🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1cq5voINNefo@iskut.ucs.ubc.ca> unruh@physics.ubc.ca (William Unruh) writes:
}palmer@icat.larc.nasa.gov (Michael T. Palmer) writes:
}
}>Well, don't worry.  We silly Americans tend to see the role of government
}>much differently from people in other countries.  If you really, honestly,
}>believe that it is the government's responsibility to protect your family
}>at all times and under all circumstances, then you are doomed to suffer the
}>fate that inevitably follows giving a government the power that must
}>accompany that kind of responsibility.
}
}Come on, learn to read. Where did I say "government's responsibility to
}protect your family at all times and under all circumstances

You won't get off the hook by minimizing your support of the fascism you call
"regulation for the common good".  BTW, that's literal fascism, as in what
was practiced by Mussolini and Hitler, not just a trite epithet.  Individual
Liberty IS the common good.

}>By the way, the whole idea of having an armed citizenry is that the guns
}>should never NEED to be used... the fact that people have them and are
}>willing to use them to protect their liberty is enough.
}
}Unfortunately you guys do use them all the time it seems. And you will
}eventually get yourselves a dictator elected to protecrt you from your
}indiscriminate use of them in the cause of liberty.

Shall we call this ignorance or bigotry?  Assuming the former, allow me to
inform you that we know why there's so much firearms violence here, it's
because of the black market drug price support program (a.k.a. "War on Drugs"),
the income tax, inflation, the abhominable public schools, and the very same
regulations you meekly find not one fault with.

}>Well, about 200 years ago most of the people (to the south of you) all said
}>those exact words, and they didn't quite all die.  It seems they even built
}
}It's interesting that when we look at Britian and the USA today, most of
}the world has a hard time deciding which has more liberty. So all of
}those people sacrificed in the revolution- did they die in vain?

No, but they'd be justifiably horrified (but perhaps not surprised) at the
meek acceptance of tyranny by most.

}>And what are you going to do when the government decides that it doesn't
}>want to throw out the current "experiment?"  If you have already given
} 
} Who elects that government? HJow will this dictatorship you fear come
} into being? Of course it can happen and when it does it will with the
} agreement of the vast majority of the population, all of whom have guns
} to make sure you too fall into line.

All it takes is for the majority to vote away their rights in exchange for
"privileges" which centralize power, which will then be exercised upon them
in turn.

It's far easier for tyranny to establish itself if its victims are unarmed
than if they aren't.  Switzerland has machine guns in most homes, and is
quite free and stable.  History is filled with cases where minorities could
have defended themselves if only they'd had firearms, and, to bring this
back to the point, freedom of communication has proved itself a necessary
condition for the defeat of tyranny.


Tim Starr - Renaissance Now! - Think Universally, Act Selfishly
starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu

"True greatness consists in the use of a powerful understanding to enlighten
oneself and others." - Voltaire