Braineack

iTrader: (62)

the rest of the world.

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

for joep:

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

now is a good time to talk about Flynn:

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

Lokiel

Genuine question here, please DON'T view it as anti-USA as some US members seem wont to:

USA vs Dictators

I get the idea that US presidents are limited to 2 terms so that dynasties/dictators don't occur (China has just dropped this restriction - not a good idea IMO, shades of Valdimir Putin there).

I don't agree at all with the 2A but some argue that one of its goals is to prevent the country from falling under the control of a dictator (keep dreaming guys if you think armed citizens can challenge the full force of the US military).

The USA is very much against dictators and promotes democracy.

So how did Trump get elected?
He's the closest President that the USA has ever had to a dictator.

So far his office staff has turned over more staff than any Presidency.

The Secretary of State was recently fired because he disagreed with Trump (and called him a moron but never retracted the statement which Trump apparently cannot get over).

Gary Cohn, Trump's top economic adviser, resigned over disagreements with Trump, free trade being the key disagreement (protecting US jobs against unfair trade practices abroad is reasonable but Trump announced the plan which annoyed fair-trading countries around the world and he then had to come up with a list of exemptions to appease them - even I know that's a completely amateur move).

It seems that anyone who disagrees with Trumpty-Dumpty gets replaced.

It seems he just doesn't listen to his advisors (who are usually in those positions because they have years of experience in them, aren't amateurs, and consider the repercussions of any decision before announcing it).

Isn't this what dictators do?

Ryan_G

iTrader: (8)

The US military would likely splinter in the event of a revolution so an armed citizenry would be supporting fully trained and equipped US troops. See civil war.

Just because Trump fires his aides all ***** nilly does not make him a dictator. He is still subject to being voted out. He has exerted no authority or power that exceeds the power or authority he has been appointed under the US Constitution. The people he fires or complains about on Twitter are also not being jailed, killed, or disappearing. He's just an *** hat that **** posted his way into the white house. He hasnt fundamentally changed anything.

Chiburbian

iTrader: (1)

Plus, we have two other houses of our government that he has absolutely ZERO power over. He can't pass laws without the legislature. He can't pass unconstitutional laws (theoretically) without the supreme court ruling them invalid.

He can hire and fire any of his staff he wants, but he can't make law on his own.

Joe Perez

iTrader: (8)

This is the thing that bothers me the most about how much authority many people seem to ascribe to the Office of the President, particularly in a negative connotation, and particularly in election cycles.

People scream about how if so-and-so is elected, they're going to lose their guns, or their free birth-control, or their right to marry whomever they please... And the reality is that the President simply doesn't have all that much authority over domestic policy in the grand scheme of things.

I mean, Candidate Trump promised he was going to build a wall. Without hand-waving over the political ramifications, wall-building is one of those tasks which human-kind mastered somewhere around the time that we learned how to grow crops. President Trump issued an executive order over a year ago decreeing that the wall be built. DHS issued a waiver, allowing said construction to bypass:

• The National Environmental Policy Act
• The Endangered Species Act
• The Clean Water Act
• The Clean Air Act
• The National Historic Preservation Act
• The Migratory Bird Treaty Act
• The Migratory Bird Conservation Act
• The Archaeological Resources Protection Act
• The Safe Drinking Water Act
• The Noise Control Act
• The Solid Waste Disposal Act
• The Antiquities Act
• The Federal Land Policy and Management Act
• The Administrative Procedure Act
• The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, and
• The American Indian Religious Freedom Act

(source)

But do you see any wall-building going on, aside from what had already been authorized during the Obama administration?






And now, a joke:

A backpacker is traveling through Ireland when it starts to rain. He decides to wait out the storm in a nearby pub. The only other person at the bar is an older man staring at his drink. After a few moments of silence the man turns to the backpacker and says in a thick Irish accent:

"You see this bar? I built this bar with my own bare hands. I cut down every tree and made the lumber myself. I toiled away through the wind and cold, but do they call me McGreggor the bar builder? No."

He continued "Do you see that stone wall out there? I built that wall with my own bare hands. I found every stone and placed them just right through the rain and the mud, but do they call me McGreggor the wall builder? No."

"Do ya see that pier out there on the lake? I built that pier with my own bare hands, driving each piling deep into ground against the waves and the tide. But do they call me McGreggor the pier builder? No."

"But ya **** one goat.."

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

if this a bad thing? you'd rather par for course and political positions for favors/donations?

it's kind of a big deal to disagree on iran.

trump was elected, they serve at the will of the pres.

he's gone back on some of his lame-brain ideas.

no.

samnavy

iTrader: (7)

For ***** sake, we already went over this ad nauseum. I wrote paragraphs on this bullshit a month ago.

This is probably the most common argument that anti's use to discredit the reality of the 2A... and it's comlplete crap. It's part of the barrage of propaganda to make 2A supporters look like they are backing a lost cause, and since you can't win against the military, you certainly "don't need an AR15 to hunt deer". I can 100% promise you that when the revolution kicks off, both current and former members of the military will be leading the charge. I'm not even sure what that means, but I'm hoping it doesn't mean that I grab my kit and head for Washington DC to help storm the capital. But I guarantee you that when 10,000 people like me walk up Pennsylvania Ave, even a Spectre gunship overhead isn't going to stop us from going through the front gate at 1600.

But it's not gonna go down like that. More than likely, militarized government agencies and our own local law-enforcement will be the catalyst. An army platoon won't come knocking down your door if you make fun of somebody on Facebook and it's deemed a "hate crime"... it'll be the ******* FBI or a squad of special local police in tactical gear. When they come armed and are prepared to kill you if you don't come quietly, and you're willing to die rather than submit, and your neighbors have your back, AND THE REST OF YOUR CITY OR STATE are with you... that's when the revolution starts. That's when groups of armed people find out where certain politicians live and visit them in the night. That's when the police are forced to act with more force. That's when somebody rolls curfews and martial law. That's when more gov't agencies are called in to assist. That's when there are riots and people really start dying. That's when you choose a side and whoever has the most guns wins. Holy **** man, this stuff plays itself out in countries all over the world all the ******* time... but what's the difference between real riots in Turkey or Greece or Venezuela or China vs. the one that would happen in America? Need a hint? The hint is that those countries have to stop at riots because they don't have any guns to actually make the revolution happen.

You guys in Australia have all seen "V for Vendetta", yes? How much clearer can the need for a 2A be? Europe as a whole is halfway to that movie in one form or another.

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

Keep dreaming if you think the US military is finally going to take over the country and install your leftist utopia. Maybe this time it will be real.

Joe Perez

iTrader: (8)

It seems odd to me to disagree with SamNavy.

The first part of this makes no sense to me. It seems to presuppose that "the revolution" is a single event. Like, a coded message goes out on FaceTwit, and everyone who is fed up with the creeping totalitarianism in their government rises to arms simultaneously.


The second part is spot on, but I don't think you have fully appreciated how gradual and sporadic it might be, and well-tolerated it will be by the population. It's much more likely (and, I admit, this scenario is not likely in the first place) that "the revolution" will be a series of unorganized and disjointed uprisings which, really, is just an acceleration of the present-day status quo. Small groups will periodically rise up, and they will be put down by a combination of state and federal police along with the armed forces. We already live in a society in which police agencies embrace military-style equipment and tactics (as per Braineck's frequent observation) and routinely exercise them against civilians. Add in the firepower, tactical and organizational skill, and logistics capability of the military, and it's a no-win scenario for anyone electing to revolt.

I realize that this is likely a suggestion which you may find offensive both to your sense of patriotism and your respect for the professionalism of the armed forces. But it's not as though the US Military has never engaged in armed conflict with US citizens on US soil in order to suppress insurrection. The Whiskey Rebellion, the Bonus Army, the Battle of Blair Mountain, the Little Rock Nine, the Kent State shootings, the 1992 Los Angeles riot... All examples of the military acting in cooperation with state and local police agencies to wage combat against civilians for the purpose of suppressing insurrection, as authorized by the Constitution (Article I, Section 8.) And in every case, after the hippies got finished protesting, people went about their daily lives.


Even as recently as Hurricane Katrina, the US Army went door to door carrying out warrant-less seizures of every civilian-owned firearm which they found, at the direction of Police Superintendent Eddie Compass, and the authorization of Governor Kathleen Blanco, under the order that "No one will be able to be armed. Guns will be taken. Only law enforcement will be allowed to have guns."

So, at a small scale, this idea of forced disarmament isn't some abstract hypothetical. It's something which has already happened, and in a state with the 13th highest rate of civilian firearm ownership per capita in the US.

It failed to produce a revolution. Because most people are not officers with a heroic sense of patriotism and a willingness to commit mutiny; they just want to not be arrested / killed.

mitymazda

iTrader: (1)

mitymazda

iTrader: (1)

You want to comment on freedom, let us talk about how free speech isn't a right guaranteed to the subjects in your country whereas it is a fundamental right of the citizens of mine.

​​​​​​​

Lokiel

You're nit-picking:

From https://www.humanrights.gov.au/freed...nd-expression:Constitutional law protection

The Australian Constitution does not explicitly protect freedom of expression. However, the High Court has held that an implied freedom of political communication exists as an indispensible part of the system of representative and responsible government created by the Constitution. It operates as a freedom from government restraint, rather than a right conferred directly on individuals.

samnavy

iTrader: (7)

Joe, I pretty much agree with everything you said. The "gradual erosion" and constant resetting of the bar for status quo IS how it will happen. Small groups fighting over their own small-scale interests against the machine and losing ground little by little. The government will do what it does to keep us safe and one by one we turn it all over to them. I'm reminded of a quote from Blade Runner... "If you're not cop, you're little people."

With respect to Katrina gun confiscation (Pandoras box now opened), I think you'll find that the reality of what happened there is not nearly as dramatic as any media source would allow you to believe. At the time, both left and right media outlets were producing headlines on the subject with their own slants on how/why it was happening. Right wing screaming the narrative that the gov't was coming for our guns. Left wing screaming about how badly the cops are outnumbered and this is why we need more gun control.

As for actual confiscation, I'll admit that for a long time, I bought into the hype. Just some casual google'ing nowadays should make it pretty clear what really happened, which is an order of magnitude less dramatic than history had told for a long time. Obama's election was huge fuel to the fire for "remember New Orleans" like it was the Alamo... there's a reason he's called "The Greatest Gun Salesman of All Time", and the guy really didn't do a damned thing gun-related in his whole 8 years to deserve it. His party, sure as **** tried their best, but Obama really kept himself on the sidelines.

Additionally, I don't actually think any confiscation was done by full-time Active Duty Army personnel. True, the President has the power to federalize the National Guard, but they're still just weekend warriors from out of town. Most of the confiscation was carried out by non-local police and some out-of-state National Guard personnel who were "confiscating" guns that they found while in the process of searching empty houses. I'm certain that most of these cases were simply cops looking in sock drawers or on closet shelves for people hiding from being evacuated against their will, and weren't actually taking an active role in the stealing of firearms themselves. We all know the cops wouldn't do that.

In only a few instances, (those that got the major headlines) were people actually confronted and told to hand over their weapons. The old woman with the ancient revolver (the video of that is uglier than the Elian Gonzales raid), the two rednecks coming across the lake, muscle dude with the ponytail, etc... Most quotes by public officials at the time were taken out of context to fit whatever media narrative was being pushed. Quite a few law enforcement groups became quite vocal about refusing to follow the "orders" they were given to take guns away... but only after they realized that their orders came from somebody with no jurisdiction, or that they weren't really "orders" so much as "guidelines to secure guns if you find them loose in houses", or that there weren't actually any orders to do so in the first place.

However, the tsunami of litigation in the aftermath did make actual changes to law in a lot of states, where many states adopted legal statutes that specifically prevented gun confiscation. You can do some homework on the days leading up to Hurricane Sandy and how both sides danced for the camera as entire coastlines for some very blue states were going to get wiped off the map. A lot the pre land-fall hysteria dealt with law enforcement plans to keep the peace... "remember New Orleans"... brought gun confiscation out of the woodwork again.

In any case, the Great New Orleans Gun Grab was anything but.

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

z31maniac

^That completely glosses over many of the details of Operation Eland.

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

isn't that how memes work?

z31maniac

You don't want to visit Zimbabwe?