I see you specialize in ad hominem attacks. I won't respond to you again as I will not be seeing your posts.
You probably cannot, and it has nothing to do with firearms. Las Vegas was a true anomaly for the typical "mass killer". That shooter did not fit the profile for a mass killer. Unlike all other mass killers, after his violent act people did not step forward saying "I knew it, he was violent, no surprise". He was financially secure, retired, older, mature, he gave no sign of his intent, he had no mental health issues, his friends and family were completely surprised by his actions. He does not fall into the criminal mass killer category. He falls into the true terrorist category - he planned in secret, no bravado, prepared well, collected the resources he needed (not just guns, but construction material to build his shooting platforms), implemented his plan carefully, worked alone. It was not a spur of the moment act. He is more like a 1970's terrorist in the USA or Europe, or an insurgent in Iraq, or more recently a McVeigh in the USA. You cannot prevent a determined intelligent person willing to work carefully and secretly and alone from committing such an act. Take away the guns, and such a person will use explosives (such as McVeigh or obama's buddies in the Weather Underground in the 1970's), or poison, or even a knife. Yes, a knife. Knives kill more in the USA than all mass killers with guns - serial killers use knives and blunt objects and their hands, and kill for years, sometimes over decades, its estimated that serial killers kill between 800 and 1800 a year in the USA.
The term "IED" is new, but IED's are not knew, they were not invented in Iraq. They are really mines, booby traps. They are placed deliberately. For AQ and ISIS and Iran, they want chaos, they want to make life difficult and to burden the coalition forces, so one of the targets for IED's is the civilian population. Another target are civilians friendly to US troops so they use IEDs to teach a lesson (be friends with the US and you get blown up). A big target is US forces, and AQ/etc monitor US movement and activity and place IEDs accordingly. Remember, AQ/ISIS isn't interested in winning hearts and minds and letting people live their own lives, that's Western thinking. AQ/ISIS wants religious converts or dead bodies, that's the2 options they give people. Their philosophy is either join them or die. Speculating about a civil war in the US, IED's would be a huge factor. Bigger than in Iraq or Afghanistan. The US population is better educated, has more resources to create sophisticated IED's, and don't forget all the people in the USA who were in the military and have had a "graduate course" on IED's and their use and construction (as well as the tactics of insurgency). Civil war is always nasty, its a shithole whether its in a third world muslim country or the USA.
You think they are correct to bust them, but I disagreed. It's not the government's place to dictate morality nor tell people how to live, think or believe. It's the government's place to resolved disputes where the rights of individuals conflict such as someone dumping poison in a stream not to tell them they can't smoke pot or own a gun.
Correct. I'm well acquainted with guerrilla warfare tactics. Amazing what a person can do with a knife, bamboo and a little bit of rope or human waste. Or a piece of wire, a grenade and a C-ration can.
As far as weapons for defense vs. assault, Columbine was carried out with two 30 year old shotguns and semi-auto pistols that held about 10 rounds. The gun grabbers that want to outlaw "assault weapons" like ARs will quickly move on to outlawing most shotguns, rifles and handguns given the chance. The 2nd Amendment wasn't for personal defense anyway. Back then there were virtually NO policemen especially in the colonies so the need to protect oneself was a given not worth mentioning. The purpose of it was to have a well armed citizen militia to prevent against government abuse, and that means citizens should be able to carry weapons that are similar/comparable to what soldiers carry.
No. No I would not. But then, I don't expect to ever be put in that position as I never expect the tyranny of the nation to ever get that far.
Modern era governments should never give people any incentive to improvise weapons. That would be stupid.
Under the board rules, describing a statement as a lie is to call the person making the statement a liar. Thus, describing a statement as stupid (el al) is to describe the person posting it as stupid. In doing so you violate rule 2 and rule 3.
noun paranoia 1. Psychiatry. a mental disorder characterized by systematized delusions and the projection of personal conflicts, which are ascribed to the supposed hostility of others, sometimes progressing to disturbances of consciousness and aggressive acts believed to be performed in self-defense or as a mission. 2.baseless or excessive suspicion of the motives of others. Dictionary.com So, just be happy. "… from 1900 to 1987 governments MURDERED almost *170* MILLION people ... far exceeds the 34.4 million battle deaths ... from all...wars fought during the same period.... democratic governments were responsible for only about one percent of the twentieth century's death toll from democide...." The Atlantic Monthly, "The World In Numbers," "Murder By The State," Vol. 292 NO. #4, 11/20. (emphasis mine) The Atlantic's source: "Rummels books on the subject - particularly "Death By Government" (1994) and "Statistics of Democide" (1997).
She may have gotten used to forums that only ban direct personal attacks. Of course, ad hominem argument is not limited to personal attacks.
Each forum has different rules. On this one is it allowed to claim a message is a "lie" (though "inaccurate" or "false" usually would be correct). Call words a lie is a bit different from calling a person a liar as the person my belief a message for which the contents are false. Thus, the message is a lie - ie false, but the poster not a liar. Context and intention probably matters to forum staff in evaluating a critical message.
Its probably against the rules to do do, but I can copy/paste an infraction notice form the mods who clearly state that describing a post as lie violates the forum rules because it transfers to the person. Fought it out on the moderators forum as well.
Ad hominem is not logical argument, but if you exclude it entirely you risk chilling the debate. Direct personal attacks should clearly be discouraged. I am glad I am not a moderator. ad hominem [ad hom-uh-nuh m -nem, ahd‐] Spell Syllables • Examples • Word Origin See more synonyms on Thesaurus.com adjective 1. appealing to one's prejudices, emotions, or special interests rather than to one's intellect or reason. 2. attacking an opponent's character rather than answering his argument. http://www.dictionary.com/browse/ad-hominem
I realize that I'm not a part of this conversation within the thread, but I just have to spew my .02 cents worth, so excuse me: First, I don't think that discussion boards are debate forums. I went up against the board troll who really thinks he is in a debate and pointed out to him that, according to the rules, I was to have the last say. Oh, he'd have none of that and forfeited any debate he was in. Debates have rules. Second point: Much ado is made over the term ad hominem. I don't see how it applies in discussions of legal / political issues. Our system of jurisprudence is such that we have to use analogous situations in order to explain a principle. That is not necessarily an ad hominem attack. It's simply a way of rephrasing a principle into an analogous situation to make the points easier to understand. For example, anti - gunners don't understand that we do not ban cars nor booze because people die in DUI accidents AND you cannot ban guns for the same reason (in principle.) Learned that one once when the city of Atlanta tried to ban so - called "assault weapons" once. The city argued that anti-smoking ordinances gave the city the right to outlaw so - called "assault weapons" because the anti smoking ordinance was passed in the interest of public health and they were outlawing so - called "assault weapons" on the same principle. The ONLY thing that saved the pro-gun side is that the state stepped in and said state law preempts local ordinances. Therefore, city ordinances had to comply with the state laws. I've made that analogy without citing that law many times and been accused of ad hominem attacks. So, I don't think most people understand what it really means nor when it applies.
You have frequently made personal attacks when you get frustrated here so I don't think you can claim to be someone following the rules
There will be no civil war in the USA, not in any our lifetimes. Opposing "tryanny" is more on a localized, group or individual level. Were there a civil war, the military and police forces would not universally side with the government anyway. The only way there would be some national crisis on a grade scale would be other events creating a social crisis or dystopian situation. Yellowstone massively blows, genocidal scale pandemic, limited nuclear attack but not so great humans can not survive - leading to total breakdown of law while government becoming totally authoritarian, mass starvation and illness. Yet even in that event, I would not figure I'd be mowing down mobs of desperate starving people trying to get to our food with us firing belt fed Browning 1919 .308s - nor fighting of a renegade Army unit or National Guard unit rounding up people for refuge camps. Simply, I can not think of any situation where I would need firepower capable of slinging out large numbers of bullets. While I do have survivalist plans even in worst case scenarios none are focused on maximum firepower. We have plenty of fire power even if the horrific Democrat bill became law and I complied. Rather, the focus is on the hierarchy of life needs and initially hunkering down (quietly) and if that failed then to flee to a pre-decided sequence of safe/secure locations under the concept of hiding. This area has an abundance of food, particularly in the Gulf. Fishing gear and archery equipment would be more valuable than firearms, though would have those. Even for firearms, a subsonic 22LR rifle would be more usable than a .308 or 5.56. The ONLY scenario in which I would even consider firing on government forces would be if those forces were determined to kill us or put us into some holocaust camp. But there will no Civil War in the ordinary sense of tyranny, because neither our military personnel nor law enforcement would go along with it. However, their could be some other crisis that causes a total social breakdown in law and order and at a mass starvation, mob rule level - which the government would likely address with iron fist responses. In that situation, in my opinion the best decision to figure how to out of the way of all of it.
