Why?

Why is Martin Luther King the ONLY person who has a Federal holiday named after him? The only other “person” in that category is Jesus, and he was probably fictional. We did have presidents, right? What, no one in all of American history is worthy of having his own holiday besides this one man? Why not a scientist? Why not Ben Franklin? Why not George Washington Carver? And by the way, this “nonviolence” preacher (MLK, not Carver) had his own guns for protection...see, neither MLK nor the Pope were/are quite as stupid as those people who really do have religious faith. MLK had his guns and this article says the latest Popemobile “is fitted with 3-inch-thick bulletproof glass and enough Kevlar to outfit a Navy Seals team.” Source. Religious faith...just warms yer cockles, eh?

Why did people think things would be so much better in the country if there were a black President? To be fair, I really can’t say yet, since we have not yet had a black President (the correct term for Mr. Obama is Mulatto). You’re not a racist? But you think things would be better with a black President? Why? I think you’re paying too much attention to the “black” and too little to the “President”. “As a black man who plans to eventually start a family with my white girlfriend, I'm going to tell them that Obama was the first man of color in the White House and that America’s 44th president was biracial.” Source. (Seeing as all Presidents before him were utterly transparent, with no color at all) But it will be oh so much better when we finally have a woman President. I think we should do this....disqualify all future presidential candidates, for at least one election cycle, who are not female, lesbian, Muslim/atheist, black (no Mulattos please), (or possibly Hispanic - whatever that means), who have had an abortion...she would surely fix things, right? Actor/actress, prince/princess, President/Presidentress...why not?

Why do we allow such things as private prisons in the USA? Why do we allow the Supreme Court to say corporations are people? Why do we allow this stuff? Because “we” don’t have a damn thing to say about it, that’s why. Like “we” don’t have anything to say about the fact that tobacco kills over 400,000 Americans every single year...plus costs billions a year in medical costs, lost work time, etc., whereas (lawyers say that sometimes) in more than 5,000 years of documented history no one can produce a single individual who has ever died from smoking marijuana, yet the USA will go to war with other countries to force them to allow tobacco in the “free trade” agreements, but will sentence ordinary Americans to life without parole in one of the private prisons, for marijuana. “When someone is convicted of an offense punishable by a mandatory minimum sentence, the judge must sentence the defendant to the mandatory minimum sentence or to a higher sentence. The judge has no power to sentence the defendant to less time than the mandatory minimum. A prisoner serving an MMS for a federal offense and for most state offenses will not be eligible for parole. Even peaceful marijuana smokers sentenced to "life MMS" must serve a life sentence with no chance of parole.” Source.

Protests? Of COURSE you can protest (as long as you remain inside a Free Speech Zone)...you can also scratch your balls (scratch ‘em if ya got ‘em), or use your dildo (unless you’re in a place where that’s illegal too), and juggle running chain saws, but it won’t change any of those laws. Does it occur to you that there’s a REASON why them folk in the various Congresses are called “lawmakers”....and you ain’t?

The Union 1:44 about marijuana and laws.

TRB

Guns, Freedom and Communication

I am not religious believer - a ‘nut’ or other wise. I am not a ‘right-winger’. I am not paranoid or full of fear. I do not hate any groups of people. I have no desire to hurt or kill anyone. I am not ‘pro-gun’. I am not a gun enthusiast, a ‘sportsman’, ‘outdoorsman’, collector, etc., nor am I a hunter or fisherman. I certainly do not ‘worship guns’. I am not a Limbaugh ‘ditto-head’, nor do I watch Fox News except once in a while....probably much less than I watch MSNBC, CNN, Current TV, and other outlets. I sometimes read right-wing or conservative material online, such as Town Hall and Human Events in the same way I read the left-wing Alternet and The Huffington Post. I do not support the Second Amendment as a reason for private gun ownership. I am not in favor of “states rights”, secession, and I am certain that no group of citizens, no matter how well-armed they may be, could ever have any successful (from their point of view) confrontation with the government. And, I do not own any guns. So... tell me please, just what horrible box will you put me in so that you can justify dismissing my opinions and arguments as merely the rantings of a....what? If this is your modus oprandi, I’m sure you’ll think of something.

If you are a more thoughtful, reflective person than that, perhaps we can talk.

I have friends on Facebook of many different ‘stripes’; conservative, libertarian, liberal-progressive, anarchist, Christian, agnostic, atheist, black, white, hispanic, male, female, gender-neutral, straight, gay, etc. I don’t know of a single one of these people with whom I can’t talk about something, even if we do best to avoid particular topics, since we know each other’s position and that they are not likely to change.

Regarding the so-called ‘gun debate’ in our country, if you care enough to read on, allow me to explain why I totally support the idea of people having the right to own guns. First, as I said, to me, the Second Amendment is totally irrelevant to the issue. I figure that life, all life, has innate within it, a natural right to attempt to defend itself from harm or death to the best of its ability. In the case of modern humans, this is best accomplished in most cases with guns. They are the tools which, in one sense, are the true equalizer; your physical size and strength has little to do with being able to defend yourself with a gun.

We might get into flinging statistics back and forth about how many people are killed with guns, or how often having a gun saved many lives, but these are, at best side issues, with little relevance to the main issue...which is the ability to defend yourself. There are MANY side issues which have little or nothing to do with the main issue...which is the ability to defend yourself. Why does he need a semi-automatic weapon, why does he need a 30-round clip, why does he need a hundred different guns, etc. The bottom line on all such questions is that A) “need" is not the issue and, B)it is simply not your business why he wants them. ‘Should everyone have nukes too’ is an argument ad absurdum, completely off the topic...which is the ability to defend yourself with PERSONAL weapons, not weapons of mass destruction.

There is much insulting vitriol thrown toward all gun owners that they are full of hate and fear; this seems especially ironic to me, since it seems to me most of the people who call for more gun laws have a good deal of hate, for lack of a better word, toward their stereotypes of gun owners, and a fundamentally irrational fear of guns themselves and all people who own them. I read a story sometime back about some customers getting bent out of shape because a couple of men who were also customers in a Starbucks, were openly carrying their weapons. The weapons and their method of carrying them were completely legal. If they had been concealed carry people, no one would have even known....just as they didn’t know how many of the customers had concealed completely illegal guns.

“Guns are made only to kill people”. First, that is only a bias....I can equally say guns are made to protect people; or it is simply incorrect because some guns are made for hunting or sport shooting or for collecting, etc. Also, even if taken at face value that guns are made for killing people, this is NOT a bad thing....some people very much need killing. Such as one who takes a gun into a public place and begins killing innocent people. It’s fine with me if some people have no desire to defend themselves. Pacifists exist (though not for long should an enemy attack them).

There is one question in particular to which I have not yet seen any answer: Why do you think more laws would prevent certain people from having guns? I am dismayed and astounded that so many of my liberal friends seem to think that passing a law against X puts an end to it and we don’t have to worry about it any more. This is just not very rational at all. There are ABUNDANT laws on the books about legal gun ownership, and don’t forget the ones about murder being illegal too, but none of these, so far, seem to have put an end to murder.

Many of the people on the right, certainly not all, think it is their business if gay people can legally get married or women can legally have an abortion. It isn’t. Unless some gay person is trying to force you to marry them, it is simply not your business whether gay people get married or not. Unless some woman is trying to abort YOUR baby against your will, then it is simply not your business whether she has an abortion or not. Likewise, unless someone is trying to force you to have guns in your house or on your person, or unless someone is assaulting you with one, it is simply not your business if someone else wants to own guns. That’s the long and short of it...bottom line. It’s simply not your business. On this, the right-wing sites are correct; it’s seldom ABOUT guns at all, but about control. Unfortunately, the same is true of them re the gay marriage and abortion issues. Could it be that, we might have just a little better national discourse if we all stopped screaming about what other people do, whether we like it or not, as long as they are hurting no one?

TRB

GUNS

This is one of my attempts to write a piece on the whole issue of “guns and gun control” based on reason rather than raw emotion, which seems to pervade most of the “debate”, in this case, especially from the “left” and sometimes from the “right”. This is just my personal reasoned opinion...I will not attempt to cite any statistics or “facts” to support my position, though I will give some links you might use if you have further interest in the subject.

Let’s start with the Second Amendment...for the record, here is the full text of that:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

In MY opinion, this amendment has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the “gun debate”, either in favor or against. Here’s why: IF the amendment stated simply, “The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed”, it would be flatly and unequivocally a Constitutional right. But it doesn’t say that. It has those two modifying clauses in front. It seems abundantly clear to me, given the time and circumstances in which this was written, that the REASON the Founders had for legally guaranteeing the people the right to bear arms was so that, if necessary, ‘the people’ could rise up in armed revolt against their government and overthrow it. I think that was perfectly sensible at the time, although. even then, it was no cut and dried matter that such a revolt would be successful. After all, cannon had been around a long time by then, it seems obvious that the government, if it wanted, could and would have access to far more cannon than ‘the people’ either individually or in militias would have.

At the very least, by the time nuclear bombs were available, the ship had sailed as far as ‘the people’ being able to militarily resist their government, if the government was determined enough to put down any revolt. By NOW the notion of any successful armed revolt of ‘the people’ against the government is so far beyond absurd it is downright delusional. I very seriously doubt there is any other nation on this planet with ANY chance of defeating the US military machine. Rationally and realistically, there is zero chance of any 'citizens militia’ defeating even civilian law enforcement apparatus (local police, state police, FBI, etc.), never mind anything about the military.

I remember when I first encountered the word ‘freethinker” and found the definition of it given by the FFRF: free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. As a newly minted atheist/freethinker, I embraced this, though there was that niggling thing in the back of my mind that we should be able to remove the “about religion” part to make the whole idea of freely thinking much broader. Sadly, it didn’t take long to find out that many “freethinkers” had interest ONLY in the term as it applied to religion, but not in any other aspect of life. Though I am aware of several atheist and non-religious folk who have a more reasonable view of the “gun debate”, I find it a bit alarming that the majority seem as mired in mindless social dogma on that issue as the “religious nuts” they so excoriate about religious beliefs. One notable exception is Sam Harris.

I find it troubling that so many of the same people who rightly point out many of the ridiculous claims and arguments made in favor of God-belief and religion, cannot seem to see that many of THEIR claims and arguments in the “gun debate” are just as ridiculous and without merit. As Sam Harris puts it in his article The Riddle of the Gun, “I am surrounded by otherwise intelligent people who imagine that the ability to dial 911 is all the protection against violence a sane person ever needs.” I am not in lockstep agreement with Sam Harris, or anyone else, on atheism, guns, or anything else, but so far, I find his arguments on these issues in general remarkably cogent and reasoned.

The issues of guns and gun control are the only ones I know of which have so many of the arguments ad absurdum so often found in religions.

I encourage you to read Sam Harris’s The Riddle Of The Gun, a more eloquent treatment of the issue than mine, from a nationally known liberal atheist...not a “religious gun nut”.

TRB