🚀 go-pugleaf

On Tue, 16 May 2000 16:01:46 GMT, big_toe_1@my-deja.com wrote:

IG:
==>> The issue of self-defence is hardly relevant here.  The fact is that
==>> it's stupid beyond belief -- suicidal, in fact

==>It quite probably is.   However it is relevant in the context that
==>people do have the right to self defense.   No one said that an act of
==>self defence had to be necesarily sane.

Actually, it does.  An act of "self-defence" that leads to your demise
isn't self-defence at all.  Self-destruction in defiance of something
or someone you don't like, or as a matter of principle, may be noble
and romantic, but it's not self-defence.

==>That very fact alone should
==>have been the government's greatest clue that a full frontal assault
==>was probably not the best approach against a compound of people with
==>assault weapons, led by a fanatic, self appointed, minister.

It was not the BATF's finest moment.  No argument here.

IG:
==>-- to engage a heavily
==>> armed force of government gunmen in a firefight.  You may have right
==>> on your side; you may the law on your side; you may have God on your
==>> side, but the fact is that if you shoot it out with government troops
==>> you're almost certain to end up dead.

==>There are those that are willing to die for right, law, and God.

Dying for right is admirable, dying for the law is shortsighted and
dying for "God" is stupid.

==>People that feel that they
==>are being threatened will eventually fight back, no matter what the
==>odds of their survival.

Yes, but it is the nature and credibility of the threat that
determines whether the response is sane or not.  If I decide to battle
a snarling housebreaker who demands to know where my daughter's
bedroom is, I suspect most people would consider that a reasonable
response, even if he is wielding an Uzi and I am barehanded.  If,
however, I start shooting at cops because I'm convinced they're in
cahoots with whoever is in those unmarked black helicopters that are
preparing the way for a UN takeover of my country, that's just plain 
nuts, even if I genuinely feel myself threatened, and can hardly be
dignified by the term "self-defence."

IG:
==>> Faced with that kind of situation, anyone who's not certifiably insane
==>> will surrender peacefully and let the lawyers argue it out later.

==>You're assuming a level of sanity that probably was not present.  There
==>is no denying that.   However, last I checked, even the insane have a
==>right to due process.

True.  If my understanding is correct, however, the BATF raid was
backed by a warrant, which made it legal, if ill-advised. It's the
courts that are supposed to provide due process -- not Smith & Wesson.

==> And WACO did not have to end that way.

No argument here, either.  I've never understood why the FBI didn't
simply wait the Waco wackos out.  Their food was going to run out
sooner or later and, as crazy as they were, I doubt if they were
prepared to engage in cannibalism.

IG:
==>> Martyrdom may be romantic, but it's so damned permanent.

==>Yet, there will always be martyrs.

Yes, as long as people delude themselves into thinking that dying
stupidly confers any post-death benefits.


  
- Ivan Gowch <gowch@hotmail.com>