For example, if you believe that the federal government has the duty to "protect the family" from anything other than armed foreigners I respectfully submit that your family just isn't worth saving. Something is eventually going to get them, and it's very likely going to be their own idiocy. Try as you might, there's just way to legislate against ignorance and superstition.
There's a cost-benefit ratio inherent in conservatism that most conservatives seem to have forgotten about, particularly where federal power is concerned. .
Here's how I feel. If I don't give a shit about something, I'm pretty sure that there's no reason for the government to give a shit. At best, such issues are best left to more local levels of government. Ideally, they should be left to the people.
There are already more than enough meaningless laws that are never enforced. I would argue that most of them are passed for no other reason than for stupid people to feel good about themselves. Look at the Unborn Victims of Violence Act of 2004. Murdering a woman is, contrary to popular opinion, not a federal crime in the United States. But four states out fifty didn't make killing the fetus of a pregnant woman a crime, so Congress stepped in. So far as I know, there has never been a case prosecuted under the UVVA, but it sure makes idiots feel good about themselves.
And that brings me to Bill O'Reilly. He'd never describe himself as a conservative (he prefers "traditional American"instead,) which is good because he's an idiot that wants a small federal government that does fantastically huge and stupidly intrusive things.
I'm sure that you've all heard about the Kansas City football player that killed his girlfriend and himself last weekend. It was tragic and sad, but more tragic still was the opportunity it gave idiots to be idiotic.
Bob Costas made a remarkably stupid argument. That's because football and baseball aren't "America's pastime;" killing one another is. Lots of countries, from Somalia to Switzerland, have an excess of guns. But no other country sees its citizens killing each other for no reason quite like the United States. Not only are they good at it, they enjoy it. Anyone who has watched MSNBC on the weekend knows that.
The available evidence suggests that Jovan Belcher really wanted himself and Kasandra Perkins dead. If he didn't have a gun, he probably would have used a knife or even a really big stick. One way or another, those folks were gonna get dead.
It's important to note that Costas works for NBC. That's because Bill O'Reilly might be the only living person left watching NBC. If anyone on NBC says anything at all, there's a better than even chance that O'Reilly will feature it on his insipid "Talking Points Memo."
And guess what Bill's topic has been this week!
Wow. So much stupid. Can barely breathe. It burns, I tell you! It burns!
Let's take this point by point, shall we?
Well, even if you believe what Costas and Whitlock are putting out there, what's the solution? The Constitution gives Americans the right to protect themselves, that's clear. In many parts of the country people need hand guns in order to feel secure against criminals who might harm them.Actually, the Constitution does no such thing. Here is the Second Amendment in full.
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.
Look at the language of the amendment. Nowhere in it is the right to "feel secure against criminals who might harm them." That's just not what the Constitution says.
If you read the Federalist Papers, there is only one thing (other than that the English monarchy eats ass) that the Founders agreed upon - that there should be no standing army. A standing army is an invitation to constant foreign war, which is something that the years from 1989 through, well, now, sort of prove.
But European conquest of the New World was still rather a fad in 1789. The Spanish had Mexico and Florida, and the British had Canada. The United States had to defend itself somehow, right? That's where "A well regulated Militia" comes in.
Militias weren't necessary to secure a free state from criminals back then, since there were already police. The Second Amendment was created to defend against foreign invasion without putting together a standing army.
That might sound to you like a wildly liberal reading of the Amendment, but it's what it actually says. If you don't read so good, I'll print it again.
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.
See? The language really isn't that complicated.
On the other hand, if gun ownership is a constitutional right, I can't see any language barring carrying by convicted felons, the mentally ill or near federal buildings and schools. That's not there, either. But there is no literal reading of the language that gives you the right to blow a hole in Treyvon Martin's chest. Just sayin'.
Look, I don't care if you have a gun or not. Accordingly, that's something I'd leave to the people, just as a matter of common sense. Shooting people is, more often than not, already a crime. But the idea that's it's an individual right, absent national defence, is an incredibly expansive and hardly literal reading of what the Second Amendment actually says.
O'Reilly continues bringing the stupid.
"Talking Points" has long felt that criminals who use handguns should be punished more harshly than they are now. In fact, all gun crimes in America should be federalized and that includes illegal possession. The level of aggression that a criminal brings is far greater when that criminal uses a gun. A lethal weapon is just that... lethal.
And so there should be mandatory federal prison time for any person convicted of having a gun illegally and if you commit a crime with a gun that mandatory should be 10 years.
I hate to be a know-it-all, but is there is a single state in the Union where "having a gun illegally" is anything other than, well, illegal? Logic would also instruct me to believe that committing a crime with a gun is already a crime.
Keep in mind, this is a "traditional, small government guy," who just happens to want expansive federal laws that infringe on state jurisdiction.
And the past 10 years there has been an increase in the number of handguns in America. There may be 100 million of them in circulation right now. But there has been a decrease in handgun crime. 10 years ago there are about 7,000 handgun murders. Last year the number was about 6,000 it is quite understandable that people are reacting emotionally to this terrible crime in Kansas City.You know how Bill O'Reilly's right? Because federal drug laws have worked so swimmingly! Notice how no one is getting high anymore?
But the problem America has is not law abiding citizens possessing weapons. That's not damaging the nation. Crimes committed with handguns and out-of-control people -- that's what's hurting the USA. You'll never stop crimes of madness, you're never going to stop them like the Kansas City situation.
But you can put violent criminals away for a long time if they use a gun during the commission of a crime. And that should be done.
If you want to point to a decrease in American handgun deaths in the last decade, have I got a statistic for you!
About the same number of Americans were killed by other Americans with handguns in the United States in the last twelve months than were killed in Afghanistan and Iraq in the last ten years.
In that spirit, here cometh the Great Battle of the Morons.
Oh God, it burns. It burns so bad!
"BEARS AND INDIANS!"
Nothing beats the Aurora "Dark Knight Rises" argument, though. That is classical stupidity of the sort that I'm sure will one day be taught in classrooms.
So let's say you're in a really dark room that's suddenly filled with tear gas and gun fire. Do you really think that shooting wildly and blindly into the darkness is going to end well? Really? Because pretty much anyone who knows anything about guns will tell you not to shoot at something you can't see, especially with at least hundred people around you.
Here's what I've learned. The problem isn't with people having guns, it's with idiots having guns.
Unfortunately, almost everybody is an idiot.
And that's why I watch the O'Reilly Factor. So you don't have to.
0 comments:
Post a Comment