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According to wikipedia, “Classical liberalism is a political philosophy in which primary emphasis is placed on securing the freedom of the individual by limiting the power of the government.” So I’m a liberal. Who knew? I am not, however a liberal as the term is commonly applied in American politics today. I do not believe in securing the safety of the individual by increasing the power of the government. No, I’m not exaggerating for effect. Check out the clip (not magazine) from the David Parkman Show. The host says . . .

“There is about one gun per person in the United States so of course police legitimately need to be able to wield more force than the citizens they’re policing.” Hear that? It’s the Founding Fathers rolling in their graves. It’s also the sound of a modern day American liberal validating tyranny while claiming that the government isn’t tyrannical, doesn’t want to be tyrannical and even if it was, gun owners could do nothing about it.

Liberals…progressives…no matter what you call them, no matter how they sugarcoat their “common sense” fascist fantasies, these are the sworn enemies of liberty.

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188 COMMENTS

    • “When in doubt, choke ’em out.”

      I was training in some mixed martial arts and a guy had me in a triangle; I was making a move to break the hold and I woke up on the mat not knowing how I got there.

      It’s that fast.

      • “eyes and ears”

        If you wind up in a situation like that in the street, remember those words and attack them. There are few things more effective than a propper choke hold, or that work faster; but a thumb to the eye socket will win that fight every single time…

        Just like in shooting, it’s all about target selection and shot placement. The eyes, ears, nose, and throat are the easiest and softest targets on the body (I left out privates because most men instinctivly block them very well and during a choke hold, the eyes are closer than the nuts.)

  1. Of course they do. They are hell bent (and bound) to destroy personal freedom and make us subjects of the all powerful government. They are nothing more than traitors.

    • Please stop perpetuating this fallacy that they base everything on emotion – it’s all based on emotional disorders.

    • Why would a post that basically just outright lashes out at a certain political group wholesale (ignoring the fact that, yes, there are liberal gun owners and there are pro-gun liberals) would lead to an intelligent conversation?

        • I am a liberal gun owner…

          I own a very liberal number of guns. (I assume that a conservative number would be fewer.)

          I also believe in and support lots of liberal causes:
          The govt should have no say in who marries who.
          Race, gender, sexuality, and religion should not determine how you are treated. Your actions are what should determine that.
          We should support those who cannot support themselves (think poor children, not lazy parents.)
          The war on drugs should go away and never come back. It costs way more in money and blood than it’s worth.
          Police officers do not need baklavas and bayonets to do their jobs. ever.

          Nope, sorry, those are actually conservative views that we’ve let the liberals steal from us…

        • “The govt should have no say in who marries who.”

          I agree. That is why the government should not redefine marriage from what it only is. One man, one woman.

        • That’s fine, so long as 1) government doesn’t get into business of handing out privileges based on marriage, and 2) different groups can define marriage for themselves as they deem fit (i.e. if Christians want “one man one woman” – ok, but don’t tell e.g. Wiccans that they should also use it in that sense)

      • Honestly, the few times I have seen “liberal gun owners” written about/reported on, or writing about/reporting on themselves, they have invariably fallen into the “for me but not for thee” camp–which is fairly typical liberal thought, applying equally to things like free speech, the use of carbon-based fuels to enhance their quality of life, and other things. I know there are exceptions to the rule, but we call them “rules’ and “exceptions” for a reason.

    • By that you mean make it illegal. A liberal’s dream, in other words (which they’ll have to approve before you can use them).

  2. As a moderate libertarian the politicizing of these issues is quite frustrating.

    Guy in the video seems to misidentify the militia movement/2A support as the reason behind police militarization. Wasn’t it the war on drugs and the war on terror that drove a lot of this?

    • War on Drugs and Terrorism are the official justification for “Police Militarization.” However, if you don’t think DHS is beefing up for what they think could be armed insurrection when people get fed up with government, you haven’t been paying attention.

    • Bingo. The government creates a black market where people will be unable to seek police protection due to the ‘illicit’ nature of their lucre so they have to provide their own means of protection, which the government then uses as an excuse to tool up and repress individual liberty.

  3. So according to Pajama Boy if we decide we need a handgun in case the government becomes tyrannical then the government will get RPGs an drones and Apache helicopters, etc. But the government already has those things. So in his mind the fact that the government only has the citizenry outgunned by a thousand to one is reason for the government to stock up. And if the government decides to be tyrannical than they’ll just squash us like they did the Taliban. I mean, nobody’s even heard of those guys in a dozen years.

    • Taliban…Taliban…Taliban…aren’t those guys some misunderstood humanitarian organization? Or were they a beach towel manufacturer?

      • I don’t know. I just remember our government decided they didn’t like them so they squished them like little bugs and if any of them survived they scattered, never to be heard from again. Just like the omnipotent government will squish us if we get out of line.

        • I would argue they did a piss poor job of squishing them out. If anything, the Taliban are in a long list of groups that have proved our government, and any government that’s ever existed or will exist for that matter, is far from omnipotent.

        • As usual, Guv, the sarcasm seems to have gotten lost on some folks. Admittedly, sometimes it’s hard to detect through just the written word.

        • Ironically, if you ever spent time in Afghanistan talking the locals or detainees, it’s generally “No Taliban”. Like Iraqis, it was always “No Insurgents”.

      • I think that “Taliban” is a roll-on deodorant that covers up the smell of human BO with the piquant aroma of goat ass.

        It’s all the rage in Afghanistan. Women use it to drive the men crazy with desire.

        • Ahh yes….”Smells like Taliban”, the original working title to Nirvana’s breakout hit Angst-ridden anthem.

    • Our Progressive overlords had no trouble nuking a right-wing Japanese government, and I assure you that they’d have no trouble nuking the Taliban if it served their purposes.

      The Left has thrown every war this country has fought since WWII like a fixed boxing match.

      Don’t mistake a government trying to lose wars for a government that can only lose wars.

      • “The Left has thrown every war this country has fought since WWII like a fixed boxing match.”

        How so?

        Korean War – how did the “left” cause the final outcome of stalemate?
        Vietnam – Once the lines were drawn, do you really consider this a winnable and appropriate conflict for the US to have directly engaged in? I do not.
        Gulf War I – how did the left “throw” this one?
        Afghanistan – ?
        Gulf War II – ?

        • Here’s the basic idea: “Peaceful” Progressives and “violent” Progressives are all actually playing for the same team. The violent ones shoot people, and the peaceful ones whinge about how we really just need to understand the demands of these violent people because all the fighting would be unnecessary if we just accommodated some of their more reasonable demands, and in the meantime we really just need to “win their hearts and minds” and make sure we set rules of engagement under which it’s impossible to win the war.

          Korea: Imagine for me, if you will, a situation where Adolf Hitler escaped to Korea after WWII. He established a government there and was expanding out of his base in northern Korea using a mostly Korean army and well-armed remnants of Chiang Kai-Shek’s forces. Can you imagine a situation where we fought him to a stalemate and have just let Adolf Hitler and his descendants run a country on the Korean peninsula for 65 years? Me neither. So that’s Korea.

          Vietnam: How often did you hear the Progressives calling for a halt to the bombing campaigns over Christmas in WWII? In WWII, the Progressives locked up thousands of Japanese-Americans because they *might* have sympathized with the Imperial Japanese. In Vietnam, the Progressives let Hanoi Jane and the Black Panthers go kiss NVA butt and tut-tutted about civilian casualties. Again, imagine that Hitler or Mussolini had ruled Vietnam. Do you think the Left would have considered the war “unwinnable”?

          Gulf War: This one was actually over before the Left had a chance to throw it. Kudos to GHWB for being the only US President since WWII to win a war.

          Afghanistan: The Left’s version of history will count this war also as “unwinnable.” It’s easy to make wars unwinnable when you set up the rules of engagement to make them unwinnable. Have you heard the Progressives wring their hands over how we *had* to nuke Japan because an island campaign on Japan would have cost too many US soldiers’ lives? Why didn’t they just consider the war against Japan “unwinnable” and lay off as long as Imperial Japan pinky swore not to invade any more Asian countries or bomb the US again? Because they were determined to subjugate Japan, and not doing so was an unthinkable outcome of WWII. If USG had had this kind of will in Afghanistan, it would’ve prevailed here also.

          Iraq: See also Vietnam and Afghanistan.

          So you see my theme here: the Left won the crap out of WWII on both fronts, and they pulled exactly zero punches doing so. Why were subsequent wars different? It’s because il n’y a pas d’ennemis a gauche, mais pas d’amis a droite.

          And as if by magic, what was the headline on Fox News this morning? “[Hillary] Clinton says America should ’empathize’ with its enemies”: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/12/05/clinton-says-america-should-empathize-with-its-enemies/

          Read it for yourself and tell me why USG keeps losing wars. And then flip it over and ask yourself if the Progressives would choose to lose a war against a bunch of OFWGs with AR-15s yelling about the Constitution. Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Dresden have your answers for you. Again, don’t confuse a government that chooses to lose wars for its own purposes with a government that is incapable of winning wars.

        • Pretty good, John, but I gotta expand (expound?) on Vietnam a bit.

          Of course it was a stupid war we should not have entered, Hell, it was America being used as a weapon in a war of Catholic aggression, attempting to convert a nation which was 85% Bhuddist. What does that have to do with whether we could have won it without the bleeding hearts?

          As a participant, I was privy to the secret plan formulated by the pukes nobody would ever listen to, but I dare you to find the flaw. First, you load all the Vietnamese on ships, and sail them 50 miles offshore.
          Second, you nuke the country from north to south until it is flat as a pancake and covered with 3 feet of glass.
          Third, you sink the ships.

          In the Gulf War (I was there, too!), the liberals (mostly among our allies, not within the US) prevented our marching into Baghdad and executing Saddam, which would have eliminated the possibility of Iraq II.

          Svet, If you keep your eyes closed really hard, you can pretend your attitude is correct, and that your questions are so tricky and sly, but you still know the truth, and if you don’t, John just explained it real good.

          You’re welcome.

        • @LarryinTX: I’m more and more convinced that we should do total war or do nothing. I think there are lots of ways to win a war without killing everyone, but much like a gunfight, if you’re not ready to go all-in, you’re better off just laying back and trying to enjoy whatever it is the other guy wants to do to you.

    • Sure the US government couldn’t defeat the Taliban. But that’s in a country of 30M people and 650k km^2, with no large population centers to hide in, and very low tech to use to resist. The US is a country of 320M people and 10M km^2, with large cities to hide in and high tech. So it’ll be easier, somehow. <scratches head>

      • In the wars of late the US had an absolutely secure home field. An uncontested area of logistical support and all of it’s vital rear area resources protected.

        It’ll be easier to squash an insurgency here because an insurgency here would be close to all of that vulnerable infrastructure. Or something.

        • It’ll be easier to squash an insurgency here because the Left will have no qualms about completely razing rebellious cities, towns and neighborhoods and killing all the inhabitants. Because they have to make the world safe for Democracy. Or something.

  4. Don’t trust either party when they’re full of idiotic contradictions.

    LIBERALS: Guns are evil, dangerous weapons and only the POLICE should have them… BUT what about police brutality and excessive use of force and the shootings and SWAT teams with AR-15s, I don’t say ish.

    CONSERVATIVES: Governments are brutal and tyrannical and oppress their citizens and are bloated… BUT when a cop chokes a man to death for selling “untaxed cigarettes” or when it comes to unlimited spending on defense contracts of questionable utility because the Army/Navy/AirForce wants an expensive new toy to fight an enemy that doesn’t exist, I don’t say ish.

    • I agree, don’t trust the parties, but that’s not the conservative position. Republican position maybe, but not the conservative.

    • I must call BS on your definition of Conservative. Conservatives are enraged by the choking death of Eric Garner, as they should be. And a lot of self-identified conservatives on this site are far from cop-suckers.

      • A lot of the conservatives on this site are very close to the libertarian border.
        I believe he’s referring to the sort of conservative who works in talk radio or on Fox News.

      • There are plenty of conservatives (or do you prefer “Republicans”? but that smells of the no true Scotsman fallacy) who believe in “tough on crime”, which generally translates to exactly this kind of thing. Nixon essentially came to power on that platform back in the day.

        OTOH, if you’re arguing that there is an opposite viewpoint within the conservative movement, well, not all liberals are anti-gun, either – only the majority of them.

        • Oh, right. She watched as five white guys piled onto him. Therefore it wasn’t racially motivated whatsoever. Totally nailed it. Case solved.

        • @ Grindstone No it’s not a “racial issue” because the issue was not him being black, it was him selling untaxed cigarettes (for the umpteenth time) in NYC, which apparently is a big no no to the Progressive overlords there. Can’t have anyone circumvent the tax laws apparently. Not excusing the take down methods used on him, but the problem is with the high tax policies and chronic minority unemployment, his death is just the symptom of the overall problem.

        • Yellow devil, I’d go further. I have no objection to the takedown methods, if you pass any law, you have to expect cops will shoot someone dead for disobeying that law. My problem was the LAW! Who the billy hell passes a law against selling a single cigarette? That’s even stupider than passing a law against selling cocaine, or any other drug. Those laws were sold to us as “protecting” us against ourselves, even though they put us in prison for decades or killed us outright, we are supposed to thank these idiots for so protecting us. And we keep signing up. We can blame them, but “them” is US!

        • It is very unreasonable to expect cops to use deadly force to force compliance with just any law. Laws have gradations for a reason. If it’s a violent crime, sure. If it’s something like that, it’s silly. There are many ways to enforce compliance that don’t involve shooting.

        • Not if the offender refuses to comply, refuses to be arrested, refuses to acquiesce. Follow it down the path to the end, and you either let him go or kill him. ANY law.

        • Not at all. What you do is use some non-lethal (but forcible) way of subduing the perpetrator – baton, Tazer, mace etc – handcuff them, and shove their ass into jail. The point, after all, is to stop them from violating the law, and that achieves it just as efficiently without killing them. Then you put them on trial etc (and again, if they resist along the way, there are always non-lethal means, and if they get violent every time they get to the court, well, they’ll end up rotting in a cell for contempt of court for the rest of their life).

    • There has been mission creep a plenty for both parties for sure. Not to mention the republics constituent grab up of a few decades ago that stuck them with loud obnoxious bigots that are at the root of the parties image problem today. The issue with big spending IMO is rooted in the problem of career politicians. People who take it up as an expedient for their own wealth collection rather than servitude.

    • “CONSERVATIVES: Governments are brutal and tyrannical and oppress their citizens and are bloated… BUT when a cop chokes a man to death for selling “untaxed cigarettes” or when it comes to unlimited spending on defense contracts of questionable utility because the Army/Navy/AirForce wants an expensive new toy to fight an enemy that doesn’t exist,”

      Yes NYC is truly a bastion of the Conservatives, and while we are on the subject of the Big Apple I bet the folks that work in the World Trade Center would disagree with you on the nonexistent enemies if they were not dead.

    • “…when it comes to unlimited spending on defense contracts of questionable utility because the Army/Navy/AirForce wants an expensive new toy to fight an enemy that doesn’t exist…”

      What is this unlimited spending on defense you speak of? Defense spending is the one thing Conservatives approve of. Is there wasteful spending by the military as any bureaucracy? Yes. But overall defense spending is not even a quarter of the spending and that includes International security assistance, not just “new toys”. Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, and Welfare account for 58% of spending and none of that should be the business of the Federal Government. Thanks Progressives!
      I want my government to be able to kick a non existent enemies ass. That way they stay non-existent.

      • US spends more on military than the next several states that follow after it, combined. IIRC, it is something like 1/3 of all world military spending – i.e. if half of the rest of the globe decides to gang up against US, it can still handle that. Given that this would basically require an alliance between Europe, Russia and China, you can compute the likelihood of that.

        OTOH, if even a bit of that defense spending would be spend on, say, fusion power, we’d probably have it working already ten years ago, and US wouldn’t need careful politicking in the Middle East to secure its oil supply… it could just ignore the region altogether and let them hash it out between themselves. Saving even more military expenses.

        But no. American voters, apparently, like to make things go boom, and are willing to spend insane amounts of their own money to make this happen.

        • A very overly simplistic view. I won’t argue that more is spent than necessary, but I will argue the reason why. There is corruption in the bidding processes and billing by defense contractors. Sweetheart deals for contractors making deals with politicians, etc.

          What we are paying for is absolutely necessary and a good thing, but the price we are paying for it is too much. Rather than simply reducing spending we need to reform the process to make these things cost less.

          However, just cutting funding and expecting it to work out would be a very bad idea.

          And even if we got things down to a more reasonable price, we should never cut it to the point where we are spending the same as Russia, China, etc. Russia, for example, spends so much less primarily because they skimp on safety features and testing. Look at any of their military hardware and even their space program. Things have improved somewhat since the Soviet era, but they tend to do things on the cheap at the expense of redundancy and safety.

  5. This is a crock of crap.
    Police need less guns, we need more.
    Whatever happened to Officer Muldoon walking the street with his billy club twirling around…….?
    I know he was looking for Officer Toody and his car.
    Even today when I think of a lot of cops I think of Car 54.
    I miss that show.

  6. Call me crazy, but didn’t most cops carry a simple revolver, back when anybody could buy an M1 carbine from the hardware store without a background check?

    • And most carried a .38 revolver (if any gun), back when you could order a machine gun through the mail, without a single line of paperwork.

        • True, but when officer friendly roamed the neighborhood, the population was almost a third less dense in this country, those who spent generations on welfare rare, and ashamed of it, and parents taught their kids morals and standards. So much for just a .38 in the ‘hood.

      • Yip, until Lee Harvey Oswald. screwed everyone by shooting the president with a mail order rifle. Why is it that one person can do something wrong but everyone is punished by ridiculous laws. I didn’t shoot the prsident but have to have NICs check with every frigging gun I buy!
        What is this, grade school? Johnny screws up and the whole misses out on an ice cream cup (regular event when I was in grade school) The government is a bunch of school marms now – Geesh Louise

        • The funny thing is, you can still mail-order a rifle quite capable of repeating that feat. Think of, say, an antique Mosin, G98, or Schmidt-Rubin 1889.

          Or, for that matter, the original Modello 91 in 6.5 Carcano.

        • I blame the individual for the individual’s action, government for government’s action, and the People for their inaction. However, the blame must be placed upon the correct party for the specific action. Oswald wasn’t to blame for government’s action or the People’s inaction.

  7. The thing that gets to me is the constant redefining of already-understood terms. For example, a “liberal” a hundred years ago was somebody who was prone to any policy to support individual liberty. Today, a “liberal” is somebody against any policy that supports individual liberty.

    Same with the red/blue state thing (red is the commie color!). Now republicans are “red”?! (we’ll ignore that republicans are becoming more “red” by the minute).

    I’m not sure if it’s part of a sly plan, or if it’s just a symptom of their moral relativism. Either way, it’s scary!

    • How is, say, being pro-choice, or pro-drug legalization, or pro-marriage equality, being “against any policy that supports individual freedom”? All of those are individual freedoms.

      And conservatives (or what passes for them today, on average, in any case) have their own set of things that they very much love to use the state power to push onto the populace.

      “Red” vs “blue” terminology dates back to the 2000 election. Before that, the more common color coding was the reverse, i.e. red for Democrats, blue for Republicans. However, this was not consistently used – sometimes the colors were reversed, sometimes different colors were used etc.

      The reason why the present scheme was converged on in the 2000 election is due to all the associated scandals and publicity, which meant that map got shown on the TV screen and newspapers a lot, and discussed in detail. Color-coding makes such discussions much easier and quicker to visualize, but you need to be using the same scheme for both. Because, in that particular election cycle, more mainstream media sources were using red for Republicans, that’s the scheme that was eventually adopted by everyone.

      • “How is, say, being pro-choice, or pro-drug legalization, or pro-marriage equality, being “against any policy that supports individual freedom”? All of those are individual freedoms.”

        I’ll take this one.
        Pro Choice is actually Anti Life. That human in the womb has rights.
        Pro drug legalization is debatable for sure but it has to be done right. I would be for it if we eliminated welfare for addicts, and you know that ain’t going to happen.
        Marriage is between a man and a woman by definition. Leave it alone. To fight for gay marriage is to bring more government into it.

        • Pro choice is free will. No-one is forcing anyone to abort or kill anything. As a caveat, I believe no-one should be forced in any way to support that choice if it’s against their religious beliefs. It’s called compromise.

          Don’t want an abortion? Don’t have one.

          Want someone else to cover the cost of your abortion? Don’t work at Hobby Lobby.

          Marriage between a man and a woman is an emotional issue for some. Some of us, myself included, couldn’t care less if we tried whether Steve and Bob or Lynn and Nancy marry each other. I’d love to see a compromise where “civil partnership” is through the government and “marriage” is through whatever religion you hold dear. The two should be completely separate entities. To those who hold the word marriage sacred… It’s yours. To those who want equal rights under the law… It’s yours. No-one should be forced to perform ANY ceremony(straight, gay or other) or offer any service that is against their beliefs pertaining to that union.

        • Don’t want an abortion? Don’t have one.

          The living human being whose life is taken doesn’t get a say in the matter.

          I’d love to see a compromise where “civil partnership” is through the government and “marriage” is through whatever religion you hold dear. The two should be completely separate entities.

          I agree 100%. Marriage is a religious institution, into which the State should not involve itself. Let the State define the meaning of “civil union”, for the purposes of ensuring equal protection under law, and leave religion to define “marriage” for its adherents.

        • “The living human being…..”

          1. My opinion differs.
          2. Even if it didn’t, I believe that some eggs need to be broken to make an omelet.
          3. I believe that children who are actually wanted have a better chance at a good upbringing.
          4. Being raised as a “burden” could likely lead to some serious emotional issues, the same could be said for abject poverty.
          5. A self imposed decrease in population growth now seems like a better alternative than overpopulation, leading to a lack of finite resources, leading to who knows what later.
          6. Neither did the deer, cow, pig or whatever you had for dinner. Vegans and members of PETA would likely have a similar argument with you at the dinner table to the one we’re having now.
          7. If the bible is your guide on this I can respect that. I even envy you in a way for having the comfort that faith can grant. I however neither believe nor disbelieve in that book or any other and use only my experience coupled with research and instinct to guide my beliefs. Without actual faith it feels disingenuous for me to shape my life steadfastly around a religion or book rather than to allow my beliefs to evolve as new information is gathered/seen.
          8. I don’t have a uterus so I’d rather let those who do have the final say on this specific matter.

          Just my 2 cents. I’m entitled to mine as you are to yours.

        • I have no religious affiliation. Belief-o-matic categorizes me as “Liberal Quaker”. Quaker because I don’t believe religion is a once or twice a week endeavor and liberal because I drink alcohol. I am comfortable as a self proclaimed Agnostic.
          If you want to know where my stance on abortion comes from, It is easier and natural to define when life begins than to decide when to “legally” take it.

        • “It is easier and natural to define when life begins than to decide when to “legally” take it.”

          This may ruffle some feathers around here but I could easily draw a correlation between this and castle doctrine when used in defense of property, harm or death.

          While the unborn isn’t a criminal it can still threaten the life of the mother giving birth, endanger her possessions due to the financial strain of having a child as well as inhibiting her ability to earn either short or long term(18 years) leading to possible poverty(also shown to be unhealthy).

          It may seem unreasonable to some but it’s a line in the shifting sand that I’m not willing to draw. I can see and understand BOTH sides of the issue so I’d rather err on the side of personal choice and responsibility for the person I see most capable of making that decision i.e. the potential mother. For me personally, the “pursuit of Happiness” included NOT having children so I’ve been very careful over the years. For others, accidents happen.

        • Ruffle feathers? More like utterly morally bankrupt.

          While the unborn isn’t a criminal it can still threaten the life of the mother giving birth…

          Abortions due to legitimate risk of life of the mother account for a fraction of a percent of all abortions.

          …endanger her possessions due to the financial strain of having a child as well as inhibiting her ability to earn either short or long term(18 years) leading to possible poverty(also shown to be unhealthy).

          So, what changes about these risks before birth and after birth? And how is the choice of the parents (over 98% of all abortions are purely elective) the fault of the child?

          You actually try to make a connection between justifiable use of deadly force in self-defense via castle doctrine and the use of deadly force of an unborn child because of the financial impact it will have on the mother?

          That is utterly disgusting. Do you even think such bovine excrement through to its logical conclusions, or do you just puke out the first thing that pops into your head in your attempt to justify murder?

        • I was posting a possible comparison for the sake of argument. I also stated clearly that I do see BOTH sides of it and can RESPECT both positions.

          Your comment on the other hand makes you look like a disrespectful douche bag. If you’d like to rewrite that last post in a more respectful way I’d be glad to continue the discussion when time allows. If not… Have fun being a jackass all by yourself.

        • Your comment on the other hand makes you look like a disrespectful douche bag.

          If standing up against the murder of unborn children, against tearing them limb-from-limb, and vacuuming their brains out of their heads makes me a “disrespectful douche bag” in your eyes, I really couldn’t care less. I have no interest in rewriting what I wrote in order to assuage your apparently aggrieved sensibilities regarding respect. Trying to equate abortion to castle doctrine is morally bankrupt. No apologies for saying so.

          You can try to rationalize it away all you want. Abortion is the murder of a human being.

        • Chip, that is correct, the sole choice is that of the mother. It has been that way for 40 years. If you don’t like it, pass an amendment. Trying to cheat your way around the constitution is not something I expect from regulars on this site, I would think we’ve had enough of that.

          On marriage vs civil union, I agree completely, but I doubt most here know what that means. After you are married, or before, you must enter into a civil union in order to have any of the benefits which now arrive simply because you are married. Marriage would be totally worthless, would accomplish nothing at all except before a god or something. Why government has instituted policies and procedures to force people to get “married”, I don’t know.

        • Chip, that is correct, the sole choice is that of the mother. It has been that way for 40 years. If you don’t like it, pass an amendment.

          …because SCOTUS is never wrong, and never contradicts/overturns prior rulings, right? Even after 60 years?

          Trying to cheat your way around the constitution is not something I expect from regulars on this site, I would think we’ve had enough of that.

          I do believe the Constitution is silent on the matter of abortion, specifically. Just because a handful of legislating-from-the-bench progressives in black robes found a right to abortion emanating out of a “right to privacy” from the penumbras of the Constitution doesn’t make abortion constitutional, or right.

        • Roe v. Wade is a bad decision, that invented things in the Constitution that do not exist there. This is something that should be deferred to the states (of course, as a liberal, I would prefer the states to do the right thing as far as I’m concerned, and make it legal – but either way it’s up to them).

        • Roe v. Wade is a bad decision, that invented things in the Constitution that do not exist there. This is something that should be deferred to the states…

          We may not agree on many things, but we agree 100% here. +1, and a tip of the coffee cup to you.

        • I’m a pro-decentralization (aka “states rights” in US parlance) liberal. We probably disagree about a great deal of things, just as I disagree with e.g. Ron Paul over most things, but I’d still prefer to see him as president over Obama solely for his states rights stance. I don’t need to push my agenda on the federal level, especially when it means that conservatives also get to do the same… we can create lower-scale communities according to our views where we have people who actually agree with those views live together in a true consent of the governed fashion, and let other people and other communities do likewise. So long as freedom of speech (to be aware of that arrangement), and freedom of movement and association (to be able to join whatever community one fits best) are held absolute and inviolate by everyone, the rest of the stuff can be as people see fit, IMO.

        • I’m a pro-decentralization (aka “states rights” in US parlance) liberal. We probably disagree about a great deal of things… we can create lower-scale communities according to our views where we have people who actually agree with those views live together in a true consent of the governed fashion, and let other people and other communities do likewise. So long as freedom of speech (to be aware of that arrangement), and freedom of movement and association (to be able to join whatever community one fits best) are held absolute and inviolate by everyone, the rest of the stuff can be as people see fit, IMO.

          Alright, that’s it, buddy: next time we’re in the same town together: the first round is on me.

          Someone who actually understands some of the fundamental concepts of our founding as a republic of sovereign States. That’s pretty rare anymore, on either side of the ideological spectrum.

        • Roe v Wade was a bad decision, based on some imaginary “right to privacy” or whatever, it does not matter, it was a decision by SCOTUS which then defines the constitution for the future until and unless someone passes a constitutional amendment. The question is CLOSED, until you pass an amendment. Ask yourself why, after 40 years, there has not even been an attempt. Two answers which become apparent to me are 1) All involved realize it would never pass in a million years, and 2) somebody thinks it would be easier to just use the subject as a political football to generate billions of dollars in campaign funds far into the future. How stupid are we? Pass an amendment or drop it. In the same vein, WHY NOT?

        • I would rather pass an amendment that says that SCOTUS must always provide the exact quotation from the text of the Constitution to justify its decision, and said quotation must be directly and obviously relevant – and retroactively invalidate all decisions that would not pass that bar (not just Roe, but also e.g. Wickard and quite a few others).

          This notion that a bunch of guys, not even elected, can pretty much arbitrarily rewrite the law as they see fit, has got to end. This is not the role that SCOTUS had at the founding of the republic.

          By the way, regarding the amendment process… the fact that, today, nobody even seriously considers the notion of passing an amendment because none would be likely to get support, is a strong indication of how unhealthy the political system has become. It used to be that when they wanted to ban some stuff nationwide, on the federal level, they actually passed a constitutional amendment to make that legal – and didn’t complain that it’s impossible, but campaigned to convince people to support it – and guess what, it actually passed! And then a decade later, when it became clear that the idea is unworkable, they similarly campaigned to get it repealed – and lo and behold, it got repealed! That the same is unthinkable today – that no-one even thinks in terms of “hey, I don’t like guns, let’s amend the constitution to regulate them” – but rather it’s always “let’s find some way to work around this by sophistry, and if all else fails, let’s hope that SCOTUS is going to rule our way for political reasons” – is horrifying.

  8. Liberals…progressives…no matter what you call them
    “Statists”. It clearly expresses their goals in two syllables.

  9. It still astounds me that major media, the talking heads, and most left-wing bloggers, don’t understand, know, that the “liberalism” of John Stuart Mill’s era had nothing to do with today’s version. Liberals were against restraints on economic behavior created by statutory privilege. It had nothing to do with giving people free stuff. It had everything to do with fighting the “conservative” politics of statute-based restraints on enterprise and market privileges. Today’s progressives quote Mill’s critique of conservatives, while having no understanding of Mill’s writings. But they fashion themselves highly educated? It’s humorous.

  10. That’s it! This 21 yr old blogger knows everything. Yay liberalism!

    Imagine a world where the elders were honored and their decades of experience were seen as an invaluable source of knowledge. Why are college students liberals? Because they’re not old enough to remember the last time an entire generation of lies was revealed.

  11. Conservican? Democrtive? All these titles baffle me. None address all my sentiments. Pro 2A, pro choice, pro getting all the loot out of government. Guess I’m just a man with a brain.

      • Yep, it is the same when liberals say it’s “for the children” but then the liberals are the ones most often that supports the murder of unborn children.

        So in actuality, it’s conservatives that care more for the children than do liberals.

        Well, except when it comes to the young of animal species, then it’s “murder” you know, “save the baby seals”.

        • Conservatives apparently only care for the unborn children. As soon as they’re born, they’re welcome to die at their own leisure – welfare is bad, as we all know, and if their parents are lazy bums who can’t find a job, the kids can suck it. And don’t even get me started on kids who get here from Mexico or further south running away from a very real threat of being killed in gang wars in their own home country.

        • Oh yes, and Conservitives long for dirty air and polluted water also, right? Just because we don’t suscribe to the idea of a government program FOR something doesn’t mean we are against it. Open your eyes to what some people do for children, with there OWN time and there OWN resources. When the government takes care of you, you get Ferguson, you get Detroit.

        • If the parents are lazy bums and can’t–excuse me, won’t–get a job, they can just get on welfare and the kids are then well-cared for and turn out just fine, don’t they? Typical liberal “thought”.

        • Sigh. So how is that welfare working out for the black family? Prior to welfare in the sixties almost ninety percent of blacks had a father in the home. Now it’s twenty to thirty percent? It is clearly demonstrable that a single parent,(usually female) is more often living in poverty, that the children living in a single parent family in poverty has a higher incidence of drug use, un-safe sex and criminal activity.

          How compassionate.

          The problem with “compassion” from a liberal is that it comes from the state. The state has every incentive to create a dependent class and keep it dependent. It gives them control.

          So int19h; how many of those children from across the border do you have living at your home? You have so much compassion. How much of your personal income do you give in donations in supporting the children from these other countries? How much time do you spend in working for help organizations that send food and aid to these other countries?

          I would bet you don’t provide living space at your home or spend very little time or money of you own in what you seem so concerned about. Because for most people like yourself, your are generous with other peoples money and time.

          Well, I’m not a hypocrite. I can’t save the world, and I don’t expect other people in this country to spend time, money of effort in doing what is not even possible. It’s called free choice. When we as a people chose to live as free man and women, we fought a revolution and won. Then through our efforts we provided the greatest wealth producing country in the world. If other people want that in their own countries, then I will support them in it, but to just open up the doors to my home, my country would just overwhelm our ability to keep being the greatest wealth producing and free country in the world. But if people want to immigrate to this country legally, I’m all for it, my ancestors were from some place else after all.

          Now as for people living in poverty? Well, if your living in poverty in this country, it’s a choice. I grew up poor, my parents provided food,shelter and clothing; that was it. I started working at 15 and provided my own car and any other luxuries. . Once I moved out I started a business chimney sweeping and window cleaning making two to three hundred dollars a day. So later I got bored with this and got training as a major appliance repairman and started my own business and again made two to three hundred dollars a day.

          This isn’t rocket science. I did’n’t need a degree and fifty thousand dollars, ( back then) to make VERY good money. Just the drive to learn a skill and the willingness to work (at the beginning) seven days a week and 12 to 14 hours a a day while building clientele.

          Then I got bored again and wanted to help people more directly, so I got a degree in the health field and again, I am making very good money.

          I’m of moderate intelligence, anyone not classified as Mentally Handicapped could do the same.

          Now with government programs for minorities to start businesses, get degrees and training in different blue collar fields, ( I don;t know, like Major Appliance repair?), if some one lives in poverty, yes, it’s a choice.

  12. Growing up in NYC, and sadly still stuck here, my history teacher in high school taught that the left side was about freedom and individual liberties. I considered myself a democrat at that point, I mean who the hell wouldn’t side with that!? But sadly that just is not what being a democrat is about anymore and I obviously realized that as I grew up and experienced the real world. He was still a good teacher even if he was teaching in terms of what it meant to be a democrat a long time ago. Shockingly, he taught that the second amendment was the last line of defense against a tyrannical government. That’s right folks, you heard it here first. A teacher in NYC saying the second amendment is for the purpose of defeating a tyrannical government, good man he was.

    • That’s because, it’s never a fight about what parties or governments actually do, and how statism doesn’t work. Clearly capitalism and freedom crush the alternative by all measures. It’s a fight about the narrative, and that is the hardest fight to win. If you want to know what I mean, pretty much every time Barack Obama(or most other politicians) opens his mouth, he doesn’t talk about facts, he pushes the narrative that “you are poor because of the rich racist people who keep healthcare and jobs from you.” This is all nonsense and yet people eat it up.

  13. “Liberals…progressives…no matter what you call them …”

    Let’s see, “Liberals” as they call themselves believe that the Almighty State is God, and no one except for the ruling class can be trusted with anything — including money and property. Rather, “Liberals” believe that the Almighty State must own and control everything — for our own good of course. Newsflash: the correct term for that philosophy is COMMUNISM.

    Yes, I will say it. The people who have hijacked the term “Liberal” are, in actuality, COMMUNISTS.

    • I suggest actually looking up the definition of the term “communism” in some political dictionary. You’ll find out many interesting revelations, like the fact that “communism” was a term coined by Marx to refer to a future utopian society that is to be classless and stateless, for the lack of need for a state. So, according to Marx himself, and all his followers henceforth, there can be no such thing as a communist state, by definition – either it’s not a state, or else it’s not communist.

      • Marx’s ultimate communist society looks a great deal like an ultimate libertarian society, everyone treating everyone as equal, no coercion… so the need for a state disappears.

        • Kinda, but with one substantial difference: said society does not recognize the concept of private property. It doesn’t mean that there’s a state repressive apparatus actively working on taking it away. It’s just that your property rights would not be recognized by other people in such a society, and should you try to enforce them, they would not help you, and may even see it as initiation of aggression on your side, with all the consequences that entails.

          It’s why some people also distinguish between right libertarianism (minarchism, anarcho-capitalism etc), and left libertarianism (classic anarchism, anarcho-syndicalism etc).

          I actually strongly recommend that people who are interested in a starkly painted image of either type of society read two science fiction novels: “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” by Heinlein, and “The Dispossessed” by Le Guin. The first one uses an anarcho-capitalism society as its backdrop and explores the related idea, the second one does the same with anarcho-syndicalism. The nice thing about these two works in particular is that, while the respective authors obviously sympathize with the society that they paint, they are also not averse to showing the flaws inherent in such an arrangement.

      • int19h,

        Regardless of your description or a dictionary definition, real world communist states like the Soviet Union, China, and Viet Nam reveal quite a different working definition. In those actual states — which are/were very much states by every possible definition — the state is Almighty God. The state defines right and wrong, provides everything, owns everything, tells people where they will live and what work they will do, attempts to control all expression of art and science, and suppresses any religion that does not glorify the state. That does not sound like anything even remotely approaching any version of utopia that I have ever imagined.

        In the real world communism is simply a ploy for the ruling class to exploit the masses.

        • In the real world IDEOLOGY is simply a ploy for the ruling class to exploit the masses.
          Doesn’t matter if it’s communism, capitalism, catholicism, or any other -ism; so long as there are human beings involved, any structure bestowing more power on some than on others is going to boil down to authoritarianism.

        • My description is not a dictionary definition. It’s a definition that’s used by every single one of the states that you’ve listed. They never called themselves “communist” in the first place. Note that USSR, for example, was Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, not Communist Republics.

          Now, they all had communist parties, yes. Which, in theory, were supposed to guide the society towards the state of communism that I described above. In practice, as the Soviet joke goes, the communism was always on the horizon, the horizon being the imaginary line where the ground and the sky meet, which gets further away as you walk towards it. And Soviet socialism was, of course, very statist. But it is not communism, even according to the Soviets themselves.

      • I haven’t read Marx, and I probably should just to get a better understanding, but I believe this “stateless ness” was all dependent on the emergence of the soviet man who was essentially a robot.

        • Kinda, but not really. Not a robot, more like a super-enlightened man who would be 100% ethical and never do anything wrong.

          Which is about as likely to happen as the 100% rational self-interested man necessary for the libertarian utopia. Which is why they both remain utopias.

    • Oh there are lots of us. But don’t tell the conservatives or they’ll try to take our guns away just before they attempt to round us up for treason.

    • I’m sure there are, but they’re vote is overridden by their choice in politicians.

      “And don’t call me Shirley.”

  14. Politicians (and the MSM) rolling with the title of liberal or progressive are statists and totalitarians trying to rebrand themselves, and have been for decades. They’re effectively wolves in sheep’s clothing, and they’re the dangerous ones.

  15. “There is about one gun per person in the United States so of course police legitimately need to be able to wield more force than the citizens they’re policing.”

    This gave me an aneurysm.

    I seriously wish people like this would just leave America. It is quite clear they think our country is fundamentally wrong. There are several other nations in the world where the police and military far outnumber the citizenry that I would be happy to refer them to.

  16. Just when I thought Farago’s whining about the left couldn’t get more reductive or infantile, he outdoes himself. Way to go, buddy.

    • +1
      The billionaires buying all of our elections appreciate your “red” vote, but remind you to mind your status, commoner.

      They’ll come for the guns right after they go after wanking, butt-sex & anyone who wears an american flag made into a tee-shirt.

      Red does not equal “respecting the constitution.. far from it.

      And just because guns aren’t first on their list of freedoms to steal, doesn’t mean they arent on the list.

  17. They are coming for us.

    The recent I-594 Initiative in WA State must be taken seriously by every State in the Union. Today, 594 technically went into effect, whatever it means. But, as soon as the door opened at our Capital doors, the same anti-gun folks arrived and started pursuing even greater aspirations of gun control. Trust me American, this is not a situation to be taken lightly, we have come to a tipping point and these dangerous radical people are out to erase the the second amendment.

    The anti-gun sales pitch is the same, to inject fear of all firearms and make their proposals appear so smart, so common sense!

    They have gloated in an unfounded victory. Rather than risk a fail, a ballot Initiative process was used. Millions of dollars thrown at it. With only about 35% voter turnout, the 60% is a very small part of the entire WA State registered voter base. Yes, a win, but unfounded.

    Now that the cat is out of the bag and many people are becoming aware these groups are nefarious, the wolf cloaked in sheep clothing.

    Here’s some reality they don’t want to have understood. True smarts, logic, and rationale upset them the most.

    The anti-gun community is directly responsible for increasing gun violence. Their propaganda has created an unfounded fear of firearms. An individual responding to fear is not typically a good thing. A population responding to fear is definitely not a good thing. It is this fear which can exacerbate a person already paranoid to strike out against that which they may feel persecuted by, this has already been seen numerous times.

    The anti-gun movement must be stopped. Their radical fear-based message is detrimental to all of us. Their ignorance of human psychology is apparent.

    The issue I assert is not popular with them as it is an undeniable fact and can easily be supported.

    Educate everyone and anyone you know. The true danger is the fear. And the cause of the fear is the anti-gun movement.

  18. So tell me what the hell does background checks or gun safety have to do with Ferguson?

    That’s like saying: With that nasty wreck in NASCAR this weekend means we must continue our dialog about teen driver training and drunk driving.

  19. Having firearms to protect oneself from a tyrannical government is pointless because they will just one up the citizenry and bring out shoulder fired rocket launchers, drones, tanks and helicopters? Tell that to the Taliban. Tell that to any insurgent from any part of the globe.

    “What you’re doing is pointless because they are technologically superior and all you have is small arms. What? You have crew served weaponry as well? You got it from your adversaries? What did you use to take all this from them? The small arms your personally owned? Oh….”

    This guys rationale is about as solid as a bowl of Ramen. No deductive reasoning and not even a half ass attempt at implementing inductive reasoning. People take a Philosophy 101 course in college because they had to and then pass themselves off as intellectuals. This is the result; people who mistakingly believe they are thinking critically. These people think they are moving humanity to a ‘new age’ a ‘golden age’ where everything will be rainbows, lollipops and unicorn farts. The image they’re fed is bullshit. They are a means to police those who are ‘non-compliant’ and influence public opinion in line with the agenda of the powers that pretend to be. Once they’ve outlived their usefulness, they’ll be herded off. The powers that pretend to be want total control. If you aren’t one of ‘them’ then you’re in the way. It won’t be until the boot of their keeper is upon their own throats that these commie pseudo intellectuals realize they had been duped.

  20. Uh, I must be tired but I could not follow this guys train of thought at all. I think it was….

    ________ because Ferguson (fill in the blank as needed).

  21. This guys logical reasoning about gun ownership, tyranny, and cops shooting innocent people is mind numbing. Here’s an analogous example: guns, video games, blueberries, unicorns reign of terror.

  22. The biggest question I ask progressives is, “what are you progressing towards?” They can never provide a concrete answer.

  23. Just for the record, it’s Pakman, with no “r”. He’s originally from Argentina, which may have something to do with his views about firearms.

    Personally, I’m extremely disappointed/pissed at him. On many issues of individual liberty he’s spot on, even eloquent, but this . . . actually he looked a lot more shaky and uncertain on this than what I’ve seen when he’s actually passionate about something.

    He has a hefty following, but IMO mostly because he’s good-looking, and secondarily because he’s passionate on some individual liberty issues. But this make me baffled once again how so many liberals can be so in favor of so many individual liberties, but when the right to choose and carry your own choice for self-defense they get squeamish and go all nanny state.

    I wonder if he’s even aware that what saved Ferguson from far greater destruction was armed citizens calmly and quietly exercising their rights?

  24. Robert, I agree with everything you have to say, except the very last sentence…it’s not just Liberals who are the sworn enemies of liberty…it is the government institution itself, regardless who is in power…just that the particular issue may be different. On guns, yes, Liberals are the sworn enemy. But Conservatives have done their fair share to erode liberties as well (PATRIOT Act anyone?). It comes down to the natural order of things when you have one group of people who are empowered to exercize control over others….

    Thomas Jefferson and Swiss political philopsher Jean-Jacques Rousseau both observed that it is “the natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and for governments to gain ground”

    http://files.libertyfund.org/pll/quotes/442.html

    This is true regardless who is in power…Democrat, Republican, Liberal or Conservative….

    So, when talking about “liberty” in the broader sense (not specific to firearms) and regardless of the government system established, it is by its very nature and existence and within every government’s genetic code to erode liberty over time.

  25. Never trust anyone to respect your liberty but you.
    Politicians, pundits, friends and even family will sell you out in a heartbeat. Some for their own selfish reasons and others for “altruistic” reasons such as “your own good” or “safety.”

    Where liberty is concerned you and you alone are the end all be all. Nobody is going to come charging in to save you but you. Which brings me to idols and heroes. There are none. It’s all you. You’re born alone, you live alone, you’ll die alone.

    • Well Shire-man, that is man at his base. Only his existence is what is important. It is when he transcends this and is willing to give his life for another that a “hero” is born. A parent giving their life for their child, a soldier jumping on a grenade to save his platoon, a person giving their life to protect a stranger. Fighting to defend an idea of a place where freedom and justice for all is possible.

      A person willing to give their life for something greater than themselves. But the end of a culture is when there are no more “hero’s”, there is nothing worth giving your life to defend and the only thing worth fighting for is you and maybe a few others base survival.

      What a bleak and pointless existence.

    • At another level you are right. A mature adult is ultimately only responsible for their own food, shelter, warmth ad self-defense. But then the next step of maturity is to realize to provide that for their family, then their community, then their country and finally the world.

      Hopefully, we would have others around us to then work together to provide that for each other. Like our Founding Fathers and their communities. Just think how a call could go out and a whole community could come together and face down the greatest military power and kick their butt

      It was because they trusted each other to fight and die for each other. Of course, it was hit or miss, some volunteer militia stood and fought, others turned and ran, but the idea was there and many individuals lived up to and died to be that “hero”.

      And our country was born by this ideal.

      Today? Unfortunately, unless you are current or ex cop or soldier, I would see not many willing to risk their lives for a total stranger. Except for some of the POTG.

  26. To steal another tactic from the progressives,

    Police in Europe don’t seem to need to be dramatically more well-armed than the public. What’s wrong with American police?

  27. “Modern liberalism is a political philosophy in which primary emphasis is placed on eliminating the freedom of the individual by inflating the power of the government.”

  28. “Liberals…progressives…no matter what you call them, no matter how they sugarcoat their “common sense” fascist fantasies, these are the sworn enemies of liberty.”

    Uhhhh, blatantly untrue, inflamatory, and simpleminded in its broad assignment of a position to a wide swath of individuals.

    I generally adhere to liberal or progressive values, but when I vote, a candidate’s party has no influence on who I vote for, their positions do. I live in vastly a pro gun state, am a proud gun owner, and generally support politicians that support gun rights (unless they have some other crazy ass part of their platform that I find to be a deal-breaker in me voting for them).

    What you have said is the equivalent of saying that all libertarians and tea party members are terrorists. It’s ignorant and ignores the reality of the situation.

    • “I generally adhere to liberal or progressive values, but when I vote, a candidate’s party has no influence on who I vote for, their positions do”

      That is an admirable position to take…if it helped. The problem is, once your “pro gun” progressive candidate gets in office, he will tow the party line. The conservatives have the same problem on the Republican side. For the most part, Republicans are held accountable for going against the voters wishes even on minor issues. I don’t see the Democrats this day and age succumbing to the same pressure.

      You are unique to your ideology and this article may not describe you personally. But in this case, painting Progressives with a broad brush is so accurate, it is like saying all dogs bark.

      • “once your “pro gun” progressive candidate gets in office, he will tow the party line.”

        They don’t get elected in my state! The closest thing to that would be a conservative democrat or a moderate republican. Going against gun rights means you’ll never get elected to any position of state level power in Alabama, no matter what the other tenets of your platform are.

      • He’s not as exceptional as you make it sound. We are a minority, but not a tiny minority. For example, with respect to gun laws, polls show that anywhere between 20% and 30% of all Democrat voters oppose stricter gun laws compared to the status quo, and over 30% oppose AWB.

        • “…with respect to gun laws, polls show that anywhere between 20% and 30% of all Democrat voters oppose stricter gun laws compared to the status quo, and over 30% oppose AWB.”

          That is my point. They are voting for the wrong party candidates.

        • They’re only voting for the wrong candidates if you assume that they don’t care about any issue other than guns. But they do, and some of them (like the right to own one’s own body) they deem more important, hence they vote as they do. A two-party system makes such compromises inevitable.

        • But they do, and some of them (like the right to own one’s own body) they deem more important…

          And they get that one wrong, too. Which party passes laws banning cigarettes, or Big Gulps, or salt, or mandating the caloric content of school lunches? (et cetera)

          And as for abortion: they get that one wrong, too. An unborn child is a distinct human being, from the moment of conception. Its body is not the body of the mother, during or after pregnancy.

        • Which party passes laws banning drugs, or ripping out pages about contraception from textbooks?

          And as for abortion: your “the moment of conception” position is not rationally defensible, and can only be meaningfully held on religious grounds: Surprise: not everyone shares those grounds! (not even all Christians believe that life begins at conception; heck, not even most evangelicals believed that until mid-70s or so, before that it was strictly a Catholic thing).

        • And as for abortion: your “the moment of conception” position is not rationally defensible, and can only be meaningfully held on religious grounds…

          Actually, no. Basic biology and genetics support that claim. The Zygote is a living entity, genetically human, and genetically separate from either host parent. Biology defines what the term “living” means, not religion. The biological definition of life is: the capacity to grow, metabolize, respond (to stimuli), adapt, and reproduce.

          Most of us learned that in the freshman year of high school.

        • A living impregnated cell is a living being, yes. And a human, genetically. It doesn’t make it a person. It doesn’t have brains – indeed, doesn’t have any kind of neural system at all. It cannot think, reason, or feel pain. It cannot realize that it exists, even. In other words, there’s no “it” there.

        • There is no biological definition of a person, because it’s not a biological concept. You can come up with a definition that use some biological concepts as its basis (e.g. “has a brain”), but those are all also subjective.

          It’s just like the issue of sentience or consciousness – there are biological underpinnings there, of course, but we don’t have objective definition for those, only “we know it when we see it” (which varies from person to person).

          For me, personally, the cutoff line for personhood is when it’s an entity that has feelings that I can potentially empathize with. This includes my cats and dog, and yes, it’ll include a sufficiently developed fetus, but a zygote? No way.

      • Never heard of “Blue Dogs” have you? Hell, in my state the Democratic challenger for the Gov race had an A+ NRA rating while the incumbant R had an A rating and recently vetoed a pro-gun bill.

        As long as you keep voting based on consoants, we’ll keep having the same problems.

        • Well I am not going to sit here and go over every single voting record of every single elected official holding a State or National office. Of course there are exceptions. This is why local government is more important than Federal government. You can vote for the guy you know regardless of party affiliation. My coroner has a party affiliation. Why? Oh yeah…dead people vote Democrat. Seriously though, there is no denying that once a person get to D.C., the powers that be, the royalty, start to work on the freshmen. There are many perks given to those that get in line and the ones that don’t can forget about getting any support when up for reelection.

      • “Personhood” is conferred upon a human being at the moment of live birth. By law. Until you pass a constitutional amendment to change it.

      • I guess if your definition of being in opposition to individual liberty is not being able to do whatever you want, whenever you want without potential regulation or legal consequences, then I guess I am in opposition. You can keep most of the people off your lawn, but in a country with this many people in it, you can’t just pretend and act as if they don’t exist at all (or, if you do, you’re just deluding yourself.)

        • I guess if your definition of being in opposition to individual liberty is not being able to do whatever you want, whenever you want without potential regulation or legal consequences, then I guess I am in opposition.

          Wait, I’m confused: are you trying to define my beliefs, your beliefs, or progressive ideology?

          For simplicity, you can summarize my ideology as such: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

      • Ahh, “Progressives” and “Fabian socialists” are pretty well-recognized political terms–hell, for awhile the liberals themselves took on the name “progressives”. Many still do. And socialists in other parts of the world are pretty proud to call themselves socialists. “Muckraking wingnut” is pretty much an intellectually substance-free insult. Easy to see where the liberals get their reputation for tolerance and superior intellectualism…

        • In today’s political climate, I’d say that “muckraking wingnut” is a more recognized term than “fabian socialist”, and it certainly has no less accuracy than the latter term, despite it’s lack of use in well educated political discourse. Additionally, while “muckraking wingnut” may be an academically substance free insult, it is quite descriptive of the intellectual substance of the party at whom it was aimed and, as such, has all the intellectual substance that was intended.

          While I’m sure it is great fun for you fundies, calling a liberal/progressive a socialist is an old, tired, and inaccurate (regarding to most of us) baiting attempt.

        • While I’m sure it is great fun for you fundies, calling a liberal/progressive a socialist is an old, tired, and inaccurate (regarding to most of us) baiting attempt.

          Hey, it’s not my fault you don’t know the history of your own ideological movement.

        • @ foop: So you intended to resort to substance-free “argument” because you decided that your opponent is stupid. Rather than, say, pointing out how his proposed labeling scheme is inaccurate. Instead of saying, no, you’re wrong, here’s why, you just decided to say “You’re stupid”. Again, typical liberal/progressive “thought”. I wrote a letter to the editor once opposing the position taken by a columnist who happened to be female. Another typical liberal wrote in to say I obviously hate women. It’s the go-to liberal “argument”: if you say government handouts to reward illegitimacy are destructive to the family, you obviously “hate the poor” or “hate African Americans”, or, as in higher up in this thread, “hate children”. If you say the government has no business taking your money to pay for someone else’s contraceptives (among other things), you obviously “hate women”. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised at an intentionally “substance free” retort coming from a practitioner of an intellectually bankrupt ideology.

      • Resorting to ad hominem so soon. You’ve exhausted your repertoire of logical debate already? Or are you also an Alinskyite, and this response is just part of your repertoire?

        • My calling you a wingnut was no more or less an ad hominem attack than you calling me, or other liberals, socialists was. Your statement was clearly inaccurate in intended to insult and inflame. I responded accurately with a characterization of your political stance. You may take it as an insult if you care to.

        • “Socialist” is merely a particular ideology. You may articulate why standard, American liberal/progressive ideology differs from socialist ideology, and we can have a debate about that. That’s how adults engage in civil discourse.

          I could be incorrect in that assertion, but an incorrect assertion is not ad hominem. I cannot help that you infer insult in or are inflamed by an assertion that you ascribe to a particular ideology. I could ask why you are so clearly offended; but honestly, I don’t care. You have chosen the route of logical fallacy, thereby indicating your lack of desire to engage in civil discourse.

        • Yep Chip Bennet, the truth hurts. It’s why the liberal/progressives keep trying to re-lable themselves. Their roots are big government statists, what ever flavor; marxist; communist, socialist, ect. that they point to.

          But the roots are the same. All good things only can come from government; which they control. of course.

          It still comes down to control. Before it was the church speaking for god, using government to control the masses. Now it’s the statists using government as god, to control the masses.

          The more things change, the more they stay the same.

  29. Conservative, Liberal, Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Green, Tea party…… It’s like fighting over the best way to push water uphill with your bare hands or nail Jell-o to a tree without a hammer or a nail.

    The party system IS THE PROBLEM! It allows the politicians to skirt the actual issues and hide behind vagary and false allegiance. It also encourages laziness by giving the sheep a reason to vote for them without actually doing any research. Anyone voting a straight party ticket without researching the actual candidates is only contributing to the problem. Voting based on party takes the decision making power out of the hands of “We The People” and gives that control solely to the groups that can spin the best rally cry and fool the sheep into believing they work for them not vice versa.

    How exactly would the R.I.C.O. act NOT apply to the political parties in this country? People loose everything, suffer or die because of bad policy or poor government decisions every single year while they profit from it. If the term “organized crime” doesn’t apply to the political parties then how can it apply to ANY group? They, ALL OF THEM, profit from us while they themselves have no skin in the game. They hold no responsibility for their actions and rarely will any of them face the consequences of any but the most heinous of actions they take.

    Party affiliation needs to be a relic of the past. Outlaw, abolish, disallow… whatever it takes. Politicians NEED to be elected based on their SPECIFIC VALUES by their constituents and forced to vote consistent with those values once elected. Represent us or GTFO! It’s the only way “We The People” will ever regain and retain our power to shape this country for the better. It’s not only the fault of the “greedy evil” politicians…. WE as a group have allowed it to happen.

    Feel free to jump in here guys and gals. Throw in your 2 cents, I’m willing to listen if anyone has a better idea.

    • I disagree on that. As distasteful as I find the Democrats (mostly) and Republicans (half the time) I view it as a natural result of the First Amendment, with regards to free speech and association (or rather “assemble”). As long as you have some sort of government, there is going to be a party system, whether just one (totalitarian controlled one) or multiple parliamentary style ones. People are just going to naturally find ways to join a group in order to gain strength by numbers.

      If anything, I would mandate that there would be no party affiliations on voting ballots, just names and position they are running for. If that.

      • “I view it as a natural result of the First Amendment, with regards to free speech and association”
        “If anything, I would mandate that there would be no party affiliations on voting ballots”

        That actually makes perfect sense to me in a way and I agree on both counts…… BUT…. We as a people should also discourage any affiliation to any group that seeks to use that power against us. While I agree that they have the right to associate PERSONALLY I believe that in their capacity as our direct representatives(paid by us) they should be disallowed from voting in lockstep with a group based on “power in numbers” rather than directly on the behalf of the voters of his or her district. The only way I can see to accomplish this with any expediency is to disallow advertising of any party as a federal entity(???) and as a people, shaming them into oblivion. It would also require more issues to be put on local ballots at EVERY election to be funneled directly through that representative as his/her vote.

        Opinion subject to evolution based on further data…lol.

      • The problem is not the party system. It’s the two party system. It forces people into two diametrically opposed camps, even if they disagree with most points that either side is making, just because one of them agrees on one or two points more.

        There are good ways to deal with this – proportional representation system for parliament, instant runoff or ranked for presidential elections etc.

  30. “There’s no way a smaller, less equipped force could put up any sort of a fight against the United States armed forces. Viet-where? Tali-who? Quit making up words.”

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