🚀 go-pugleaf

Merlin Dorfman wrote:

> DPH (rally2xs@csi.com) wrote:
>
> : George Worley wrote:
>
> : Did you notice during Ollie North's testimony during Iran Contra that he related how
> : he was asked to formulate a plan to declare martial law, collect up all the guns,
> : and take over the government?  He said his report stated that it couldn't be done
> : because of the large number of privately owned firearms.
>
>      Is this for real???  I don't believe much that Ollie North says,
> but are you saying that Ronnie Reagan asked Ollie to work up a plan
> for martial law??

Somebody asked him.  I heard him say it on TV.  Ronnie was Prez, so...

> : More recently, Bill reportedly asked the Pentagon how he could forceably remove all
> : guns from private ownership.  The Pentagon gave it to the War College to work, they
> : researched it, and essentially said, "Such an illegal order would be refused by the
> : USMC as well as the elite units and the reserves and National Guard.  There are only
> : 440,000 men in uniform in at the moment, and if this were tried, 2.5 million
> : civilian combat veterans would defeat the US Army in 6 weeks."
>
>      It will be a cold day in Houston before I believe that any US
> president, Liberal, Conservative, Democratic, Republican, whatever,
> asked the Pentagon or anybody about forcibly (and obviously illegaly)
> removing guns from private citizens.  I believe this to be so much
> right-wing fantasy.

I believe it.  It is the great desire of all governments to increase their power.
Throughout history, there has always been those who believe that they could, if only they
had absolute power, do sooooooooo much good...

>      If for some reason the armed forces did get into a  war with
> armed civilians, the armed forces would win easily and the destruction
> of life and property in the country would be enormous.

Just how would they do that?  Can they rationally order a napalm attack on a suburban
housing development?  If they did, what how many pilots would carry it out?  How many
would refuse orders?

The major advantages our military has tend to disappear when there are no "fronts" and the
exact location of the enemy is difficult to determine.  With the army's support, which
normally comes from a loyal American populace, is made subject to sabotage and other
failures (is the driver of that 18 wheeler really going to deliver those mortar shells
after a mortar attack of his city killed his grandma last week?) how far is the army going
to get?  6 weeks might be optimistic for them.


> : > >They do fear a public that is highly armed and willing to shoot to maintain
> : > >their God Given, Constitutionally Recognized Rights.
> : >
> : > Here we go with the GOD GIVEN RIGHTS... The rights of the US
> : > Constitution are not GOD GIVEN, the are only given by the people of
> : > the land that hold this document dear to their hearts
>
> : The Constituttion doesn't GIVE rights.  It merely affirms pre-existing rights of
> : man.  If the Constitution didn't affirm them, people would still have their rights,
> : only they would be abridged by the government.  The rights exist independent of
> : governement.
>
>      So only the United States recognizes the God-given rights of Man?

No, not necessarily.  At least Switzerland and Isreal recognize the right of self defense
and allow their citizens to be armed.  Whether you call them God-given or natural rights,
they are the basic rights we all have.  The right to life includes the means to protect
that life, and at the moment the best means of doing that is by having and knowing how to
use a firearm.

> Countries that deviate to any extent from our Constitution are abridging
> God-given rights?

Well, our Constitution says something about not quartering troops in people's homes.  I'm
not sure thats a natural right.  Or the one about freedom from self-incrimination.  Is
that a natural right?  I don't know.  But the right to self-defense is a natural right,
and any government that abridges that one is indeed abridging a natural, or "God given"
right.

>  We are right and everybody else is wrong, to the
> extent that they don't agree with us?  What arrogance!
>
> : > The statics for this would amaze you... more people get killed with
> : > their own weapon then prevent the crime the first place.
>
> : That is a gun-phobes often repeated nonsense.  It is completely untrue.
>
>      It is completely true.  The only point of argument about this
> statistic is that it includes suicides among those who are killed
> with their own weapons.  Some feel this aspect should not be in the
> statistic; I feel suicide prevention is as good an argument for gun
> control as any of the others.

Your premise is faulty because it is possible to commit suicide without a gun.  If not
having a gun would prevent the suicide, I'd say you could include that.  If there is a
correlation between having a gun and an increase in suicides, I would disagree that the
gun is "causing" the suicide.  It may just mean that those prone to suicide are more apt
to have a gun.  But suicide is just too easy without a gun.  Japan has virtually no guns
in their society, and their suicide rate is much higher than that in the USA.

DPH