gmerkt comment worthy of thread

[baker3gun]

Not going to flame you at all (in spite of the eye bleach recovery from the prior post).
Likely one of the most complex issues on this forum and life in general. Others have noted, what I think we have missing in a society that is drifting toward not libertarianism that you appear to be discussing but a, "I want to do whatever I want without any consequences," is the utter lack of said consequences. If someone (not saying you of course ) chooses to driver 200 mph, loaded on speedballs, firing their MP5 out the window with their sex robot in the passenger seat and kills a child, well I think most would agree that their life should be over.

However, when they spark up a natural herb, knowing that it seriously impairs your ability to drive, and you kill the same child, how do we treat this? What if they don't kill anyone but are caught on the roadway? What if they become complete stoners and live off the government? Two things seem important with freedom, consequences for your actions and natural consequences for your lack of actions (i.e. you don't get to fund your life at the taxpayer's expense.)

Having said that, I think there are times when people definitely need assistance even if they didn't live perfect lives and even some seemingly very bad people can be reformed. It's complicated. Enjoying viewing other's perspective, thanks for rebooting the thread in a nice direction!

We like to make fun of the French.

During the age of Enlightenment, they helped pioneer the manifestation of ideas of freedom, human rights, equality.

Montesquieu directly influenced our founders.

The French had a revolution immediately after the American Revolutionary war.

Their founders took a less "independent and self-reliant" approach to cementing human rights.

Today, they make impressive weapons systems, not something that many countries can claim.

If a person takes the time to learn 500 years of modern French history, perspective changes. Yes, they have had their failings, but everyone has.

All of that to say this:
WillametteWill echos the thoughts of Enlightenment authors and also the foundational documents of modern France.

Freedom is not a carte blanche free-for-all.

No person is free to do a thing that harms another person or that person's own freedom or happiness or security.

 

[The Heretic]

Question 11.f on form 4473.
Have you ever been adjudicated mentally defective, or been committed.

For now.
How long before that changes?
Maybe incorporate political affiliations?

 

[baker3gun]

...Someone else's circumstances are not my responsibility unless I directly caused those circumstances thru some voluntary action of my own.

This is a very true statement..and one that can be applied for many different questions or concerns...

Broad issue.

From the clean-hands perspective, if I didn't cause a problem, it's not my problem.

Unfortunately, "someone else's circumstances" can become yours, like when a habitual drunk driver kills you or a meth-thief steals your stuff or a crazy person shoots your kids.

Freedom allows us to choose whether we want to be involved in finding solutions to those problems.

If we stay uninvolved long enough, other people might show up and choose really dumb solutions that don't even solve the problem but do infringe on our civil rights.

Then we can either stay silent longer and lose more rights, or we can try to find a way to promote smarter solutions.

2 cents.

 

[v0lcom13sn0w]

...

View attachment 979278

omg its the spawn of @Certaindeaf

 

[baker3gun]

...We have a nanny state that seeks to absolve many bad actors from responsibility for their actions. While this sounds nice on paper (to some people, not to me), the only cost is our liberty.

I would add that 1950's America is generally not thought of as a nanny state, despite wilson and FDR.
Most informed people agree that we are trending towards full nanny-state status.
It's worth noting that these developments are recent, and reversible.

We have two or three generations now who've only ever been taught "it's someone else's fault."

Yah. Victimhood mentality. No accountability.

When a people lose the ability to recognize that they are the cause of most if not all of their problems, their society is in deep trouble.

There is a tipping point and I'm pretty sure we're just about there. Especially as we get closer to the country's tallest buildings.

The nice thing about bad governance is that it eventually impacts the people who supported it, and then they change their mind.

I remain hopeful for a sea-change in political ideology. It won't be our first. Hopefully it won't be too late.

No society has survived the test of time. All have failed or been overrun. That's a 100% failure rate.

And yet we have never stopped slowly striving for peace and stability.

Doomers hope for a fast solution: collapse and righteous murder.

The smart solution is slower and harder and takes a lot of work, but there's less blood, and that has to be construed as a good thing.

 

[baker3gun]

Answering the 2 questions, criminals (felons) and the mentally ill should and currently ARE prohibited from legally purchasing and owning firearms. So that line has been drawn, and drawn, on and on .

But not effectively.
We have Brady and ancillary legislation in place, but it is neither supported nor enforced. So it doesn't work.
IMO - the FIX NICS arm of NSSF has a good idea. http://fixnics.org/

But, an unanswered question still exists: how should our society identify and manage SMI's? What kinds and degree's of mental illness meet a standard for loss of right to arms? Those are things we need to work on, and the answer should not be provided solely by govt. The people need to embrace an active role in this process. No one is better suited than us to identify the people among us who need help and aren't receiving it. We need to retain that role and exercise it, so that we don't get to the point of complacency and nonperformance that requires government assumption of the role. I would argue that it's now or never. We are on the cusp.

Were we as a society willing to completely scrap all restrictions on personal firearms ownership, and begin anew with laws restricting certain individuals from said rights, then yes.

How can we establish a line in the middle of a mess of intersecting lines?

Picture striping a highway after it's just been paved. I'm talkin fresh asphalt.
That's a conversation about "lines " I'd be interested in.

yah, either we are capable of controlling our govt, or we aren't.

Anyone can give up.

Many days I do. I don't bother with this stuff at all.

Other days, I think about how the American people could and should attempt to right their leaning ship before it falls over and sinks.

 

[Certaindeaf]

omg its the spawn of @Certaindeaf

True story. I've got the hump to prove it.

 

[The Heretic]

Broad issue.

From the clean-hands perspective, if I didn't cause a problem, it's not my problem.

Unfortunately, "someone else's circumstances" can become yours, like when a habitual drunk driver kills you or a meth-thief steals your stuff or a crazy person shoots your kids.

Freedom allows us to choose whether we want to be involved in finding solutions to those problems.

If we stay uninvolved long enough, other people might show up and choose really dumb solutions that don't even solve the problem but do infringe on our civil rights.

Then we can either stay silent longer and lose more rights, or we can try to find a way to promote smarter solutions.

2 cents.

There is a line - when someone endangers me or mine, then that line is crossed over.

E.G., in general, a person can own, carry and shoot firearms - but shooting firearms inside a densely populated area can endanger others, so typically that is not allowed except in self-defense.

We don't allow people to operate vehicles on public roads while under the influence of intoxicants because that severely impairs their ability to safely operate the vehicle which endangers others on that road (or near it).

When someone steals something, they are clearly infringing on someone's rights. If they do it because they chose to use drugs (including alcohol), that is not my responsibility - they made that choice.

When the general public choose to implement "solutions" that infringe on others rights, then yes, often that is a bad thing, but it does not justify their actions - they are still infringing on our rights.

 

[The Heretic]

Broad issue.

From the clean-hands perspective, if I didn't cause a problem, it's not my problem.

It is not your responsibility, but it may become your problem depending on the situation.

My point is that government/society has no right to force me to help someone else who has an issue I did not cause.

I do help people because it makes the world a better place, but I do that voluntarily and only when I can do so without jeopardizing my ability to support my family.

 

[thorborg]

You can shame, humiliate, bully, intimidate, beat up, restrict, withhold, regulate, legislate, tax, even imprison bad or otherwise out of whack people but you will never be free of them. That is just the nature of the animal and has been such as long as the animals have walked the earth. Any effort to predict such behavior ultimately will end in the loss of all privacy and most freedoms for all individuals.
To shame, humiliate, bully, intimidate, beat up, restrict, withhold, regulate, legislate, tax, even imprison the rest of the animals otherwise getting along in an effort to alter the impossible would make you no better than the animal you are concerned with.

Moving away from the effort to alter such things can save lives by forcing folks to understand their safety ultimately requires their participation. Knowledge, intelligence, etc, is not enough, taking away the tools to assist in that safety is a non sequitur in my mind.
Leaving it up to someone else is not a prudent way to live. As a cryptic example; you are told not to feed the animals least they become complacent and unafraid of humans so will not look out for themselves while roaming the woods even though there are a multitude of regulations, laws, fees, permits, registration, etc. on hunting / poaching which ought to have solved that problem long ago..
I guess not!
Is not personal responsibility and looking out for yourself is good advice for us too?
I still look both ways before crossing the street regardless of the traffic laws, rules, lines drawn, and how loud the dang cross walk bird is chirping.

 

[Knobgoblin]

You can shame, humiliate, bully, intimidate, beat up, restrict, withhold, regulate, legislate, tax, even imprison bad or otherwise out of whack people but you will never be free of them. That is just the nature of the animal and has been such as long as the animals have walked the earth. Any effort to predict such behavior ultimately will end in the loss of all privacy and most freedoms for all individuals.
To shame, humiliate, bully, intimidate, beat up, restrict, withhold, regulate, legislate, tax, even imprison the rest of the animals otherwise getting along in an effort to alter the impossible would make you no better than the animal you are concerned with.

Moving away from the effort to alter such things can save lives by forcing folks to understand their safety ultimately requires their participation. Knowledge, intelligence, etc, is not enough, taking away the tools to assist in that safety is a non sequitur in my mind.
Leaving it up to someone else is not a prudent way to live. As a cryptic example; you are told not to feed the animals least they become complacent and unafraid of humans so will not look out for themselves while roaming the woods even though there are a multitude of regulations, laws, fees, permits, registration, etc. on hunting / poaching which ought to have solved that problem long ago..
I guess not!
Is not personal responsibility and looking out for yourself is good advice for us too?
I still look both ways before crossing the street regardless of the traffic laws, rules, lines drawn, and how loud the dang cross walk bird is chirping.

This!

I look both ways before crossing the street on foot, or while driving. Often multiple times.
I taught the kids to look both ways on a one way street. Because if someone's already driving the wrong direction it's likely the will run you over too.

 

[Mikej]

This!

I look both ways before crossing the street on foot, or while driving. Often multiple times.
I taught the kids to look both ways on a one way street. Because if someone's already driving the wrong direction it's likely the will run you over too.

This ^^ is what came to mind when I read Thorborg's post. But realize, the current crop of citizens have had the skill to "Look Both Ways" pretty much bred out of them. Hence potland's "Vision Zero" program paid for with several $100,000.00 in pot taxes that has brought the traffic to a crawl in the city in MANY places. And pedestrians have been killed more this year than before vision zero. Go figure!

 

[baker3gun]

I wonder how many contemporary citizens appreciate that right in America.

IMO - To appreciate the societal value of the citizen right to arms, you have to know enough history to know that freedom and rights and equality never last for defenseless people.
Since our education system fails to teach our citizens that simple lesson, few of them understand the value of constitutional protection of the citizen right to arms.

Side note: IMO, the chief value of the right to arms is that it creates a peaceful deterrent to the ambitions of would-be tyrants. To preserve peace and political stability and freedom, preserve the deterrent.
Another perspective is that the right to arms empowers the people to revolt against tyrants. Since that's how this country started, it would be absurd to dismiss that idea.
However, it obviously makes more sense politically to elevate the "deterrent" narrative above the "revolt" narrative.
When an uniformed person attempts to undermine the right to arms by deriding it as a right cherished by would-be insurgents, I immediately steer the focus to the deterrent angle backed by the indisputable fact that defenseless people have always eventually been vanquished or subjugated.
Thinking in terms of centuries rather than decades is helpful. Civic planning should have a longer outlook than a handful of years.

We are now in the era of free everything courtesy of the government. Free rent, no danger of eviction, free money, endless unemployment benefits, free food, freedom to set your tent up anywhere you want, etc. Which is courtesy of the government. How can they see this benificence as a bad thing? How can they appreciate their need for constant vigilance against an institution that might want to fully dominate them?

Good point. It is difficult to convince voting freeloaders that mass handouts are bad.
Often, you don't have to: welfare states eventually go bankrupt, then you no longer need to convince them that bad fiscal policy was bad. They see it, firsthand.

That's happening to America. Our Debt:GDP ratio is now 140%.
Conventional wisdom says the max sustainable ratio is 70%.
55 year chart , see also 227 year chart .
For fun, match the peaks on the 227 year chart with their corresponding historical events. Notice that the 2008-to-now peak doesn't have a corresponding historical event. It was just stupid fiscal policy.
In 2019, the ratio was 102%. We used up our emergency borrowing cushion on entitlements and other stupid ideas.
Then an emergency occurred.
Now our debt:gdp ratio is 140%.
"The full faith and credit of the U.S. Government" is rapidly becoming a meaningless phrase.

Brief summary of the fiscal problem:
When the federal govt spends more money than we give it (taxes), it must borrow money to cover the deficit spending.
If the govt spends too much year after year, the debt piles up. The cost of huge debt becomes a problem, especially if interest rates go up.
The govt borrows money by selling bonds.
The price of bonds is set at auction: the govt sells bonds to the highest bidder.
When bond prices are high, bond yield rates are low, and vice versa.
The interest rate that everyone pays on debt is tied to the govt bond yield rate.
Bond buyers are citizens and investors and corporations and cities and states and other nations.
They buy govt bonds because govt bonds are safe: the govt "will never default" on its debt.
But, when a country reaches 140% debt:gdp, the risk of default increases. It is no longer a sure thing that the govt will be able to pay off its debt.
So, to offset the increased risk associated with a bond, bidders will bid a lower price for the bond.
This causes the yield rate on the bond to increase. The cost of future borrowing increases, not only for the govt, but for everyone.
In 2008, the Federal Reserve Bank (FED) began buying US Bonds on the open market (OMO) to "support" bond prices.
The reason was to increase money supply and keep interest rates low.
Today, the FED owns $5+ trillion in treasury securities, about a fifth of the published outstanding federal debt figure (28 trillion).
In the near future, our massive debt will cause bond prices to fall and interest rates to rise.
The FED will react with its final emergency capability of buying US Bonds direct from the treasury, to keep bond demand and thus prices high, and rates low.
But, since the FED can rationally own only so much of the outstanding national issuance of bonds, there is a limit.
The more the FED buys, the less confidence other buyers will have, because it's pretty sketchy to have the federal bank buying and holding all the federal bonds.
Sooner or later, market forces will prevail, bond prices will drop, yield rates will increase.
The final problem is illustrated clearly in the chart on page 8 of the Executive Summary of the 2020 Fin Rpt of the US Govt available HERE .
Look at the white section labeled Interest Cost. That is the cost of our debt. It is projected forward based on an assumption of continued low bond yields and interest rates. Today, the interest cost on our public federal debt is higher than total Medicaid cost. By 2040 (probably earlier), it will become the largest line item on the budget.
Important: if bond prices are bid down and therefore yield rates and therefore interest rates go up, then this chart will look much worse immediately. Because when the effective interest rate on 30 trillion dollars goes from 1% to 5%, the annual cost of that debt increases from 300 billion to 1.5 trillion dollars.
That's a problem for a country that should have a total budget of less than a trillion dollars per year.

It's called a debt trap.
If you can't convince the govt to stop spending and start paying off debt immediately, America will default before 2040.
Before that happens, the govt will try to raise your taxes to 75%.
It is important to disarm you as soon as possible, so that you don't resist.
Time is running out for everyone. It's a bit of a rush-rush thing.

The current choice, available only for a few years more, is:
1 - end entitlements and cut waste and non-essential spending, or...
2 - embrace socialism.
The left wants socialism.

FYI - in this same annual Financial Report, the OMB has been telling Congress every year for 17 years that the federal govt was on an unsustainable fiscal path. The chart linked above is available in every one of those reports.
You can find prior year Financial Reports here: https://fiscal.treasury.gov/reports-statements/financial-report/previous-reports.html .
Just search each report for the word "unsustainable", it will take you right to that warning.

Government, per se, isn't the root cause. Because the "government" as an insitution consists of people. But people can clan up, band together, call it what you will, to form groups. These groups then pursue their ideas and interests within the institution of government. Some people within the institution use it as a means of forcing their way of thought on others. In turn, they sway less powerful people to their point of view. The controlling elites don't even have to be on the actual government payroll; many pull strings in the institution of government without being a formal member of it.

So what happens with the gun ownership issue is that some groups within the institution of government want to ban guns. I suppose in part, because they view gun ownership as a threat to their power base. They want to use the tool of government to consolidate their hold on it.

What happens is that these mass shooting episodes give the elites in government (for lack of a better term) an excuse to bang the drum for more gun control.

Agreed.

It might just be that requiring a psych evaluation for gun ownership would reduce the potential for mass shooting episodes. Which would then reduce the amount of propaganda that government elites could use to push for gun control. Or this might be wishful thinking. An abusive government might pervert the intent of the psych eval, turn it around and use it as another tool of oppression.

A more intelligent solution would be to improve societal recognition and identification and management of mental illness.
Instead of living in a society where crazy people are unregulated and non-crazy people are required to pass a govt test before being allowed to buy a gun,
why not just have a society that effectively manages mental illness and crazy people?

Have you forgotten the primary lesson of history: that government always eventually trends to oppression. Always. It has never not happened.
The U.S. Govt today, and the state governments, are all very capable and willing to oppress civil rights to preserve their power.
They have forgotten that ultimate power resides in the people.
It's way past time that we band together and remind them, peacefully, at the ballot box.

There are other political dangers for gun ownership lurking down the road. Taxation might be one of them.

Shall not be infringed includes shall not be taxed. A new spectre is still just a spectre. They are all unconstitutional.

 

[gmerkt]

Good point. It is difficult to convince voting freeloaders that mass handouts are bad.

It's called vote buying. The Right wing has a hard sell on this. Self-reliance will always lose against free stuff.

For fun, match the peaks on the 227 year chart with their corresponding historical events.

The financial situation since 2008 is a result of disobedience to the natural tendency of needing to live within one's means.

It's called a debt trap.

It's only been possible because of the hitherto dominance of the US Dollar as a vehicle of world trade.

Have you forgotten the primary lesson of history: that government always eventually trends to oppression.

No, I haven't. It's a hard lesson that most Americans cannot accept because they are a part of it.

Shall not be infringed includes shall not be taxed.

With respect to firearms, this will probably have to go to court. But: The US Constitution grants the federal government the right to levy a tax, which has been upheld by Phillips v. Commissioner and Brushaber v. Union Pacific RR. I don't know if it's on one of the current gun control wish lists going around in DC. A few states now require a license to own a firearm. Not just to buy, but continually while they are owned. It isn't a very long leap to link licensing with taxation. I can see how a state like Washington would like to do this, seeing as how they are pretty grabby already. And with Dems in charge, it could be done.

At one time, one of the items on President Biden's agenda was reclassifying "assault rifles" as subject to NFA rules, which would add the $200 tax.

It's been a bitter pill for the most rabid gun controllers to swallow, but the anti-gun movement in DC is stalled. Various polls show it low on the priority of most voters, at present. The huge wave on new gun-buying in 2020 and early 2021 has been a revelation to them. Those who successfuly buy votes with free stuff don't want to chase them away by denying guns. For now, anyway.

 

[baker3gun]

If attracting more gun owners means even more compromise... and when we say compromise, it really means caving in... Because a true compromise means both sides walk away with something...

When was the last time that happened?

Im not opposed to compromise... but it has to be meaningful. But thats not what the other side wants and not what "our side" has the balls to fight for.

So the idea of a gun rights advocacy group that stands for watering things down even more just to attract more "gun owners" who mostly fit the category of 'bought a gun but never takes it out' and wouldnt care if the .gov forcibly 'bought it back' just doesn't strike me as a great idea.

Lowering standards to attract disinterested sellouts is counter productive

I think the central problem in the last ~40 years of "gun politics" has been the idea that law-abiding citizens need to compromise some rights so that society can be made safer by restricting those rights.

It's a big lie. Society cannot be made safer by restricting the rights of law-abiding citizens.
It doesn't work.
You can't prevent crime by restricting the rights of the non-criminals.

IMO, NRA subscribed to the big lie and embraced compromise. SAF mostly ignores the big lie and focuses on litigation. GOA refutes the big lie and demands zero compromise. FPC streams dire warnings. LGC embraces compromise. They all do good work, but none are anywhere near big enough to accomplish what needs to be accomplished.

I believe a fact and evidence and truth-based platform is inherently "no compromise," but it is not essential to brand it that way. You don't have to use brands and names that are likely to put off a lot of potential members.

Truth: guns don't cause crime, gun ownership does not cause crime, gun control does not prevent crime, gun control is nearly always unconstitutional, the right to arms is the only pillar of lasting human freedom, campaigns to pass gun control laws waste time and energy that would be better spent addressing the actual causes of crime, once a gun-control campaign is finished, politicians announce that their crime-prevention job is finished even though they haven't done anything to prevent crime, no other action is taken to address the actual causes of crime, thus the double-edged sword of gun-control is that crime is not prevented and freedom is eroded, the duty of the Supreme Court is to uphold constitutional law, the people need to hold the Court accountable for failure to uphold constitutional law, but it would also be wise to display massive political support for Justices who do uphold the law, because even the Court is not immune to political influence, and right now the only influence the Court can hear is leftist anti-gun influence.

From a platform of facts and truth, the only compromise that makes any sense is Brady/NICS background checks on all licensed dealer transactions, BUT, it only makes sense if the legislation is fully supported and enforced. Every denial is a lie on the form is a crime. Straw purchases are the #1 way to circumvent the intent of the law. Massive political pressure to force support and enforcement of Brady could turn it into an effective means of keeping guns out of the wrong hands. It will also be necessary to improve our societal methods for identify and recording persons whose mental illness is bad enough that they should be deprived of the right to arms.

No other compromises make any sense.

My idea: use truth to solicit support for a plan to effectively address crime and mental illness while repealing or striking down gun laws that don't do anything to prevent crime. So keep Brady. Also keep CCW and NFA, but only temporarily.
Institute CCW reciprocity now, and plan to make CCW fully voluntary within ~15 years. After that time, no law can require a carry permit.
Keep the CCW permitting system in place, and add training to it, but make it voluntary.

Plan to strike down NFA within 25 years.
I don't think striking down NFA now would be politically expedient. We need to restore our will and ability to effectively manage crime before we put $100 mac-9's on every shelf. We need time to convert a huge population of stupid idled people into smarter productive people. Maybe I'm wrong. What do you think?

Summary: I think the American people are receptive to truth-based platforms that allow them to support ideas for smarter government. I think truth-based platforms are inherently no-compromise.

This is a discussion I hoped would happen.

Interested in other people's views.

Thx.

 

[baker3gun]

Define "mentally ill". A very wide blanket statement.

The people could take a role in that process, or we could just sit back and let govt do it for us.

Most people who are mentally ill are not dangerous.

In any given year, only 2 or 3 of them pop and start blasting, but boy when they do, it makes quite an impact. Very influential in politics.

 

[The Heretic]

I think the central problem in the last ~40 80+ years of "gun politics" has been the idea that law-abiding citizens need to compromise some rights so that society can be made safer by restricting those rights.

Fixed it for you.

 

[baker3gun]

Agreed. 86 years I guess.

NFA obviously did not change crime trends in America.

 

[baker3gun]

...Interested in other people's views.

Still interested in other people views re post #95.

Yah, it's a lot of words, but the ideas we need to solve our societal problems can't be discussed in a 140 character tweet.

Thx.

 

[Koda]

My idea: use truth to solicit support for a plan to effectively address crime and mental illness while repealing or striking down gun laws that don't do anything to prevent crime.

Still interested in other people views re post #95.

Your post is rather long winded to reply to it all but I like where your going with it but using the truth in todays society... they dont want the truth they want what feels best and the state to care for their safety.