th century.

It really is depressing when a comedian does better research than you can manage.  Thinking really is beyond you isn't it?

[Bob Butler 54]

(05-21-2017, 07:39 PM)Galen Wrote: It really is depressing when a comedian does better research than you can manage.  Thinking really is beyond you isn't it?

Extreme partisans can think. They are just deeply committed to tightly linked and interconnected sets of ideas, perceptions and values. Anything that conflicts with their carefully selected and reinforcing notions just bounces off their mind. The tools and methods for protecting their core notions vary. Many dive into partisan sources while ignoring or suppressing awareness of conflicting sources. The number of excuses for rejecting what they don't want to hear are many and varied. There is often a scorn felt towards individuals with conflicting view, who are often ignored, despised and rejected much as publications are. Any argument an extreme partisan isn't apt to win gets sidetracked into straw-man and ad-hominum.

Eric has a consistent and well thought out perspective on gun policy that just requires one to ignore certain things... like history, the text of the law, the values of the authors of the law, the sources of the legal theories he is advocating, etc... He can think, but his thoughts are highly selective.

I engage with Eric and Kinser for similar reasons. Both lock themselves into quite different perspectives, but are more apt to rationalize their perspectives, to think how their beliefs can be defended and work together consistently. The need for any partisan to reject what they don't want to hear is frustrating, but dealing with those who insult and mock rather that making any effort to communicate or respect is worse.

[Galen]

(05-21-2017, 08:03 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(05-21-2017, 07:39 PM)Galen Wrote: It really is depressing when a comedian does better research than you can manage.  Thinking really is beyond you isn't it?

Eric has a consistent and well thought out perspective on gun policy that just requires one to ignore certain things...  like history, the text of the law, the values of the authors of the law, the sources of the legal theories he is advocating, etc...  He can think, but his thoughts are highly selective.

Kinser usually makes sense and I can actually get through to him simply because he doesn't ignore huge swaths of reality and does his homework.  Like most of Generation X, he is aware that bad things happen when you ignore reality.

Eric the Obtuse seems more like a cartoon character than an actual person given how little contact with reality he has.  Try to translate his ideas into some form of formal logic like Propositional Logic or Predicate Calculus and see where that gets you.  Try to do that a few times and you will realize he is a complete lunatic.

[Bob Butler 54]

(05-21-2017, 10:06 PM)Galen Wrote:

(05-21-2017, 08:03 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(05-21-2017, 07:39 PM)Galen Wrote: It really is depressing when a comedian does better research than you can manage.  Thinking really is beyond you isn't it?

Eric has a consistent and well thought out perspective on gun policy that just requires one to ignore certain things...  like history, the text of the law, the values of the authors of the law, the sources of the legal theories he is advocating, etc...  He can think, but his thoughts are highly selective.

Kinser usually makes sense and I can actually get through to him simply because he doesn't ignore huge swaths of reality and does his homework.  Like most of Generation X, he is aware that bad things happen when you ignore reality.

Eric the Obtuse seems more like a cartoon character than an actual person given how little contact with reality he has.  Try to translate his ideas into some form of formal logic like Propositional Logic or Predicate Calculus and see where that gets you.  Try to do that a few times and you will realize he is a complete lunatic.

This is likely to a great extent as your tangle of information sources and values is much closer to Kinser's than to Eric's.  I am very much into trying to understand extreme partisans.  Given the big differences between where people were brought up and how they were taught to think, people with a wide variety of world views can think of themselves as rational thinkers.  Extreme partisans attempting to interact with other extreme partisans of a conflicting flavor will reject each other.  The differences in presumptions and assumptions of how the world works are often too great for one with a narrow strict world view to comprehend a different narrow strict view.  You find it easier to reduce Eric to a cartoon than to try to understand where he is coming from.

A lot of extreme partisans care much more about protecting their world views and values and forcing their views on others than they care about improving their understanding of reality or improving their situation.  If someone has convinced themselves they have all the answers they stop seeking answers and start forcing them on others.  Many extreme partisans are fascinating in having extreme intricate consistent ways of holding their view of the world together, but to do so they have to reject information, news sources, sometimes whole fields of science, and what seems like simple facts of everyday life.

My premise is that most everybody has a rational or at least rationalizationable perspective.  The question is how many crooked rationalizations are required to convince themselves that they are right.  The more rationalizations, the tighter people try to hold on to them, the less able they become so see perspectives other than their own.  The problem isn't so much with one partisan or the other, but with the difference between the two partisans.  Two people sharing the same perspective will have similar defense mechanisms and are tied to similar 'facts'.  They will see each other as rational and be able to communicate.  If there are major differences between perspectives, one is more apt to stop trying to comprehend, but to make the simplifying assumption that the other guy is nuts.

I by no means agree with everything Eric says, but I can see where he is coming from.  I see your inability to follow him as more your problem than his.  What Eric is saying is not that complex.  He is not hard to follow unless one is so entangled by one's own perspective that one can't step out of it.

Of course, in trying to understand an extreme partisan, one has to temporarily swallow 'facts' or values that might seem absurdly implausible.  You might temporarily have to assume that Trump has the people skills to hold together a political coalition.  If you don't tentatively accept that assumption, which to me is hard to swallow, someone's perspective will sure look lunatic.  One might also have to wrap one's head around the idea that guns aren't useful for self defense.  Partisans will commonly go all in on ideas that seem so alien and wrong that words like 'lunatic' might actually apply.  My approach involves identifying a minimum number of key ideas that seem absurd and wrong, then attacking those few odd ideas.  For many partisans, the amount of rational thought is much higher than the number of absurd assumptions.  I'd focus on a few of the most absurd assumptions.

[Eric the Green]

(05-21-2017, 07:20 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: It's not a values-lock question. We all share the value of safety. The disagreement is over the means. In my opinion, guns endanger safety, not protect it. Guns destroy life; that is their purpose. Those who disagree claim that guns are a means of self defense.

It is because survival is at stake that it is a values driven question.  One answer or the other, there is a deep emotional element in saying how the world works and how one achieves one's goals.  As much as I distrust the red perspective, as much as I think they have gone too far for too long in many respects, some of their basic perspectives have merit at a values level.  Individuals have responsibilities and need the freedom and tools to make their own choices.  The world is a dangerous place.  Citizens needs the tools, skills and attitudes necessary to thrive.

There are some aspects of the gun debate where meaningful debate is possible.  The basic question of whether one can protect one's self, one's family, one's community is a values thing.  Someone who takes the responsibility seriously just isn't going to give it up.  I don't need to tell you that some are just as firmly committed to the opposite point of view.  "Claim that guns are a means of self defense"?  They are clearly the most effective way to prevent an immoral person from practicing his immorality with impunity.

Those on the "blue" side of the debate disagree, quite strenuously. They (we) are convinced that guns are a threat to public safety, or that at least they are if unregulated or military. So, it's not a values question at all. It's a different view on what fulfills the value that both sides have. So, neither side is values locked, since the same value is at stake on both sides. The question then is why sometimes (as in your case in your statement here) one side does not acknowledge the concern of the other. I'm not sure, except that views on guns have become part of the divide of the country. Some people who value guns do advocate violence and killing, if not murder. They may be revolutionaries on the right or the left, or terrorists, or gang members, criminals, etc. Others have vested interests in the gun industry (especially leaders of the NRA). But many do not; they just disagree with folks like me on the means of keeping the peace instead of allowing violence to prevail.

Quote:

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: You call it the "Jim Crow interpretation" of the 2nd amendment, that says that the 2nd confers the right to bear arms on the militia. I call the Scalia ruling the "right-wing extremist third-turning-era interpretation" of it. The right-wing movement that currently rules our country and took power in 1980 is the most extreme faction in our country in history, save perhaps for the Dixie hotheads of the mid-19th century.

Both the "Jim Crow" and "Scalia" labels are emotionally loaded spin, perhaps pejoratives.  "Individual right," "collective right" and 'standard model' are more neutral terms, but those not long in the conversation might not know them.  I think 'Jim Crow' is an accurate and descriptive label.  There is no hint of the collective right theory until the end of Reconstruction, the beginning of Jim Crow.  The collective right theory began with the Jim Crow supreme courts.  At the same time they neutered the Second, they took out most of the Bill of Rights.  Familiarize yourself with the supreme course case load of Thurgood Marshall and the precedents and cases that he worked in the days leading up to Martin Luther King.  He restored the notion that individual have rights and it was the job of the federal government to protect these rights.

Of course, getting you to read something that conflicts with your world view is nigh on impossible.  You are too values locked in general to consider a point of view conflicting with your own.

Scalia did write a key decision that enforced the standard model.  The standard model was well established and mature in both the academic press and lesser court cases before Scalia wrote his decision.  You can give him more than his share of credit or blame if you like, and use liberal dislike for rule of law as a tool to push your values, but Scalia was a very small if highly visible part of the standard model legal and academic history.  He confirmed everything that those following the academic standard model discussion expected.  He did nothing that many academics and lower court judges hadn't been advocating for years.

The history seems clear that, although there had been debates for decades, the Supreme Court decision came about because the right-wing seized control of the country and put its man on the Supreme Court. The Heller would not have happened otherwise. The charming actor beat the malaise of the peanut farmer, and that's it.

Quote:

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I understand your analogy about the free speech amendment. Of course, it's just an example; it's not in the constitution. The 2nd is the only amendment, I believe, in the US constitution that has such a clause. So, it's significant.

The justification phrase was a common legal structure of the times.  Other than the Jim Crow interpretation of the 2nd, no one interprets  justification phrases as limitation phrases.  The result is so obviously counter the intent of the authors that it would be absurd to do so.  Is there any other right with a justification phrase that you would wish to interpret as a limitation phrase?

Again, if you are trying to honestly interpret a right with a justification phrase, you've got to work under the assumption that the writers of the right believed the justification true and accurate, and thus the interpretation of the implementation phrase must reflect the goals and methods of the justification.  In this case, the authors of the right believed a well armed and trained general populace was necessary for security.  A lot of people in an pretty large part of the country still agree with these revolutionary era values.  Interpreting the Second in conflict with these values requires blatant and obvious values lock.

Do you disagree with the answers to those three questions?

Congress can specify training for the militia, all males of military age.  They could require training and doctrine for good handling and storage of weapons, how to act in an emergency, and what is the chain of command.  It might not be an entirely bad idea.  I don't think the blue folk want to require everyone to train in weapons.  I have my suspicion that many red leaning people care more about protecting their rights than meeting their responsibilities.  There is something to be said, if not for a well regulated militia, but at least a mildly regulated militia.  Still, a lot of blue politicians and gun advocates are trying to continue the confusion about just who the militia is.  Training all adult males and calling them the militia could change perspectives.  Anyway, I doubt bringing back any real organization of the true militia, all adult males, will happen until and unless some threat arose that it would take an awful lot of people to resolve.

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I understand why the late 20th century 3T right-wing interpretation focuses on the 2nd clause. I would interpret it this way: since the militia refers to all men, and all men were whom the constitution applied to in those days, and only white men at that, the "people" and the "militia" were effectively the same thing, originally. So the right of the people to bear arms is subject to the regulations of a militia. Even the extremist right-wing Heller ruling allowed for gun control, perhaps partly for this reason.

The Heller decision was written to resolve the individual vs collective right aspect of the Second, not to resolve all aspects of the gun policy debate.  The Supremes are taking the standard model and 2nd Amendment (in) small chunks. 

A second question is whether the right effects the state's power to regulate guns.  The standard model (and all of Thurgood Marshall's mid 1900s cases) said yes, as did the Chicago 2nd Amendment case that followed shortly after Heller.

A third question is whether the right to keep and bear arms can be infringed.  Can magazine size, rate of fire and similar limitations be placed on guns?  The standard model suggests, that as the militia is mentioned in the justification phrase, the authors of the 2nd intended the keeping and bearing of state of the art military weapons.  A lot of people don't like that part of the standard model.  Heck, I don't really care for that part of the standard model.  I do see the scholarship as solid.  The founding fathers wanted a population armed and trained with military weapons. 

Anyway, Scalia put a few paragraphs into Heller that make it clear that while he was declaring the individual right, he was not endorsing the entire standard model.  There are questions unresolved.

I think the framers probably thought men (or at least enough of them) should be armed as part of the militia to protect the security of a free state. It has also been suggested that the 2nd was a means of arming slaveholders against slave rebellions (just the opposite of the Jim Crow accusation). In any case, the framers and their people did not have military weapons of the kind that were banned in my senator's bill in 1994, or the kind used in mass shootings since the ban was lifted.

Since the militia today is never called up, the 2nd is outdated. Folks like me think it was outdated almost from the start. We have the police and the national guard today, so we don't need the militia. I think police as we know them today were invented in England in the 1820s. So yes, the language of the 2nd is confusing and archaic. That's why strict originalism fails. Language and meaning changes, as do the conditions and needs of the country and its technology.

[Galen]

(05-22-2017, 12:47 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(05-21-2017, 07:20 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: It's not a values-lock question. We all share the value of safety. The disagreement is over the means. In my opinion, guns endanger safety, not protect it. Guns destroy life; that is their purpose. Those who disagree claim that guns are a means of self defense.

Since the militia today is never called up, the 2nd is outdated. Folks like me think it was outdated almost from the start. We have the police and the national guard today, so we don't need the militia. I think police as we know them today were invented in England in the 1820s. So yes, the language of the 2nd is confusing and archaic. That's why strict originalism fails. Language and meaning changes, as do the conditions and needs of the country and its technology.

Self defense happens all the time.  For the most part the intended victim displays a firearm and the predator goes off and finds an easier mark.

The language of the second amendment is clear, you just don't like what it has to say.  The framers of the Constitution believed that power flowed from the bottom up and so the population must remain armed to make sure that it stayed that way.  You believe power flows from the top down in order to make those of us you regard as less enlightened behave as you believe they should.  In this respect you are no different than any other religious zealot.

[Bob Butler 54]

(05-22-2017, 12:47 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: Those on the "blue" side of the debate disagree, quite strenuously. They (we) are convinced that guns are a threat to public safety, or that at least they are if unregulated or military. So, it's not a values question at all. It's a different view on what fulfills the value that both sides have. So, neither side is values locked, since the same value is at stake on both sides. The question then is why sometimes (as in your case in your statement here) one side does not acknowledge the concern of the other. I'm not sure, except that views on guns have become part of the divide of the country. Some people who value guns do advocate violence and killing, if not murder. They may be revolutionaries on the right or the left, or terrorists, or gang members, criminals, etc. Others have vested interests in the gun industry (especially leaders of the NRA). But many do not; they just disagree with folks like me on the means of keeping the peace instead of allowing violence to prevail.

There might be a common value there.  Both sides value life.  I think many would agree that the good guys should out gun the bad guys.  Some might want to disarm bad guys.  Some might want to arm good guys.  I for one would like to see both.  I don't see either as irrational or difficult to understand.

We might be disagreeing more on what is a value, or what is the meaning of 'values lock'.  On the red side it is often a question of whether individuals have the right and responsibility to defend themselves, their family, and their community.  The increased concern with individual rights, responsibilities and decision making exists at a deep values level and is not lightly let go of.  As you say, the opposing position is also strong and not easily let go of.  I see both perspectives as highly subject to values lock.  Nobody is apt to move.

(05-22-2017, 12:47 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: The history seems clear that, although there had been debates for decades, the Supreme Court decision came about because the right-wing seized control of the country and put its man on the Supreme Court. The Heller would not have happened otherwise. The charming actor beat the malaise of the peanut farmer, and that's it.

There is a strong difference here.  I see a conflict in values, race issues creating the bad Jim Crow law, a modern trend started by Thurgood Marshall to get rid of bad law created by Jim Crow, and a long string of Standard Model academic papers that cast a dubious light on the Jim Crow interpretation of the 2nd.

There is a lot more to it than Scalia and Reagan.  There are deep forces at conflict in our culture that existed before those two came to the fore, and continue after they are gone.  They were players in the long struggle, but the problem is much much larger that two men.

This is part of the divide between us.  What is important to the discussion?  I'm into history, law, values, and culture.  You're trying to turn it into conflict of money and personalities.  In a partisan discussion like this, it is natural to put an emphasis on an aspect of the question where one might have an upper hand.  "Reagan, Scalia, ick" is sort of an area where the blue folk see themselves on the high ground.  This is based entirely and their perception of the two men.  The argument won't be decisive to red folk who have a different opinion of the two men.

I respect Reagan's understanding of the mood of his time, though folks have taken his perspective far far beyond the point of diminishing return.  I also like Scalia's defense of the law as written, of respecting the intent of the authors of the Constitution.  "Reagan, Scalia, ick" is not an argument that moves me at all.

There is a heck of a lot more to it than the personalities of two people.

(05-22-2017, 12:47 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: I think the framers probably thought men (or at least enough of them) should be armed as part of the militia to protect the security of a free state. It has also been suggested that the 2nd was a means of arming slaveholders against slave rebellions (just the opposite of the Jim Crow accusation). In any case, the framers and their people did not have military weapons of the kind that were banned in my senator's bill in 1994, or the kind used in mass shootings since the ban was lifted.

The Constitution lists three reasons the Federal government can call up and take charge of the militia: to enforce the law, to repel invasions, and to suppress insurrections.  Yes, slave revolts would be one form of insurrection that might have been suppressed.  Before the Civil War suppressing slave revolts was part of the picture.  With Jim Crow, preventing the federal government from protecting the rights of blacks and preventing the blacks from taking action on their own behalf was a great deal of the picture.  Yes, the abolition of pure slavery made a difference in tactics, but in both eras suppressing the black population was a key motive.

(05-22-2017, 12:47 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: Since the militia today is never called up, the 2nd is outdated. Folks like me think it was outdated almost from the start. We have the police and the national guard today, so we don't need the militia. I think police as we know them today were invented in England in the 1820s. So yes, the language of the 2nd is confusing and archaic. That's why strict originalism fails. Language and meaning changes, as do the conditions and needs of the country and its technology.

The right and duty to protect one's self, one's family and one's community is not out dated. 

Yes, to a great degree a larger number of professionals makes the use of amateurs by the government extremely uncommon.  The are no longer common problems that require the entire male population to be trained, equipped and ready to handle them in mass, now or sooner.  There are no natives lurking in the woods, or British frigates cruising off our coast.  With larger professional forces, better transportation, much faster communications and ways to gather information about threats, the tactical situation is very much changed.  We don't need the local population everywhere to be able to meet big threats with little notice. 

This does not mean there are enough professionals to be everywhere, to respond to small threats in a timely enough fashion to make a difference.  In rural areas, with more land and fewer professionals, this is obvious to a large number of people.  A good part of the cultural divide is just population density.  One solution to small threats is not ideal everywhere.

There are a very goodly number of people with values that conflict with the founding fathers.  There are not so many of them to allow the sort of constitutional amendment that it ought to take to change the Bill of Rights.  Many consider the Bill of Rights very important, a bedrock of the culture, not to be changed unless there is a very clear change in the country's values.  That change just isn't there yet.  The conditions that created values have changed considerably in urban areas, but remain essentially the same in rural areas.  Urban folk want to break up the bedrock before they have the sort of super majority they are supposed to have before the bedrock is broken up.

The part of it that you haven't responded to is how you expect to make prohibition work.  In the United States, if the populace wants something, a criminal underground will develop whatever it takes to provide it.  Violence often escalates as criminal gangs fight for market share.  This happened with alcohol, has happened with other drugs, and has happened when various levels of government have attempted to control access to guns.  While a lot of folk will agree that disarming bad guys is a neat idea, how does one achieve it?  It is much easier to get laws through legislatures than to enforce them.

In any such partisan debates, the partisans will ignore those parts of the debates that they know they will lose badly.  The practical concern of how to make prohibition work is the big hole in the blue side of the story.  There were and still are successful militia cultures, where a heavily armed and trained populace discourages the bad guys.  There were and still are successful disarmed cultures, where a lower amount of firepower and willingness to use it reduces violence.  To me, either style of culture is plausible and achievable, but the question is how to get to either place from where we are now.  How does one induce rural folk to disarm, or how does one convince urban folk to proactively defend themselves.  I don't see either happening any time soon.  The country is a muddle of conflicting values and cultures.  Either culture forcing the other to change significantly is unlikely.

[Eric the Green]

(05-22-2017, 07:28 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(05-22-2017, 12:47 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: Those on the "blue" side of the debate disagree, quite strenuously. They (we) are convinced that guns are a threat to public safety, or that at least they are if unregulated or military. So, it's not a values question at all. It's a different view on what fulfills the value that both sides have. So, neither side is values locked, since the same value is at stake on both sides. The question then is why sometimes (as in your case in your statement here) one side does not acknowledge the concern of the other. I'm not sure, except that views on guns have become part of the divide of the country. Some people who value guns do advocate violence and killing, if not murder. They may be revolutionaries on the right or the left, or terrorists, or gang members, criminals, etc. Others have vested interests in the gun industry (especially leaders of the NRA). But many do not; they just disagree with folks like me on the means of keeping the peace instead of allowing violence to prevail.

There might be a common value there.  Both sides value life.  I think many would agree that the good guys should out gun the bad guys.  Some might want to disarm bad guys.  Some might want to arm good guys.  I for one would like to see both.  I don't see either as irrational or difficult to understand.

We might be disagreeing more on what is a value, or what is the meaning of 'values lock'.  On the red side it is often a question of whether individuals have the right and responsibility to defend themselves, their family, and their community.  The increased concern with individual rights, responsibilities and decision making exists at a deep values level and is not lightly let go of.  As you say, the opposing position is also strong and not easily let go of.  I see both perspectives as highly subject to values lock.  Nobody is apt to move.

(05-22-2017, 12:47 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: The history seems clear that, although there had been debates for decades, the Supreme Court decision came about because the right-wing seized control of the country and put its man on the Supreme Court. The Heller would not have happened otherwise. The charming actor beat the malaise of the peanut farmer, and that's it.

There is a strong difference here.  I see a conflict in values, race issues creating the bad Jim Crow law, a modern trend started by Thurgood Marshall to get rid of bad law created by Jim Crow, and a long string of Standard Model academic papers that cast a dubious light on the Jim Crow interpretation of the 2nd.

There is a lot more to it than Scalia and Reagan.  There are deep forces at conflict in our culture that existed before those two came to the fore, and continue after they are gone.  They were players in the long struggle, but the problem is much much larger that two men.

This is part of the divide between us.  What is important to the discussion?  I'm into history, law, values, and culture.  You're trying to turn it into conflict of money and personalities.  In a partisan discussion like this, it is natural to put an emphasis on an aspect of the question where one might have an upper hand.  "Reagan, Scalia, ick" is sort of an area where the blue folk see themselves on the high ground.  This is based entirely and their perception of the two men.  The argument won't be decisive to red folk who have a different opinion of the two men.

I respect Reagan's understanding of the mood of his time, though folks have taken his perspective far far beyond the point of diminishing return.  I also like Scalia's defense of the law as written, of respecting the intent of the authors of the Constitution.  "Reagan, Scalia, ick" is not an argument that moves me at all.

There is a heck of a lot more to it than the personalities of two people.

Come on, I said nothing about two people. The right-wing extremist movement that took over the country is what created Heller. Reagan was the leader who was able to put it into office, because he was ruggedly handsome, articulate, and a better candidate than Carter; that's all. If Carter had been the better candidate, then the right-wingers might not have been able to take over the country and put their man on the Court, that's all. Just as if Hillary had been better than Trump as a candidate, Trump would not have been able to appoint a Scalia clone to take his place. No, I had no respect for Scalia. It isn't about us either, of course. And those who want gun control are usually on the same side as those who want civil rights for blacks and others. They are both blue. Jim Crow is red. The lingering racism in the country is of course a prime component of trickle-down free market economics. IOW "I don't want my taxes going for those people who don't work" etc.

(05-22-2017, 12:47 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: I think the framers probably thought men (or at least enough of them) should be armed as part of the militia to protect the security of a free state. It has also been suggested that the 2nd was a means of arming slaveholders against slave rebellions (just the opposite of the Jim Crow accusation). In any case, the framers and their people did not have military weapons of the kind that were banned in my senator's bill in 1994, or the kind used in mass shootings since the ban was lifted.

The Constitution lists three reasons the Federal government can call up and take charge of the militia: to enforce the law, to repel invasions, and to suppress insurrections.  Yes, slave revolts would be one form of insurrection that might have been suppressed.  Before the Civil War suppressing slave revolts was part of the picture.  With Jim Crow, preventing the federal government from protecting the rights of blacks and preventing the blacks from taking action on their own behalf was a great deal of the picture.  Yes, the abolition of pure slavery made a difference in tactics, but in both eras suppressing the black population was a key motive.

Quote:

(05-22-2017, 12:47 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: Since the militia today is never called up, the 2nd is outdated. Folks like me think it was outdated almost from the start. We have the police and the national guard today, so we don't need the militia. I think police as we know them today were invented in England in the 1820s. So yes, the language of the 2nd is confusing and archaic. That's why strict originalism fails. Language and meaning changes, as do the conditions and needs of the country and its technology.

The right and duty to protect one's self, one's family and one's community is not out dated. 

Yes, to a great degree a larger number of professionals makes the use of amateurs by the government extremely uncommon.  The are no longer common problems that require the entire male population to be trained, equipped and ready to handle them in mass, now or sooner.  There are no natives lurking in the woods, or British frigates cruising off our coast.  With larger professional forces, better transportation, much faster communications and ways to gather information about threats, the tactical situation is very much changed.  We don't need the local population everywhere to be able to meet big threats with little notice. 

This does not mean there are enough professionals to be everywhere, to respond to small threats in a timely enough fashion to make a difference.  In rural areas, with more land and fewer professionals, this is obvious to a large number of people.  A good part of the cultural divide is just population density.  One solution to small threats is not ideal everywhere.

There are a very goodly number of people with values that conflict with the founding fathers.  There are not so many of them to allow the sort of constitutional amendment that it ought to take to change the Bill of Rights.  Many consider the Bill of Rights very important, a bedrock of the culture, not to be changed unless there is a very clear change in the country's values.  That change just isn't there yet.  The conditions that created values have changed considerably in urban areas, but remain essentially the same in rural areas.  Urban folk want to break up the bedrock before they have the sort of super majority they are supposed to have before the bedrock is broken up.

The part of it that you haven't responded to is how you expect to make prohibition work.  In the United States, if the populace wants something, a criminal underground will develop whatever it takes to provide it.  Violence often escalates as criminal gangs fight for market share.  This happened with alcohol, has happened with other drugs, and has happened when various levels of government have attempted to control access to guns.  While a lot of folk will agree that disarming bad guys is a neat idea, how does one achieve it?  It is much easier to get laws through legislatures than to enforce them.

In any such partisan debates, the partisans will ignore those parts of the debates that they know they will lose badly.  The practical concern of how to make prohibition work is the big hole in the blue side of the story.  There were and still are successful militia cultures, where a heavily armed and trained populace discourages the bad guys.  There were and still are successful disarmed cultures, where a lower amount of firepower and willingness to use it reduces violence.  To me, either style of culture is plausible and achievable, but the question is how to get to either place from where we are now.  How does one induce rural folk to disarm, or how does one convince urban folk to proactively defend themselves.  I don't see either happening any time soon.  The country is a muddle of conflicting values and cultures.  Either culture forcing the other to change significantly is unlikely.

I haven't ignored things, but this debate is very tiresome and goes over the same ground over and over. Again, what's being proposed is not prohibition, except with respect to military weapons, which have nothing to do with self-defense. And no, guns do not work for that purpose anyway, but since people believe it does, and because Americans have a perceived need for guns, total prohibition is off the table for the foreseeable future. So the conflict is not over the value of self-defense, since on the pro gun control side, guns are not perceived as a reliable means for it. They are a means for people to kill people, and that's it. I don't know when rural folks might learn to see this fact. The right-wing/libertarian (or revolutionary left wing) American point of view on guns is purely an American one among developed countries; our gun obsession is unique.

In a 4T, one side emerges victorious. Values changes happen to an extent, but the victory is only partial and the cycle continues until the next 2T and 4T when values may change further. Based on the statistics I have seen, it's clear that gun control works. What is also clear, is that gun possession is becoming increasingly concentrated among an ever-smaller group of people who have this obsession.

As I said before, though, if the constitution becomes moot due to the tyrannical and unconstitutional conduct of our government, then the 2nd amendment and the entire constitution becomes irrelevant, and so probably does gun control or prohibition. Revolution and/or civil war means that the people need an army to overthrow the regime, and sometimes this might include a peoples' army. Gun control is irrelevant for the people of Syria, for example.

[David Horn]

(05-22-2017, 01:12 AM)Galen Wrote: Self defense happens all the time.  For the most part the intended victim displays a firearm and the predator goes off and finds an easier mark.

I've heard the self defense claim many times, but there is no evidence to back it up.  It's all anecdotal, and typically long after the fact.  We purposely fail to keep records on the subject of guns, so color me unconvinced.

Galen Wrote:The language of the second amendment is clear, you just don't like what it has to say.  The framers of the Constitution believed that power flowed from the bottom up and so the population must remain armed to make sure that it stayed that way.  You believe power flows from the top down in order to make those of us you regard as less enlightened behave as you believe they should.  In this respect you are no different than any other religious zealot.

The framers believed that they lived on the edge of a wilderness and had no standing army -- by choice.  That left military protection in the hands of the people, and only that.  Warping the 2nd to mean something else does not make it so ... even with the consent of the SCOTUS.

[Eric the Green]

(05-22-2017, 01:12 AM)Galen Wrote:

(05-22-2017, 12:47 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(05-21-2017, 07:20 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(05-21-2017, 05:45 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: It's not a values-lock question. We all share the value of safety. The disagreement is over the means. In my opinion, guns endanger safety, not protect it. Guns destroy life; that is their purpose. Those who disagree claim that guns are a means of self defense.

Since the militia today is never called up, the 2nd is outdated. Folks like me think it was outdated almost from the start. We have the police and the national guard today, so we don't need the militia. I think police as we know them today were invented in England in the 1820s. So yes, the language of the 2nd is confusing and archaic. That's why strict originalism fails. Language and meaning changes, as do the conditions and needs of the country and its technology.

Self defense happens all the time.  For the most part the intended victim displays a firearm and the predator goes off and finds an easier mark.

The language of the second amendment is clear, you just don't like what it has to say.  The framers of the Constitution believed that power flowed from the bottom up and so the population must remain armed to make sure that it stayed that way.  You believe power flows from the top down in order to make those of us you regard as less enlightened behave as you believe they should.  In this respect you are no different than any other religious zealot.

Well Galen, I don't usually reply to you or read your posts (if someone quotes them I can see them), but I have to say, yeah, I believe YOU are among the less enlightened, for sure, and if I can make you behave, I'm all for it

[Bob Butler 54]

(05-22-2017, 09:06 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: I haven't ignored things, but this debate is very tiresome and goes over the same ground over and over. Again, what's being proposed is not prohibition, except with respect to military weapons, which have nothing to do with self-defense. And no, guns do not work for that purpose anyway, but since people believe it does, and because Americans have a perceived need for guns, total prohibition is off the table for the foreseeable future. So the conflict is not over the value of self-defense, since on the pro gun control side, guns are not perceived as a reliable means for it. They are a means for people to kill people, and that's it. I don't know when rural folks might learn to see this fact. The right-wing/libertarian (or revolutionary left wing) American point of view on guns is purely an American one among developed countries; our gun obsession is unique.

In a 4T, one side emerges victorious. Values changes happen to an extent, but the victory is only partial and the cycle continues until the next 2T and 4T when values may change further. Based on the statistics I have seen, it's clear that gun control works. What is also clear, is that gun possession is becoming increasingly concentrated among an ever-smaller group of people who have this obsession.

As I said before, though, if the constitution becomes moot due to the tyrannical and unconstitutional conduct of our government, then the 2nd amendment and the entire constitution becomes irrelevant, and so probably does gun control or prohibition. Revolution and/or civil war means that the people need an army to overthrow the regime, and sometimes this might include a peoples' army. Gun control is irrelevant for the people of Syria, for example.

Many blues want to prohibit certain guns with certain features. It's prohibition.

Agreed, total prohibition by constitutional amendment is not happening any time soon.

I believe large cultures have a reason for coming into existence. If you look at the major memes and values underlying a major culture, if you examine the history you can find a time and place where these memes helped the culture grow and thrive. While I disagree with many of the red unraveling memes, blind squirrels do find nuts. Not everything they believe in is certified wrong.

Much of this 'discussion' is me reviewing the history of why certain memes came into being and still work in some places. The response is that everything red is evil and wrong. I'll review revolutionary values and how they are still functioning is some parts of the country. I'll review how Jim Crow law was bad, and there has been and still is a continuing a pattern of Jim Crow law being removed from precedent and the books. I also see the gun policy results as dependent, among other things, on population density. Depending on the professionals for defense works better in areas where lots of people live close together. All history and values aside, rural people will see more need to be able to defend themselves than urban people. There are good practical reason why the gun policy debate divides along rural / urban lines. One policy does not fit everywhere equally well. Different parts of the country want policies that work best in their local environment. One part of the country forcing their values and policies on another is not a smooth easy path to walk.

The dominant response seems to be a vilification and demonization of the Reagan era Republicans. Hey, I don't much care for those guys either. I will disparage most of the unraveling memes merrily. If they were ever good ideas, they have been taken well beyond the point of diminishing returns.

But blaming everything on a few people and a political movement isn't going to be convincing to members of that political movement. The core of your perspective seems to be a hatred of unraveling Republicans. Arguments based on this hate aren't going to work well on unraveling Republicans, or on me. I can understand and sometimes respect where they are coming from. You might try focusing on the issues more and denouncing people and groups less. Reinforcing the mutual hatred between the opposing cultures doesn't seem constructive.

In many ways, we are both correct. Jim Crow was real. Ronald Reagan was real. The founding fathers were real. The gun policy question is extremely complex with many layers. You are focused tightly on modern political aspects, while I'm into culture, history and law. Your expressing again how much you hate modern Republicans will not make the culture, history and law go away. Seeing different things as important, how we argue and what points we see as decisive differ.

I am having a real difficulty comprehending your notion that guns can't be used for defense. We live in an occasionally violent environment. If one is caught in an incident, a weapon does give many more options for controlling the indecent, for resolving the conflict on one's own terms. You seem to be claiming that they don't. If guns are not useful tools for resolving conflicts on one's own terms, why to both cops and robbers carry guns? Your ex cathedra pronouncements that guns cannot be used for defense simply do not make any sense to me at all, yet this bogus bit of nonsense seems to be the core of your argument. If one repeats a Big Lie often enough, does it help you convince yourself? I know you're not going to convince me, or many red leaning folk.

Another note is that just because one is fighting for one issue does not imply the other guy is fighting for the flip side of the other issue. Some say the Civil War was fought over slavery, some say over state's rights, some say it was a conflict between the old agricultural plantation and slave owning elites against the up and coming industrial robber baron elites. If the other guy is looking at the elite economic conflict, raging against slavery isn't going to move him. He is looking at the conflict from a different perspective. For me, it seems necessary to be aware of all the various perspectives. Locking into one angle only leaves one with an incomplete and lopsided view of the issue.

The founding fathers saw many reasons for an armed trained populace. That some reasons have become obsolete does not imply all reasons have gone away. It is reasonably obvious that large numbers of unarmed amateurs are no longer needed to repel invasions or suppress insurrections. This does not mean the founding fathers didn't think protecting one's self important as well, or that a well armed populace shouldn't be there to make the ruling elite at least a little nervous. Their thoughts are clear and well documented.

The justification phrase presses the need for a well regulated militia. If one is not going to be suppressing insurrections or repelling invasions with masses of amateurs, there is less need to train the masses to fight as a large team. I have considered what sort of training ought to be given to all adult males of military age, should the Congress decide to exercise their authority to train them. How does one securely store a weapon when not in use? What is the chain of command? What are the rules of engagement? How are officers appointed? If an incident is developing, who do you report it to? This sort of training is available, and is very different from revolutionary era doctrine. No one trains in how to march from a travel column formation into a firing line anymore. Maintaining proper spacing so one can concentrate fire while still having room to use one's ramrod isn't a big deal these days. This in no way implies that if one is carrying a weapon, one doesn't need to know what one is doing.

[Eric the Green]

(05-22-2017, 10:10 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(05-22-2017, 09:06 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: I haven't ignored things, but this debate is very tiresome and goes over the same ground over and over. Again, what's being proposed is not prohibition, except with respect to military weapons, which have nothing to do with self-defense. And no, guns do not work for that purpose anyway, but since people believe it does, and because Americans have a perceived need for guns, total prohibition is off the table for the foreseeable future. So the conflict is not over the value of self-defense, since on the pro gun control side, guns are not perceived as a reliable means for it. They are a means for people to kill people, and that's it. I don't know when rural folks might learn to see this fact. The right-wing/libertarian (or revolutionary left wing) American point of view on guns is purely an American one among developed countries; our gun obsession is unique.

In a 4T, one side emerges victorious. Values changes happen to an extent, but the victory is only partial and the cycle continues until the next 2T and 4T when values may change further. Based on the statistics I have seen, it's clear that gun control works. What is also clear, is that gun possession is becoming increasingly concentrated among an ever-smaller group of people who have this obsession.

As I said before, though, if the constitution becomes moot due to the tyrannical and unconstitutional conduct of our government, then the 2nd amendment and the entire constitution becomes irrelevant, and so probably does gun control or prohibition. Revolution and/or civil war means that the people need an army to overthrow the regime, and sometimes this might include a peoples' army. Gun control is irrelevant for the people of Syria, for example.

Many blues want to prohibit certain guns with certain features. It's prohibition.

Agreed, total prohibition by constitutional amendment is not happening any time soon.

I believe large cultures have a reason for coming into existence. If you look at the major memes and values underlying a major culture, if you examine the history you can find a time and place where these memes helped the culture grow and thrive. While I disagree with many of the red unraveling memes, blind squirrels do find nuts. Not everything they believe in is certified wrong.

Much of this 'discussion' is me reviewing the history of why certain memes came into being and still work in some places. The response is that everything red is evil and wrong. I'll review revolutionary values and how they are still functioning is some parts of the country. I'll review how Jim Crow law was bad, and there has been and still is a continuing a pattern of Jim Crow law being removed from precedent and the books. I also see the gun policy results as dependent, among other things, on population density. Depending on the professionals for defense works better in areas where lots of people live close together. All history and values aside, rural people will see more need to be able to defend themselves than urban people. There are good practical reason why the gun policy debate divides along rural / urban lines. One policy does not fit everywhere equally well. Different parts of the country want policies that work best in their local environment. One part of the country forcing their values and policies on another is not a smooth easy path to walk.

The dominant response seems to be a vilification and demonization of the Reagan era Republicans. Hey, I don't much care for those guys either. I will disparage most of the unraveling memes merrily. If they were ever good ideas, they have been taken well beyond the point of diminishing returns.

But blaming everything on a few people and a political movement isn't going to be convincing to members of that political movement. The core of your perspective seems to be a hatred of unraveling Republicans. Arguments based on this hate aren't going to work well on unraveling Republicans, or on me. I can understand and sometimes respect where they are coming from. You might try focusing on the issues more and denouncing people and groups less. Reinforcing the mutual hatred between the opposing cultures doesn't seem constructive.

Calling it "hatred" or "vilification" is a way of dismissing the value of what I or anyone says. No, it's a substantive opinion based on acute observation. I have watched what has happened to our country, and I know that the right-wing takeover of 1980 is the reason for the decline and reversal of progressive movement in our society. You have observed this too. Reagan is to blame only in that he was an electable candidate who propagated the movement. No, I don't see any value in the red memes, beyond the fact that there are grains of truth in them, but on the whole they are all quite wrong. There is no saving grace in the Republican ideologies. It's true, condemnation doesn't work on them. What needs to happen is people need to wake up from these delusions. I am not going to wake up Galen, Dew, Classic Xer. It's up to them to see the error of their opinions. All I can do is point out the errors as best I can. Perhaps someone might listen, sometime. No, I don't think I'm right on everything all the time. There is much to learn on many topics. That's why I listen, and observe. At least sometimes

Quote:In many ways, we are both correct. Jim Crow was real. Ronald Reagan was real. The founding fathers were real. The gun policy question is extremely complex with many layers. You are focused tightly on modern political aspects, while I'm into culture, history and law. Your expressing again how much you hate modern Republicans will not make the culture, history and law go away. Seeing different things as important, how we argue and what points we see as decisive differ.

I am having a real difficulty comprehending your notion that guns can't be used for defense. We live in an occasionally violent environment. If one is caught in an incident, a weapon does give many more options for controlling the indecent, for resolving the conflict on one's own terms. You seem to be claiming that they don't. If guns are not useful tools for resolving conflicts on one's own terms, why to both cops and robbers carry guns? Your ex cathedra pronouncements that guns cannot be used for defense simply do not make any sense to me at all, yet this bogus bit of nonsense seems to be the core of your argument. If one repeats a Big Lie often enough, does it help you convince yourself? I know you're not going to convince me, or many red leaning folk.

I have covered why guns are not good defense over and over here; doing it another time would not seem productive. It's certainly obvious though that many times using guns results in unnecessary injury or death. And usually an armed robber will win.

[Bob Butler 54]

(05-22-2017, 10:28 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Calling it "hatred" or "vilification" is a way of dismissing the value of what I or anyone says. No, it's a substantive opinion based on acute observation. I have watched what has happened to our country, and I know that the right-wing takeover of 1980 is the reason for the decline and reversal of progressive movement in our society. You have observed this too. Reagan is to blame only in that he was an electable candidate who propagated the movement. No, I don't see any value in the red memes, beyond the fact that there are grains of truth in them, but on the whole they are all quite wrong. There is no saving grace in the Republican ideologies. It's true, condemnation doesn't work on them. What needs to happen is people need to wake up from these delusions. I am not going to wake up Galen, Dew, Classic Xer. It's up to them to see the error of their opinions. All I can do is point out the errors as best I can. Perhaps someone might listen, sometime. No, I don't think I'm right on everything all the time. There is much to learn on many topics. That's why I listen, and observe.

It does seem clear that from FDR's New Deal through LBJ's Great Society there was an period of liberal dominance when America was Great.  The GI's believed that with enough bodies on the ground working together, Big Government could do Big Things.  There was a sense that with hard work together, there was nothing America couldn't do.  There is a heck of a lot positive that one could say about the era.

There was a series of failures that destroyed the sense of all powerful destiny:  the fall of Saigon, the oil crisis, the hostage crisis, Watergate.  The Democratic embrace of the civil rights movement opened the door for Nixon's Southern Strategy.  The sense that the country should end poverty and share the wealth faded as racist elements tried to direct the money more selfishly.  In switching from the gold standard to a floating currency, the economic managers for a time didn't know what they were doing.  Stagflation became endemic.  Carter spoke truthfully and accurately about a national malaise, encompassing all of the above and more.  The work ethic, the willingness to pay big taxes to do big things, the optimism and the energy of the era when America was Great, all went away.  Carter was correct, but his tone was more a pronouncement of failure than a call to revitalize.  He didn't have it in him to revive the dead ghost of what America had once been.

America entered an unraveling for a bunch of reasons other than generational alignments and a convincing actor.  The crisis values of working together for a common cause and the awakening values that found fault with a faulty nation could only take the nation so far.  The highest wave at the peak high tide receded.  No wave since has come close.

My own feeling is that had Carter had the vision and speaking abilities of Churchill, and if Reagan were not an impressive spokesmen, we would have had an unraveling anyway.  It was time.  People were no longer willing to tax and spend endless money for great projects, especially with the projects and the economy failing.  It is very possible to get a sense of why America headed in the direction it did.

Most of it wasn't evil.  Nixon's racist Southern Strategy, sure.  A lot of it was a nation that had just burned itself out.  One can only pay any price, bear any burden, support every friend, oppose any foe for so long.  Eventually, the mountain is just too tall, and it seems like time to take a break.

And, yes, we still have to shake ourselves out of the national malaise.  I see borrow and spend trickle down with the government being seen as the problem nigh on inevitable, but not a path towards greatness.  Eventually, perhaps, the problems that accumulate when a people decides to stop solving problems will force a swing back toward the typical crisis era working together towards the common good.  It better.  It has to.

So, it is possible for me to understand how the unraveling Republican era came to be while still wanting the unraveling memes to be submerged by more active and progressive mood and values.

A lot of this has nothing to do with the gun policy discussion.  There are some common themes.  Rural areas don't want the government messing with their life style.  They don't want policies designed for and by urban interests forced on them.  There is a rural pride in independence, self sufficiency, responsibility and freedom.  None of these are necessarily evil or wrong.  None of them seem hard to understand.

I don't know.  You perceive yourself as listening and observing.  It doesn't seem that you are doing these things well.

(05-22-2017, 10:28 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I have covered why guns are not good defense over and over here; doing it another time would not seem productive.

You have not done so in a way which seems at all convincing.  I am reminded of the old awakening picture of the pretty flower child hippy girl sticking a daisy in the barrel of a National Guardsman's rifle.  I am trying to picture you talking to a cop or a drug gang member, trying to convince them that guns can't be used to help one resolve a conflict in their favor.  You haven't said anything convincing.

[Eric the Green]

To me what I have said on this makes eminent sense. No need to rehash. As I have also said, it makes sense these days to compromise between rural and urban needs on this issue. The rural side is not interested in compromise, however. The red side is stuck in extremism on this and all other issues. The blue side is more flexible. That is also the weakness of the blue side.

[Bob Butler 54]

(05-23-2017, 12:16 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: To me what I have said on this makes eminent sense. No need to rehash. As I have also said, it makes sense these days to compromise between rural and urban needs on this issue. The rural side is not interested in compromise, however. The red side is stuck in extremism on this and all other issues. The blue side is more flexible. That is also the weakness of the blue side.

So long as there is significant talk of true prohibition on the blue side, compromise isn't likely from the red.

I'm not sure the red guys are as firmly stuck as they have been.  Trump has taken the unraveling memes way beyond the pale, and is doing so with remarkable chaos and dysfunction.  His narcissism and lack of people skills won't make it easy for him to recover.  The Republicans are split.  It's too soon to say where things are going, but it doesn't look like the unraveling status quo is the best bet.

I find it far easier to comprehend the red base than you.  For the most part I can follow you, but there are a few pieces of the puzzle that won't fall together for me.

[Galen]

(05-23-2017, 01:33 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(05-23-2017, 12:16 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: To me what I have said on this makes eminent sense. No need to rehash. As I have also said, it makes sense these days to compromise between rural and urban needs on this issue. The rural side is not interested in compromise, however. The red side is stuck in extremism on this and all other issues. The blue side is more flexible. That is also the weakness of the blue side.

I'm not sure the red guys are as firmly stuck as they have been.  Trump has taken the unraveling memes way beyond the pale, and is doing so with remarkable chaos and dysfunction.  His narcissism and lack of people skills won't make it easy for him to recover.  The Republicans are split.  It's too soon to say where things are going, but it doesn't look like the unraveling status quo is the best bet.

The Republican Party base is at odds with its establishment which why Trump ended up as president.  On the other hand, the progressives seem to be at odds with everybody.  The Democrats have pretty deep divisions of its own to deal with right now.

Welcome to the wonderful world of living in a declining empire.  The government is bankrupt and neither it nor the various will accept this fundamental truth.  As a consequence each interest group is trying to stick everyone else with the check when the music stops.

[Odin]

(05-22-2017, 10:28 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I believe large cultures have a reason for coming into existence.  If you look at the major memes and values underlying a major culture, if you examine the history you can find a time and place where these memes helped the culture grow and thrive.  While I disagree with many of the red unraveling memes, blind squirrels do find nuts.  Not everything they believe in is certified wrong.

Historically, democratic and semi-democratic collective societies emerge when a large % of a population has access to weapons of war, we see this with massed infantry militias using iron weapons and armor in the Classical Mediterranean world, and also with firearm-based infantry in the modern West

[Bob Butler 54]

(05-23-2017, 03:16 AM)Galen Wrote:

(05-23-2017, 01:33 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(05-23-2017, 12:16 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: To me what I have said on this makes eminent sense. No need to rehash. As I have also said, it makes sense these days to compromise between rural and urban needs on this issue. The rural side is not interested in compromise, however. The red side is stuck in extremism on this and all other issues. The blue side is more flexible. That is also the weakness of the blue side.

I'm not sure the red guys are as firmly stuck as they have been.  Trump has taken the unraveling memes way beyond the pale, and is doing so with remarkable chaos and dysfunction.  His narcissism and lack of people skills won't make it easy for him to recover.  The Republicans are split.  It's too soon to say where things are going, but it doesn't look like the unraveling status quo is the best bet.

The Republican Party base is at odds with its establishment which why Trump ended up as president.  On the other hand, the progressives seem to be at odds with everybody.  The Democrats have pretty deep divisions of its own to deal with right now.

Welcome to the wonderful world of living in a declining empire.  The government is bankrupt and neither it nor the various will accept this fundamental truth.  As a consequence each interest group is trying to stick everyone else with the check when the music stops.

The government is fiscally bankrupt due to an too heavy play of the low taxes unraveling memes.  The government is morally bankrupt as both parties have embraced serving the big money campaign contributions rather than striving to earn the trust and backing of the People.  The positive side of the Trump, Clinton and Sanders election is that the People are beginning to recognize this, that the establishment candidates are distrusted.  This might leave room for a period of government where there is more care for serving the nation than attracting campaign contributions from the wealthy.

Electing Trump was a big slap in the face of both establishments.  In many ways I find the rejection of the establishment a positive sign.  It is becoming clearer, though, that the nation just chose the wrong anti-establishment.  Trump is going all in with the Reagan memes that drove the unraveling era.  He might just make us fully unraveled, and give us a chance to find where we want to go.  Our current destination seems to be Rock Bottom.

Yes, the failure of the establishment is becoming more visible.  I can only hope candidates arrive who can focus more on the interests of the nation.

During the Agricultural Age, failed empires often died entirely.  The names of great states would disappear from the maps.  Since the industrial age, the dominant states continue to exist, but with less ability and inclination to bully their neighbors.  Since the Industrial Age, Spain though access to New World gold, France though uniting a large area, Britain with its overseas colonies and naval power, Germany with its militarism, the United States with its large land area an its distance from the damaging effects of the world wars, Russia too with its large size, all took their turns as bully empires that dominated the world through economic, military and political clout.

Most over extended what they could do with that clout.  All had a sense of entitlement, a feeling that they were so great they could force their will on others.  All put too much faith and effort into the military and bankrupted themselves in debt.  Well, not quite all yet.  The United States is still working on it.  The red unraveling memes of embracing debt, not taxing to balance the debt, and spending lots on the military are leading us that way, but we aren't over the cliff yet.  Or, perhaps, we are over the cliff, but we haven't noticed yet.

So, yes, I can see us letting go of the 'lone superpower' meme.  Europe, China, Russia and other military economic powers are close to becoming our equal.  The advantage we had of having the only intact industrial infrastructure after World War II is long gone.  Stepping back from the notion that we can force our will on everybody might be prudent. If our urban elite is a annoying our rural regions by forcing their culture and values on them, perhaps the rest of the world feels the same way?

But I don't see us totally going away.  The various great powers of the Industrial Age all had to learn to avoid hubris, to step back to a more normal place in the global pecking order. They survived though in a respectable way.  Cutting back on our pride and feeling of dominance could well be a good thing.  Still, a large number of Americans still glory in a magnificent military and in frequent meddling.  We are still acting like a superpower, even if we haven't the economy to back it.