Home Forums Miscellaneous Topics Second Amendment Republicans vs Democrats

Got this via email from a friend. How true, how true!


A Republican and a Democrat were walking down the street when they came upon a homeless person. The Republican gave the homeless person his business card and told him to come to his business to apply for a job. He then took twenty dollars out of his pocket and gave it to the homeless person. The Democrat was very impressed, and when they came to another homeless person, he decided to help. He walked over to the homeless person and gave him directions to the welfare office. He then reached into the Republican's pocket and got out twenty dollars. He kept 15 for administrative fees and gave the homeless person five.










Now you understand the difference between Republicans and Democrats.

Yaaaaaah, I don't buy it.

Republicans and Democrats are equally eager to spend other people's money, as long as it's spent on what they think it should be spent on, and regardless of where the people from whom it's extorted think it should be spent.

Yes, Democrats seem to be more publicly anxious than Republicans to raise taxes, but Republicans don't get any kudos from me for cutting taxes while spending stays the same or continues to rise. Running a budget deficit (Republicans) raises inflation, which amounts to the same burden on the people that the Democrats would lay by raising taxes. At least the Democrats are honest about what they're doing.

Show me a Republican (or a Democrat!) who's willing to cut spending, preferably by hacking off huge bloody chunks of government, and I'll be impressed. So far the only one I know of is Ron Paul of Texas, and he's not really a Republican.

Yep, I'm with you on the cutting of spending/usless programs/wasted forign aid etc.
But the Dems will tax us into oblivion all the while disarming us and the military. The Republicans are the only viable alternative I can see in the foreseeable future.

Yeah, Ron Paul is the greatest. He is probably the only Constitutionalist in our federal government. If only we could wave a wand and turn them all into Ron Pauls. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

The Republicans are preferable to the democrats when it comes to national defense but neither party will ever do anything about the invasion of America by illegal immigrants.

Defense issues aside, the real difference between today's Republicans and Democrats is that the Republicans seem to offer more affordable socialism.

I can't name one socialist program that the Republicans have eliminated, reduced in size or reduced funding for. All have been expanded.

Today's Republican party is all about winning elections even if it means embracing the socialism of the democrats. After winning they do not govern according to the Republican principles, those are set aside for political expediency and future victories.

David Horowitz said something funny while he was a guest on a radio talk show that illustrates part of the problem with today's enlightened Republicans. I'll have to paraphrase. He told a story of two Republicans that were sentenced to be hanged. Before the hanging they were asked what they would like for their last meal. The first one said he would like some fresh strawberries. The other leaned over and whispered to him "Let's not create any problems."

red

What--you mean like the USA PATRIOT Act and the Homeland Security Act and the Office of Homeland Security and this completely pointless and ambiguous war with Iraq that Baby Bush is salivating over? I'm really surprised to hear that from somebody who (probably) owns guns in this country.

No.

I used to be a Republican. The Republicans embarrassed me too many times, so I started actually examining them, rather than trying to halfheartedly defend them.

I'm now convinced that there is no significant difference between the Republicans and the Democrats. There are scads of insignificant differences, so that each side can gain converts by using the other side as a scare tactic. But both sides want to extort more money from the people (whether through taxes or deficit-inspired inflation); both sides want the government to have more power and the people to have less liberty; both sides want to send other folks' children overseas to die meddling in the affairs of other nations for the satisfaction of their own delusions of grandeur and power.

Lesser-of-two-evils arguments don't cut any mustard with me anymore either. There was a time I might have believed that Baby Bush was at least a decent man, even if he didn't have the faintest idea what the word "liberty" means. But then he signed the USA PATRIOT Act and the Homeland Security Act and revealed himself as just another power-grabbing scum-sucking politician. Al Gore wouldn't have gotten away with that kind of outrage, because folks would have been watching him.

So, folks ask me, what are you going to do--vote third-party? You expect to win that way?

Well, I have two responses to that.

First, voting is nothing but a scam to give the people the illusion of control. If it actually had any effect on anything important, it'd be illegal--like assault weapons are, for example.

But more important, the purpose of third parties is not to win: it's to make treacherous major parties that betray their voter bases lose. You don't make a political entity listen to you by helping it win--which is why I'm not, and probably never will be, an NRA member.

Actually, Barak I should have been more specific. Republicans as a rule have had an edge over the democrats when it comes to funding for military preparedness and defense.

By the way welcome aboard the forums here.

You missed an interesting thread we had going in November where some members were saying that they would never vote libertarian again.

I disagreed. I will never vote Republican again based on the Bush's performance to date.

Its an interesting thread. A lot of the members views as well as my own are pretty well stated in it. It's been my experience that even fellow libertarians have political disagreements, but that's what keeps it interesting.


If you're interested here's the link:

https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbt...&sb=5&o=&fpart=1

red

Barak,

You missed the great debate on third parties held right here at the campfire some weeks ago.

My bottom line is that voting for third party candidates is pi--ing your vote down the drain. There were many examples of why this is so in the great debate. I do not think anybody changed their minds during the dispute but it was interesting.

As for not belonging to the NRA, I am truly sorry you feel that way. They are certainly not perfect but without them our guns would have been gone long ago. They are the only truly effective force for keeping private ownership of firearms in this country. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />

So like I haven't convinced you--you certainly have not convinced me. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

I'll continue to vote mostly Republican and keep sending the NRA and NRA-ILA contributions. No thanks are necessary I am happy to protect your gun rights for you. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />

Yeah, I saw the thread you spoke of. It looked as though it had been pleasantly dormant for awhile, though, so I decided not to wake it back up.

As regards Republicans, I was where you are a few years back. I ignorantly voted Republican in '92, and again in '94. (I'm not trying to imply that all Republican voters were ignorant in '92 and '94, just that I was. I wasn't really paying much attention to what people had done in office--just assuming that if they were Republicans they had to be better than Democrats. That was pretty ignorant of me.)

After being thoroughly and repeatedly betrayed by the '94 "Republican Revolution," I was almost ready to vote Libertarian in '96--especially because Dole was such a tax-and-spend goober...but I listened to all the short-sighted "a vote for a third party is a vote for the Democrats!" scare-mongers and voted for Dole anyway.

In October of '98, I was kind of a gun owner, but not really. I had a couple of old semiauto 22LR rifles (a Springfield 187J and a Marlin 60) that I took out to the range maybe once every two years (that's generous) and couldn't shoot worth a bucket of warm spit. But I heard that Brady II was coming along in November, whereby all firearms purchases, not just handguns, would have to be registered with the feds. (Please don't try to tell me that NICS isn't registration: I'm a professional software developer, and I know how stuff like that works.) I wasn't terribly politically aware, but I did know that firearms registration was a bad thing.

So I did some research, dusted off the old credit card, and bought myself one of every sort of gun I could imagine ever needing in the future, just before the deadline. I got a Marlin MR-7 bolt rifle in 30-06 with a cheap Tasco 3-9x40 scope, a Mossberg 500 pump shotgun with a 24" ported turkey barrel, and a his'n'hers pair of handguns: a Glock 17 full-size 9mm semiauto for me, and a 9mm Baby Glock (G26) for my wife. (Yeah, I know, but she liked it.) I don't mind giving details because all those guns were on paper (4473), and the gun shop where I bought them has since closed, so they're registered to me with the feds now anyway, even though I no longer own some of them.

I planned simply to shove them under the bed and wait for Armageddon, but before I did that I had to take them out to the range and make sure I knew how they worked, that they were properly zeroed, etc.

Well, of course I got completely hooked and discovered that I was a firearms enthusiast, or "gun nut." Immediately upon that discovery, the federal government bent all its considerable power to the objective of turning me into a government-hating, hair-on-fire, glowing-eyed activist libertarian. After more than four years, it has essentially succeeded. I know more about both Democrats and Republicans than most Democrats and Republicans do; I actually understand the Constitution and know what my rights are supposed to be; I am in the process of breaking out of the propaganda straitjacket into which the government schools indoctrinated me--and I've even become a general-aviation private pilot, which of course makes the government hate me even more.

But best of all, at least for me, I've found a political viewpoint that is actually principled. (Yes, I know, both Democrats and Republicans claim to have principles, but when backed against the wall they either can't list any, or they can't explain why the ones they do list are regularly and nonchalantly violated every day by the politicians they support. There's only one fundamental libertarian principle, but it's a real principle, and "libertarians" who flout it are properly anathema.)

So I voted for Howard Phillips in 2000, expecting that Al Gore would win and somewhat surprised when he didn't. One day, if they lose enough elections because of libertarians, the Republicans may again decide to stand for individual liberty instead of creeping statism. When they can convince me that they've done that, I'll drop my third party (whichever one it happens to be) like a hot potato. Until then, they can go whistle for my vote.

As for the NRA, it's much like the Republican Party. I've heard the argument about how the NRA is the Great Defender of American Gun Rights; but the facts tell a different story. On the contrary, it seems that the NRA is the Great Inventor of Completely Stupid New Gun-Control Laws, such as the "assault-weapons" ban, the standard-capacity magazine ban, and the increase in the legal age for gun ownership from 18 to 21. You can blame a lot of things on HCI and VPC, but not those: those are straight from the NRA.

Also, my state was recently considering switching from no-carry to Vermont carry; when the NRA heard that, it came barging in with a shall-issue government-privilege scheme to sink the Vermont-carry proposal.

How in the name of all that makes sense could I possibly want to give my money to a bunch of cowardly treacherous bootlicking crooks like that? It'd be just like paying taxes!

I've heard the "If you don't like it, join it and change it from the inside!" argument a number of times. I've watched other people try to do that. I've spoken to folks who came home from the annual conventions, and heard them relate how corrupt it is--how your influence will only be felt if you're among the group that is politically approved by the head honchos. I've watched them ignore their own bylaws to keep Moses in the president's chair.

Not for me, thanks. I don't like the National Organization for Women, the Gay And Lesbian Alliance, or the Brady Campaign much either, but I don't see any reason to change them "from the inside" either. I'll stay with GOA, JPFO, SAF, CRKBA, SAS, and other folks who can demonstrate that they actually understand what the word "liberty" means.

Perhaps one day you'll begin to see some of the same things I saw. Perhaps not. You're handicapped a bit, I think, by the fact that you apparently work for the government, so admitting some of those things to yourself would probably create a bit of cognitive dissonance for you. But I know other folks--police officers, even!--who have been able to surmount that challenge.

Even if you yourself can't, though, there's no reason that you and I can't be civil, polite, even friendly with each other: it's important for the two sides to associate, so that each side knows just how serious the other side is getting.

Right up until the day the government sends you to take my guns, I mean, of course.

Barak, Norm's retired, so he won't be coming for your guns any time soon. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

I agree with you about 98% on what you said.

"There's not a dimes worth of difference between a Republican and a Democrat" - Geo. Wallace

Truer words were never spoken, both of their #1 jobs are getting re-elected. their #2's are seperating you from your money, and #3, loyalties are to their party not their constituents #4 keeping the people ignorant.


US.gov Inc. Sucks! I'm sick of living in a corporation. Let's get our nation back from the lawyers and bankers and live in the Constitutional Republic our founding fathers fought and died for, rather than this fraud they call a Democracy.

Barak my friend, and what is your opinion of the parable I posted? I thought it rang pretty true myself.

BTW, I know many serving Peace Officers that would tell the .gov to shove it if they were sent for legally owned guns. Unfortunatly, through the slow brainwashing of America via the schools and media we are dying out!

Here is a good read on media for those interested.

http://www.jpfo.org/skunk.htm

T Lee that was an excellent read. Thanks for sharing it.

There are a lot of good cops out there that support the 2nd amendment.

I ran across one of them named Leroy Pyle on the net a couple of years back that not only supported us but he was the kind of activist that puts a lot of us to shame because of the time and effort he put forth. He writes a lot of essays but one was an excellent essay regarding this very issue. I regret that I had a computer crash and lost his website and his essay. Another staunch supporter was named Angel Shamaya(sp) another good 2nd amendment cop that takes the fight right to the antis.

There are more of them out there than the average person would think there are. When I was involved in the 4-H shooting programs I had the pleasure of teaching and training some of their kids in marksmanship and gun safety.
They are out there and they support us.


red

I can't believe that I actually had the info on a disk. For anyone interested try this link:

http://www.2ampd.net/

I even found the essay:

Drawing The Line
By
Leroy Pyle
The role of the police officer in the quest for individual rights is a common topic for many in the activist community. I am often challenged with the demand for my personal interpretation of certain constitutional rights, or to define my response to a hypothetical situation. Typically, the question is, "If the [government leader] ordered you to go door-to-door to confiscate firearms, what would you do?"
Such confrontations are not unusual for a law enforcement officer, as their role in society often places them on that "thin blue line" separating adversaries. Early in my career, I worked the Oakland Induction Center and Berserkely riots, separating those for or against the Vietnam conflict. Over the years, volatile issues of drugs, Black Panthers, unions, KKK, sexual preferences, and abortion provided ample "working" opportunities to learn both sides of many arguments. Most officers share those or similar experiences.
Ironically, both sides get angry when the police maintain neutrality. Everyone wants some assurance that the police are on "their side" of the issue. As evidenced, the majority of my dealings with "radicals" were on the Left, and causes supported by the media. The press has always been quick to criticize the police, regardless of facts.
As a gun rights supporter, the growing hostility directed at law enforcement by gun rights activists is disappointing. There have been some serious abuses, of course, but I view the exaggerated judgment of ALL police by isolated violations with the same contempt that judging ALL gun owners by a Columbine tragedy warrants. It works for the Left and the media, so maybe it should be expected from the Right.
As my good friend Joe Horn put it, "They view us, American citizens, cops, as the enemy. What's new? The Left calls us Pigs, the Right calls us Nazis. Way kewl ... Seig! oing, SEIG, oink, SEIG, oink..."
Where do I define that middle? Where do I draw the line? Simply put, I do not believe that house-to-house confiscation will ever occur. My experience as a California gun owner leads me to believe that "they" don't care about taking your guns. It is your children and their children who will find it increasingly unpopular and uncomfortable, if not impossible, to obtain a firearm.
I owned ARs and HKs at the time the Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989 went into affect. I had recently purchased a brand new AR-15 to use in a Police Rifle Instructor Course, but as an employee of the infamous Chief McNamara, as well as an outspoken critic of his role as HCI spokesperson, thought it prudent to abide by the new law. I registered mine.
But I was in the minority when it came to registering the newly identified "assault weapons." The vast majority of owners ignored the law. Most police officers that I knew ignored the new law. Until threatened prohibition made semi-auto rifles so desirable, police officers were probably in the majority as ownership goes. All my career, I remember that every officer had a long gun or three to backup that revolver we always carried.
They didn't come. There has been no attempt during the ensuing years to seize the unregistered "assault weapons." And the CA laws worsened to include one grossly abusive government act that resulted in a retroactive assignment of certain firearms to the prohibited list. Letters were sent to the registered owners informing them of the change of status. Again, the majority of registered owners ignored the law.
They didn't come. They don't care about our guns. It is our children's guns and our children's children that they are legislating against.
But if you insist on my answer and that of every police officer I have ever seriously discussed the issues with, I am confident there would be mass refusal to obey such orders, and serious defections prior to enactment. I recognize this to be a real disappointment to the many frustrated activists who are begging for a fight and hope to get it on right now with the easiest, most visible (and traditional) target, the cops. But cops are not the enemy. Confiscation won't happen.
� �It won't happen because while certain activists try to blame the police, the school teachers and librarians are depriving the next generation of the patriotic lessons of history and poisoning their minds against individual rights and responsibilities. The NEA and virtually all teachers organizations don't need jack-boots to plan and coordinate their anti-gun agenda for the coming years, intended to stomp the Second Amendment into oblivion.
� �It won't happen because while certain activists try to blame the police, religious organizations and leaders of every denomination are actively demonizing firearms and their owners at every opportunity. They don't need barricades or teargas to herd the crowds into their places of worship to indoctrinate them in the ways of anti-self defense.
� �It won't happen because while certain activists try to blame the police, your family doctor is quietly informing your spouse and children that firearms in your home is a health problem. The American Medical Association doesn't need a baton to beat the media into submission, they just promote anti-gun "research" that is published in their "prestigious" papers and passed to the news media for public consumption.
And it won't happen because while certain activists try to blame the police, the media is reporting this anti-police rhetoric to the teachers, the churches, the doctors, and your community leaders as an example of how extreme we are! And that is where you might remember the value of the admonishment against wearing cammies in public. If you are one of those who believe the police are to blame for your firearms laws, you might just as well put on your NRA cap, crude T-shirt, and cammie pants, and march on city hall. The bravado of anti-cop rhetoric is accepted as the norm regulars on discussion lists, but to the citizens we should be recruiting stands out like a set of cammies at a press conference. I don't question their sincerity or concern for Second Amendment Rights, but I would prefer that more people consider the example of "wearing cammies in public" and the perception involved when venting their frustrations on the police.
Law enforcement can be a valuable ally in the fight for individual rights and The Second Amendment. Cops are traditionally conservative, and are as repulsed by the abuses in government as anyone might be. They are as offended by the highly publicized police abuses as gun owners are offended by the highly publicized firearms abuses. There is that tendency to paint with a broad brush in both cases, and there is a common enemy in the media and on the Left.
If "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" might be considered an acceptable aphorism, gun owners would be wise to look at the law enforcement experience in preparation for their own future. Especially as the concealed carry laws become the norm of the future. It has become common practice for the media and Leftist community "spokespersons" to immediately condemn any police action, and especially the use of a firearm, without regard for the facts, truth, or accuracy in the reporting. Cops have always been an easy target for the media when it comes to "making" the news. Cops and guns do share the common problem of being easy targets for the media, who all too often prefer the quick emotional rhetoric to any attempt at facts or accuracy.
It has been my observation that too many Internet "news" websites are mimicking their commercial brothers! If you condone the media assumption that EVERY police use of force is suspect, what do you expect the reaction to be to YOUR use of a firearm. A move towards a mutual understanding of this media generated phenomenon could be beneficial to both law enforcement and gun owners if they chose to work together as gun owners. For a good example of a gun owner being railroaded by the news media, visit http://www.2ampd.net/Articles/jerad_kruse.htm.
My friends and I at The Second Amendment Police Department, www.2ampd.net, are working to dispel the myth that cops are anti-gun. As career police officers, we are very well aware that cops ARE gun owners and share the respect for firearms as the valuable personal defense tool that they are. I would not expect to modify the behavior of the more extreme among us, but only caution and encourage the majority against the negative tactics that are all too familiar on ABC, NBC, and CBS.
There are times when government abuses, using the police or not, should be railed against. I will guarantee the full support of The Second Amendment Police Department in the condemnation of abusive government or police tactics when they occur. We will join you in the condemnation of any and all "police state" tactics that seek to remove the community identification of the local officers in favor of an ominous federal umbrella.
All I ask in return, is cooperation from the majority of gun owners to consider the ramifications of repeating some of the rhetoric passing as news on the Internet. I am sure that an attempt at tempering the inflammatory rhetoric relating to the working police officers will result in a more positive approach to the average citizen and especially law enforcement officers who are more apt to be your friends and neighbors, and eventual contributors to www.2ampd.net.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

While I don't agree with each and every thing he has to say I agree with a lot of it and I'd share my campfire with this guy any day of the week.

red

That's good to know.

Y'know, I'm actually not a cop-hater. I understand that I sound like one, but what I have is much more fear of and for cops than hatred.

Especially young cops. Young cops make me very nervous--and it's a nervousness that comes from hard experience, not paranoid fantasy. There's a long story connected with this that I'll probably tell here at some point, although I don't have the time or inclination now; but I have been felony-stopped about a dozen times in my life--if you include not only being pulled over in a car but also being jumped at the DMV. (No, not because I broke the law, but because they were under the mistaken impression that I was an escaped felon. It was an SSN thing that these days they would call identity theft.) The treatment I got from the vast majority of the cops was thoroughly unprofessional (they didn't have video cameras, and neither did I) and thuggish. That treatment, combined with the fact that the government has decided that we are not to be allowed superior or even equivalent armament, protection, and training, ought to scare everyone. I get the feeling that most folks don't know anything about it, because most of the people who get treated that way are felons and nobody listens to their protestations.

Old cops are different: they still remember when the police worked for the people rather than for the government. I frequently have philosophical and political differences with old cops, but I'm not scared of them. I can sit with a couple of old cops and talk guns and politics over a cigar and a Diet Coke without figuring that one of these days my address is going to find its way onto a blank no-knock warrant, or my car is going to be snowflaked, or my daughter is going to be arrested and terrorized for no good reason (except to put me in my place and instill in her the proper respect for government authority). As a matter of fact, it was an old cop who, after felony-stopping me and discovering the mistake, who finally deigned to explain to me what was going on and why this was happening to me and how I might be able to go about mitigating the situation.

But the thing I'm most afraid of is that if the oppression and thuggishness and corruption continues to spread among cops, one of these days we'll be living in a world where it's considered a public service, if you happen to find a cop alone in a dark alley somewhere, simply to plug him as a matter of civic duty and walk away. I want nothing to do with that world (imagine what the cops would develop as standard operating procedure in such a place!), but I'm afraid it's coming.

Actually, there would be one important benefit of living in a corporation. Corporations have to make money to survive, and to make money they have to persuade people to part with it. They have to make their customers trust them to provide a quality product or service enough that they choose not to go to a competitor instead.

Government, on the other hand, has no competitor, and you pay for its products and services whether you want them or not. Your money is simply extorted from you at gunpoint in whatever amounts the government decides is appropriate, and spent in whatever ways the government finds useful.

You're absolutely right that we don't live in a democracy, but these days I think it'd turn out to be a little difficult to argue that we live in a republic either. When was the last time your elected official voted in your interest rather than in his own?

Mine too.

I can't tell if you're joking or not, amigo. If you're not, I gave my opinion in the second post on this thread.


Oh, rest assured that by the time the cops (or the armed forces acting as cops) are sent to confiscate the guns, they will be thoroughly illegal. And the people holding them will be felons. A few years ago I would have predicted that the media would be labeling us right-wing militia nuts, but now it looks more like we'll probably be called terrorists.

That's one of the problems with laws that prohibit the mere possession of something--rather than a real act that causes demonstrable harm to someone else. You can, through no act of your own, instantly become a felon without even knowing it.

So you see, assurances that these notional legions of 2A-supporting police will refuse any order to confiscate legally-owned weapons...well, they fall kinda flat. No offense intended.


Yup--we agree on the issue of old cops vs. young cops.

Thanks for the essay, red.

I think there are two important points that Mr. Pyle misses.

The first one is the same point that is missed by people who say, "Well, if you haven't got anything to hide, then why could you possibly object to being searched?"

The answer to that question is, "Because government, by its very nature, is corrupt." We can argue later, if you like, about why it's true that all governments more than two or three weeks old must be corrupt, but it ought to be obvious to all in attendance that the particular government under consideration in this instance is shot through with corruption.

Now consider the fact that policemen carry guns, have (or can get) government authorization to go wherever and do whatever they want, and unless they're congenitally stupid, can arrange for anyone who's not too high-profile or politically connected to be unjustly imprisoned or even killed.

Finally, let's look again at Mr. Pyle's assertion that many should not be judged by the actions of a few.

Strictly speaking, perhaps from a moral perspective, he's right. Simply because I've been abused by a number of cops in my life does not necessarily mean that I would be similarly abused by Deputy Norm or T LEE if they were given the opportunity.

However, from a practical standpoint, he's completely missing the boat. If you run into a bad plumber or electrician, you might get leaky pipes or an electric shock. If you run into a bad cop, you might get dead. (Also, if a bad plumber screws up your plumbing, a good plumber might be able to set it right. If a bad cop sets you up or shoots you, that's your chance: you're done. All the good cops in the world won't do you a lick of good.) Additionally, you get to choose which plumber or electrician you're going to try next; cops are involuntarily assigned to you by the government. So since you have so much less control over the selection, and the stakes are so much higher, some folks find it necessary--at least at first--to treat every cop as a bad cop, just in case he happens to be one.

I think the only way to get around this is to let the people themselves decide who is going to be walking among them with guns and grenades and the power of life and death. The best way, I think, would be a bunch of private law-enforcement companies which would compete with one another for a community's (or a neighborhood's, or a family's) business. But a less-effective way that would be much more workable in our current system would be to give the community a final veto over everybody in the police department. The government can hire whomever it likes, but if the community vetoes him, at any point in his career, he's instantly out of a job--no review, no appeal, no nothing. (If you allow any government review of the community's decision, then you have eliminated its veto power, and you're back to what we have now.)

The second point that Mr. Pyle misses, in my opinion, is related to his assertion that door-to-door confiscation will never happen.

I agree with him that every possible step to non-violently eliminate private firearms possession will be taken before that, and the items he lists are all very astute.

But the government will only get so many guns that way. Probably a lot of folks on this board pride themselves on being law-abiding citizens, and if their guns were outlawed and they were ordered to turn them in, their law-abiding citizenship would prompt them to toddle on down to their local precinct and surrender them. But there are some folks who just won't do that, even if it makes them felons not to, and who will teach their kids the same thing. (There are a lot of home-schoolers out there whose kids are almost free from government indoctrination; I know a number of them personally.) Maybe there aren't very many, but it doesn't take very many people with guns and a plan to knock over a National Guard armory and then lay siege to every police station and government office in a medium-sized city.

And we can't have that, because by the time things have gotten to the point where the sort of people I have in mind would do something like that, the general public would already be feeling a bit oppressed and downtrodden by the government. People would overwhelmingly support something like that, at least in secret, and before you know it several more cities would have fallen to "terrorists."

So they have to get those last few hard-core guns somehow, and the only way I can think of is door-to-door confiscation, preferably during the day when most people are at work and with lots of military support. They'd start with the folks who are known to have unsurrendered guns, but if they don't eventually do everybody, then sooner or later they'll have an organized, armed rebellion to deal with.

I'd predict that the confiscations are probably some distance into the future, at a point when time, propaganda, and technology has put the advantage firmly on the government's side. But I definitely think they're coming.

Maybe I missed something in your post. I was referring to the other post I made about going to hell.

And yep, you are right, the .gov will make them "illegal" before they send in the troops to get them. Take the moral high ground as it were, no matter how flawed , they will have the force of "law" behind them first. Just look north of us, and watch closly to what happens there. If it goes south for the gun owners, we are gonna suffer even more stringent attacks by the anti's for sure. In the "old days" we wern't concerned about the guns, just the person with it, different society all together. I sometime don't recognise my America anymore!

Believe it or not, I have been there done that with the mistaken ID thing, DOT officer typoed and punched in the wrong SSN when checking my license one time and detained me for back child support till the locals got to the scale house and ran my ID again. And no, they were not nice about it, very unproffessional. Then they were miffed again when they found I was a retired Peace Officer and hadn't mentioned it. My parting crack was "What difference does that make, there are dirtbags wearing badges also". That did not win any smiles for sure.

Ah. No, I missed something.

I thought your parable was incisive and insightful, as long as it's properly applied. Too many people are going to read that and think, "Yeah, you know, if that isn't just like a Democrat." But that's not your fault.

As a matter of fact, I made reference to it in one of my replies on this thread, but then decided that I was droning on for too long (imagine that!) and cut it out.

I was going to make a point about "smaller-government" Republicans. They don't really mean smaller government. They don't mean government that stays the same size. They don't even mean government that grows slower this year than it did last year. They mean government that grows slower than it was projected to this year. And that's only during the campaign. Then I was going to point at your parable.

In the 1920s, a wealthy Brit decided to go big-game hunting in Africa, and he took his beloved dog along with him. During the course of the hunt, the hunter and the dog became separated. Almost as soon as the dog realized that his master was nowhere to be seen, he saw a leopard sneaking up on him.

He was concerned, because he knew that even at his best he never would have been a match for a leopard, and these days his muzzle was turning grey and his joints were beginning to creak. But he saw a pile of sun-bleached bones lying nearby, so he flopped down and began gnawing at one of the bones, continuing to watch the leopard from the corner of his eye.

Just as the leopard was about to pounce, he dropped the bone, stretched luxuriously, and said to himself in a loud voice, "Mmm, that leopard made wonderful eating! But I'm still hungry: I wonder if there are any more about." Startled, the leopard made himself scarce as the dog began ostentatiously glancing around himself.

But a monkey in a nearby tree had seen the whole exchange, and saw an opportunity for himself. "That dog just tricked the leopard, and I'll bet the leopard would be grateful to know it--perhaps grateful enough to provide a little protection service to a poor monkey!" So the monkey ran off after the leopard as the dog began to look for his master.

But the dog had not even caught his master's scent when he glimpsed the leopard running angrily toward him, with the monkey riding on his back. Instantly, he understood what must have happened, so he put his head down and began pacing back and forth exasperatedly. When the leopard was within earshot, he said to himself in a loud, annoyed tone of voice, "Now where on earth is that confounded monkey? It must be half an hour now since I sent him off to bring me another leopard, and he's still not back!"

And the moral of that parable is...ah...um...well, it's funny...