I don't know whether or not that's a "right" but you do have the ability to do so on cable and pay channels. I tend to think you should also be able to do so on network television (there are worse things my children will be exposed to than the occasional f-bomb) as well. It's worth noting that this is only illegal because of an expansion of Governmental power (the creation of the FCC)
the right to show off your tits without being labelled a sex offender
You actually can do this in most of the United States so I'm baffled as to why you are raising it as an issue. Here in New York State it's legal for females to go topless anywhere it's legal for males to do the same.
the right to not having to "think of the children"
Now you are just rambling. Politicians from all representative states use "think of the children" or similar punchlines. It's not a uniquely American thing to do.
the right to not be executed
That's not a right. You have the right to due process before the state deprives you of life, liberty or property. You don't have the "right" not to be punished for crimes committed.
the right to share a joint with your friend or how about the right not to be a 3rd rate citizen
I'm in favor of drug legalization. Drugs were legal until somebody came up with the bright idea of using them as an excuse to expand the power of the Federal Government. Do tell me why an even further expansion of Government would result in legalization? International Law is filled with treaties and agreements designed to enforce drug prohibition. Why would a World Government behave any differently?
how about the right not to be a 3rd rate citizen just because you've been in jail (i.e. the right to vote)?
Again, you don't have that right. You just have the right to be accorded due process of law before being deprived of liberty. Ex-cons also can't (legally) own firearms in the US. Does that bother you as well? If not then why is it acceptable to deprive them of one liberty after they've served their time but not another?
If people had viewed it in context of actual threats to their safety (i.e. you aren't going to die in an airplane flying into the WTC) then the airlines wouldn't have imploded.
The airlines imploded because they were grounded for three days. It had nothing to do with the fear that took root in the country after the 9/11 attacks. It was a direct result of the 9/11 attacks.
Then there's the billions of dollars of damage down to lower Manhattan, loss of tax revenues for NYC, increased spending that was required on security, etc, etc.
What about my right to live in a country with far less firearm murders because there are far less firearms?
Then do something about the root causes of crime. Ending inner-city poverty would be much more effective at reducing gun violence than any gun-ban legislation. Guns don't cause crime -- you can find countries with high levels of gun ownership and low crime (Switzerland, Finland, France) and countries with low levels of gun ownership and high crime (Russia, Poland, Ukraine).
Stop going after the symptom of the disease and do something about the cause. Most people do not wake up one morning and decide to become murderers. They fall into a life of crime for want of better alternatives and it eventually spirals out of control. There are a few genuine psychopaths out there but that's what the prisons are for.
It's really interesting when you look at gun ownership statistics isn't it? The argument that guns cause crime is dispelled when you consider the example of Finland or Switzerland. The argument that gun control prevents crime is dispelled when you consider the example of Russia or Poland.
You can even find the same trend within individual nations. Vermont has no gun control laws of any kind (anyone can buy a carry and carry it openly or concealed with no license or permit) and has one of the lowest crime rates in the United States. Chicago has the strictest gun laws and a comparatively high crime rate.
I've often used these numbers to suggest to gun control advocates that there are other causes of crime that need to be addressed (poverty?) but they rarely want to hear it. They have convinced themselves that guns are bad and will ignore all evidence to the contrary. It's amusing too because gun control in the United States is primarily pushed by Liberals who would normally be in favor of addressing poverty and despair. On this particular issue though they want to go after the symptom of the disease rather than the cause. Rather foolish of them isn't it?
By that regard I should be able to have an automatic weapon. (Banned in the US).
I don't see any reason why law abiding citizens shouldn't be allowed to own automatic weapons. They were able to do so until 1986 when some jackass liberal Senator attached a ban to the Gun Owners Protection Act. The dipshit even attached his amendment to the bill late at night when there was nobody around who would have voted against it.
I should be able to rig land mines in my yard. (Banned in the US).
I would take issue with this because land mines are indiscriminate. My gun isn't a threat to the mailman walking up to my door to deliver a package, now is it?
I should be able to use armor piercing ammunition.
Why not? Armor piercing ammunition in the hands of a law-abiding citizen is no threat to anyone.
I should be able to employ hand grenades.
The same bit about being incriminate certainly applies to hand grenades.
Is it a human right? No I don't think so. That doesn't mean it should or should not be a right for citizens but it's not a human right to own any weapon which helps defend one's self.
Yes, it is. It's a human right not be to rendered defenseless against aggression and tyranny. History is filled with examples of disarmed populations being slaughtered by genocidal nutjobs. An armed population is a free population that has a measure of control over it's destiny. A disarmed population is at the mercy of those in power and neighboring populations that haven't disarmed.
I'm not even really sold on the original cause for the second amendment (to defend against government tyranny).
I don't really care whether you are "sold" on it or not.
So I assume I could acquire one when joining the resistance.
What good does that do you if you are killed by a roaming death squad (see Rwanda for a recent example) before the resistance gets off the ground? Those death squads were primarily armed with AK-47s. Think their victims might have fared better if they had also had AKs?
I'll still be HEAVILY out gunned. The day I'm fighting the US military I pray to god that I'm not still depending on the weapons currently available to me.
The Redcoats also heavily outgunned the Colonists and even beat them on the battlefield more often than not. Freedom isn't free as the saying goes. I would also say that the US really shouldn't have much of a standing army at all. No standing army == no threat to liberty.
If I need to overthrow the US government they'll probably have horse fly sized search and destroy drones which kill anyone holding a gun.
Somebody has been watching too many science fiction movies. If we had that kind of technology then why aren't we using it against the savages giving us so much trouble over in Afghanistan?
Even now the best weapon in an insurgency or revolution is C4.
Well if things ever get so bad as to require a revolution then I guess we'll have to obtain some C4. But that's all a moot point if the population is completely at the mercy of jackasses with AKs, isn't it?
Now should it be a fundamental human right that you may use appropriate force to defend life and property? Sure.
You don't think firearms represent appropriate force when your life is seconds away from ending?
If you lived in a country with gun control laws, then your attacker is probably not going to be carrying one.
Which explains why no criminals in New York City, Chicago or Mexico can obtain access to firearms.
He'll probably just threaten you with a pocket knife or something.
And that's better? The last time I checked knives are just as deadly as a firearm. I'd rather face someone with a firearm than a knife -- it's easier to take a firearm away from someone.
can you cross the road on a red man without being beaten up by the police?
Yes, I jaywalk all the time without being beaten up by the police. WTF are you trying to say here?
your attacker is going to be carrying a gun, and is going to have it drawn before you can reach yours. Good luck not getting shot.
This is the problem with flower children. You've convinced yourself that it's pointless to stand up if confronted with violence, thus ensuring a profitable market segment exists for those willing to use it to obtain the objects of their desire. Perhaps if more people were willing to stand up to violence it would be less prevalent in our society.
Perhaps someone will get the drop on me. I doubt it because I have good situational awareness and pay attention to my surroundings but you can never say never. What I do know is that many of my fellow countryman have used firearms (usually without even firing a shot) to halt acts of aggression directed at them. I hope that I never find myself in such a situation but if I do I'm going to confront violence with violence and do whatever is necessary to ensure that I'm not the one leaving the scene on a gurney.
Normally i'm against regulation and would say "let the market decide" but there are some areas that only have one provider with no competition
And why is that? It couldn't have anything to do with government franchises that grant a single company an exclusive right to do business in a particular area, could it?
We could avoid this all together if we had competition for broadband providers.
Normally I'd agree with you but I seem to recall that a lot of the discussion about network neutrality got started when some AT&T chairman started complaining about Google using their pipes for "free". If the Tier 1 providers intend on charging at both ends then does it really matter how many last mile providers service your neighborhood?
I would like to see more competition in the broadband market though. It would lower prices and stop Comcast and Time Warner from trying to protect their video services by degrading their internet product.
I say this because the poster appears to claim that the Republicans weren't really conservative.
They aren't. What's Conservative about a massive expansion of an already bankrupt entitlement program? What's Conservative about an expanded role for the Federal Government in education? What's Conservative about responding to an attack on our country by telling people to go shopping?
You can call the GOP of the last eight years many things but Conservative is not one of them.
While I'm not saying the parent does this, but acting like hooligans nonviolent or otherwise in order to obstruct the government helps no one, not even themselves.
How was he trying to obstruct the government and what's wrong with doing so?
This would make me feel more secure in my online bank transactions.
Or you could just secure your computer and put the tin-foil hat away. Just an idea. I've been using online banking in one form or another for 12 years from my regular old PC and I've yet to encounter a problem. Of course I don't generally agree to install the "ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE UPDATE ACTIVEX APPLICATION V 6.5.19.1.61" that pops up while I'm surfing for porn or warez;)
Falklands and Northern Ireland come to mind as recent history showing the UK to not be an entirely peaceful nation.
Yeah, how dare the Brits go to war when another country invades and occupies lands filled with people who were quite content being under the British Crown and utterly opposed to coming under the sovereignty of the invading power. Damn Limey aggression knows no bounds does it?
Northern Ireland is a mess and I don't know enough about the history thereof to form an opinion on whether or not the British actions are justified but to imply that the Falklands War represented some sort of British aggression is absurd.
As I've said in another post, guns are mostly useless in a real warfare
That must explain why the Army is so opposed to equipping it's troops with firearms.
They are also mostly useless at preventing crime
Then explain to me why the UK has a much higher incidence of "hot" burglaries (burglary committed when the homeowner is present) than the US does? Go talk to an American criminal and ask them what they fear the most. The #1 answer is "being shot by our victims" Also, what does "preventing" crime have to do with my point? My point was that people should be able to defend themselves. If you get to the point of needing to defend yourself then it's rather obvious that crime prevention has failed for you.
good police departments help much better.
I love the police but they can't get to me in time to save my life when the shit hits the fan. 911: When seconds count, help is minutes away.
Do you remember stories about 80-year-old grandma shooting robbers with her Magnum?
It happens all the time here in the states. The mainstream media chooses not to give most civilian self-defense stories the same coverage as they do to criminal uses of firearms. Go read any one of the numerous armed citizen publications put out by the NRA.
Population of France and the USSR were also armed at that point.
Actually Stalin had largely disarmed the population of the USSR several years before the war. And the French are a poor example because everybody knows that the only action French rifles see is being dropped on the ground;)
Not so with gun control.
Millions of disarmed and defenseless victims of crime and genocide would dispute your notion that gun rights aren't as necessary as free speech. Your guarantee of free speech means nothing if the government can take it away from you with the whisk of a pen.
personal training tasers, and chemical sprays are for personal defense.
Tasers only give you one shot and are rendered useless if you miss or get attacked by more than one person. They are also illegal in many US jurisdictions. Chemical sprays are useless if your assailant is upwind. Both are of questionable value if you run across someone hopped up on drugs.
Because handguns are the main point of difference between European and USA laws. It's legal to own semiautomatic "hunting rifles" in Europe, so it's a non-issue.
Where did I say I was making the comparison between Europe and the US? I don't even recall using the word "Europe". It's amazing how you can read so many things into my posts that aren't there. Can you teach me this skill?
If you need a gun to go to a grocery store, than you have BIG problems.
You don't need a gun until you run into a thug intent on using violence against you. Since I can't choose when or where that will happen I choose to carry a firearm wherever it is legal to do so. I'm sorry if that offends your evolved sensibilities, but thankfully I still have my freedoms in my country.
Nope. I'm talking about how USELESS are handguns in a REAL warfare or civil war. And I'd lived quite close (less than 100km at one point, we've heard explosions in our home) to one.
So now you are making more assumptions about what I wrote, unsupported by the actual text of my comments? Please point out the post of mine in this thread where I used the word "handgun".
I'd like to see you going out with your handgun against a gang of AK-74-wielding thugs. And don't think that they'll run if you shoot one of them.
I don't have to use my handgun. I've got a Mini-14 and M-1 Garand for that scenario. The handgun is primarily useful against thugs of the more mundane (criminal) variety and as a last resort in a pitched battle. The only advantage to the handgun is that it's easy to carry around with you. Rather hard to conceal the AK for the trip to the grocery store.
Join army/militia - you'll be armed there at no cost with _real_ weapons, not toys.
As an American male between the age of 17 and 45 I'm already a member of the militia:)
I recommend that you read the newspapers in Europe immediately prior to both the first & the second world wars
It's not limited to Europe either. Guess who Japan's biggest trading partner was on 6 December 1941?
If the specter of nuclear holocaust is taken off the table for any of a number of plausible reasons
That's the bit that kills me about Obama wanting total nuclear disarmament. For better or worse nuclear weapons are the main reason that humanity hasn't fought World War III. What happens when you take them off the table? You don't even need to get rid of them all either. You just need people to assume they won't be used. There's precedent for this too -- chemical weapons weren't used in WW2 despite being readily available to both sides.
I sleep very well at night knowing that my nation can unleash nuclear fire on anyone stupid enough to try and attack us. Nuclear weapons keep the peace. Getting rid of them is extremely shortsighted.
China is the next superpower, unless they screw up something bad time
History suggests they might just do that. This isn't the first time that China has opened her borders to trade and investment. Every time she does so the coastal regions get rich while the rural interior rots on the vine. Eventually the country collapses and turns back inward for a few generations.
Among the most worrying signals is that research papers I read from the US are most often authored by people with foreign names; not just surnames, but first names as well, indicating they are likely immigrants
Why is that a worrying signal? The fact that the US can still attract immigrants intelligent enough to write research papers would seem to be an asset, not a liability. People want to come here. That's an advantage that we've had since the beginning of the Republic and something that China isn't likely to have for the foreseeable future if ever. Monolithic societies dominated by a single ethic group/culture/language don't have much appeal for someone looking to find a new home.
you USians are probably not used to the world expecting you to speak a language other than English.
It's American, not USian.
Victims of 9/11: 40,000/y [dot.gov]
That's a stupid comparison. You assume that the only impact of the 9/11 attacks were the fatalities. How many traffic accidents result in billions of dollars of economic damage, the invocation of article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty and the collapse of a major industry?
Slashdot Mirror
@&%*@... &*(&%(*... NO CARRIER
Fixed that for you :)
Actually I would think that file sharing is the biggest part of the traffic, followed by porn.
What do you think a large slice of file sharing consists of?
Like the right to say "bad" words on TV and radio
I don't know whether or not that's a "right" but you do have the ability to do so on cable and pay channels. I tend to think you should also be able to do so on network television (there are worse things my children will be exposed to than the occasional f-bomb) as well. It's worth noting that this is only illegal because of an expansion of Governmental power (the creation of the FCC)
the right to show off your tits without being labelled a sex offender
You actually can do this in most of the United States so I'm baffled as to why you are raising it as an issue. Here in New York State it's legal for females to go topless anywhere it's legal for males to do the same.
the right to not having to "think of the children"
Now you are just rambling. Politicians from all representative states use "think of the children" or similar punchlines. It's not a uniquely American thing to do.
the right to not be executed
That's not a right. You have the right to due process before the state deprives you of life, liberty or property. You don't have the "right" not to be punished for crimes committed.
the right to share a joint with your friend or how about the right not to be a 3rd rate citizen
I'm in favor of drug legalization. Drugs were legal until somebody came up with the bright idea of using them as an excuse to expand the power of the Federal Government. Do tell me why an even further expansion of Government would result in legalization? International Law is filled with treaties and agreements designed to enforce drug prohibition. Why would a World Government behave any differently?
how about the right not to be a 3rd rate citizen just because you've been in jail (i.e. the right to vote)?
Again, you don't have that right. You just have the right to be accorded due process of law before being deprived of liberty. Ex-cons also can't (legally) own firearms in the US. Does that bother you as well? If not then why is it acceptable to deprive them of one liberty after they've served their time but not another?
If people had viewed it in context of actual threats to their safety (i.e. you aren't going to die in an airplane flying into the WTC) then the airlines wouldn't have imploded.
The airlines imploded because they were grounded for three days. It had nothing to do with the fear that took root in the country after the 9/11 attacks. It was a direct result of the 9/11 attacks.
Then there's the billions of dollars of damage down to lower Manhattan, loss of tax revenues for NYC, increased spending that was required on security, etc, etc.
What about my right to live in a country with far less firearm murders because there are far less firearms?
Then do something about the root causes of crime. Ending inner-city poverty would be much more effective at reducing gun violence than any gun-ban legislation. Guns don't cause crime -- you can find countries with high levels of gun ownership and low crime (Switzerland, Finland, France) and countries with low levels of gun ownership and high crime (Russia, Poland, Ukraine).
Stop going after the symptom of the disease and do something about the cause. Most people do not wake up one morning and decide to become murderers. They fall into a life of crime for want of better alternatives and it eventually spirals out of control. There are a few genuine psychopaths out there but that's what the prisons are for.
It's really interesting when you look at gun ownership statistics isn't it? The argument that guns cause crime is dispelled when you consider the example of Finland or Switzerland. The argument that gun control prevents crime is dispelled when you consider the example of Russia or Poland.
You can even find the same trend within individual nations. Vermont has no gun control laws of any kind (anyone can buy a carry and carry it openly or concealed with no license or permit) and has one of the lowest crime rates in the United States. Chicago has the strictest gun laws and a comparatively high crime rate.
I've often used these numbers to suggest to gun control advocates that there are other causes of crime that need to be addressed (poverty?) but they rarely want to hear it. They have convinced themselves that guns are bad and will ignore all evidence to the contrary. It's amusing too because gun control in the United States is primarily pushed by Liberals who would normally be in favor of addressing poverty and despair. On this particular issue though they want to go after the symptom of the disease rather than the cause. Rather foolish of them isn't it?
By that regard I should be able to have an automatic weapon. (Banned in the US).
I don't see any reason why law abiding citizens shouldn't be allowed to own automatic weapons. They were able to do so until 1986 when some jackass liberal Senator attached a ban to the Gun Owners Protection Act. The dipshit even attached his amendment to the bill late at night when there was nobody around who would have voted against it.
I should be able to rig land mines in my yard. (Banned in the US).
I would take issue with this because land mines are indiscriminate. My gun isn't a threat to the mailman walking up to my door to deliver a package, now is it?
I should be able to use armor piercing ammunition.
Why not? Armor piercing ammunition in the hands of a law-abiding citizen is no threat to anyone.
I should be able to employ hand grenades.
The same bit about being incriminate certainly applies to hand grenades.
Is it a human right? No I don't think so. That doesn't mean it should or should not be a right for citizens but it's not a human right to own any weapon which helps defend one's self.
Yes, it is. It's a human right not be to rendered defenseless against aggression and tyranny. History is filled with examples of disarmed populations being slaughtered by genocidal nutjobs. An armed population is a free population that has a measure of control over it's destiny. A disarmed population is at the mercy of those in power and neighboring populations that haven't disarmed.
I'm not even really sold on the original cause for the second amendment (to defend against government tyranny).
I don't really care whether you are "sold" on it or not.
So I assume I could acquire one when joining the resistance.
What good does that do you if you are killed by a roaming death squad (see Rwanda for a recent example) before the resistance gets off the ground? Those death squads were primarily armed with AK-47s. Think their victims might have fared better if they had also had AKs?
I'll still be HEAVILY out gunned. The day I'm fighting the US military I pray to god that I'm not still depending on the weapons currently available to me.
The Redcoats also heavily outgunned the Colonists and even beat them on the battlefield more often than not. Freedom isn't free as the saying goes. I would also say that the US really shouldn't have much of a standing army at all. No standing army == no threat to liberty.
If I need to overthrow the US government they'll probably have horse fly sized search and destroy drones which kill anyone holding a gun.
Somebody has been watching too many science fiction movies. If we had that kind of technology then why aren't we using it against the savages giving us so much trouble over in Afghanistan?
Even now the best weapon in an insurgency or revolution is C4.
Well if things ever get so bad as to require a revolution then I guess we'll have to obtain some C4. But that's all a moot point if the population is completely at the mercy of jackasses with AKs, isn't it?
Now should it be a fundamental human right that you may use appropriate force to defend life and property? Sure.
You don't think firearms represent appropriate force when your life is seconds away from ending?
They're for fighting the government if they become too corrupted and must be removed from power.
And that's not a form of personal defense, in this case against tyranny?
If you lived in a country with gun control laws, then your attacker is probably not going to be carrying one.
Which explains why no criminals in New York City, Chicago or Mexico can obtain access to firearms.
He'll probably just threaten you with a pocket knife or something.
And that's better? The last time I checked knives are just as deadly as a firearm. I'd rather face someone with a firearm than a knife -- it's easier to take a firearm away from someone.
can you cross the road on a red man without being beaten up by the police?
Yes, I jaywalk all the time without being beaten up by the police. WTF are you trying to say here?
your attacker is going to be carrying a gun, and is going to have it drawn before you can reach yours. Good luck not getting shot.
This is the problem with flower children. You've convinced yourself that it's pointless to stand up if confronted with violence, thus ensuring a profitable market segment exists for those willing to use it to obtain the objects of their desire. Perhaps if more people were willing to stand up to violence it would be less prevalent in our society.
Perhaps someone will get the drop on me. I doubt it because I have good situational awareness and pay attention to my surroundings but you can never say never. What I do know is that many of my fellow countryman have used firearms (usually without even firing a shot) to halt acts of aggression directed at them. I hope that I never find myself in such a situation but if I do I'm going to confront violence with violence and do whatever is necessary to ensure that I'm not the one leaving the scene on a gurney.
it isn't helpful to simply assume that Republicans must all have one view of this and Democrats all the other.
But I thought our entire political discourse could be boiled down to "Four legs good, two legs bad!"
Normally i'm against regulation and would say "let the market decide" but there are some areas that only have one provider with no competition
And why is that? It couldn't have anything to do with government franchises that grant a single company an exclusive right to do business in a particular area, could it?
I hope you see the irony in desiring open ears while dismissing someone who disagrees with you as blind and ignorant.
We could avoid this all together if we had competition for broadband providers.
Normally I'd agree with you but I seem to recall that a lot of the discussion about network neutrality got started when some AT&T chairman started complaining about Google using their pipes for "free". If the Tier 1 providers intend on charging at both ends then does it really matter how many last mile providers service your neighborhood?
I would like to see more competition in the broadband market though. It would lower prices and stop Comcast and Time Warner from trying to protect their video services by degrading their internet product.
I say this because the poster appears to claim that the Republicans weren't really conservative.
They aren't. What's Conservative about a massive expansion of an already bankrupt entitlement program? What's Conservative about an expanded role for the Federal Government in education? What's Conservative about responding to an attack on our country by telling people to go shopping?
You can call the GOP of the last eight years many things but Conservative is not one of them.
While I'm not saying the parent does this, but acting like hooligans nonviolent or otherwise in order to obstruct the government helps no one, not even themselves.
How was he trying to obstruct the government and what's wrong with doing so?
aside of course from Janet Jackson's nipple.
Which Michael, being dead, is no longer sucking.
Michael only sucked nipples attached to underage people ;)
(Yeah, I went there....)
This would make me feel more secure in my online bank transactions.
Or you could just secure your computer and put the tin-foil hat away. Just an idea. I've been using online banking in one form or another for 12 years from my regular old PC and I've yet to encounter a problem. Of course I don't generally agree to install the "ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE UPDATE ACTIVEX APPLICATION V 6.5.19.1.61" that pops up while I'm surfing for porn or warez ;)
The tags weren't necessary. We know you aren't Obama because our wallets weren't empty after you finished talking ;)
Falklands and Northern Ireland come to mind as recent history showing the UK to not be an entirely peaceful nation.
Yeah, how dare the Brits go to war when another country invades and occupies lands filled with people who were quite content being under the British Crown and utterly opposed to coming under the sovereignty of the invading power. Damn Limey aggression knows no bounds does it?
Northern Ireland is a mess and I don't know enough about the history thereof to form an opinion on whether or not the British actions are justified but to imply that the Falklands War represented some sort of British aggression is absurd.
As I've said in another post, guns are mostly useless in a real warfare
That must explain why the Army is so opposed to equipping it's troops with firearms.
They are also mostly useless at preventing crime
Then explain to me why the UK has a much higher incidence of "hot" burglaries (burglary committed when the homeowner is present) than the US does? Go talk to an American criminal and ask them what they fear the most. The #1 answer is "being shot by our victims" Also, what does "preventing" crime have to do with my point? My point was that people should be able to defend themselves. If you get to the point of needing to defend yourself then it's rather obvious that crime prevention has failed for you.
good police departments help much better.
I love the police but they can't get to me in time to save my life when the shit hits the fan. 911: When seconds count, help is minutes away.
Do you remember stories about 80-year-old grandma shooting robbers with her Magnum?
It happens all the time here in the states. The mainstream media chooses not to give most civilian self-defense stories the same coverage as they do to criminal uses of firearms. Go read any one of the numerous armed citizen publications put out by the NRA.
Population of France and the USSR were also armed at that point.
Actually Stalin had largely disarmed the population of the USSR several years before the war. And the French are a poor example because everybody knows that the only action French rifles see is being dropped on the ground ;)
Not so with gun control.
Millions of disarmed and defenseless victims of crime and genocide would dispute your notion that gun rights aren't as necessary as free speech. Your guarantee of free speech means nothing if the government can take it away from you with the whisk of a pen.
personal training tasers, and chemical sprays are for personal defense.
Tasers only give you one shot and are rendered useless if you miss or get attacked by more than one person. They are also illegal in many US jurisdictions. Chemical sprays are useless if your assailant is upwind. Both are of questionable value if you run across someone hopped up on drugs.
Because handguns are the main point of difference between European and USA laws. It's legal to own semiautomatic "hunting rifles" in Europe, so it's a non-issue.
Where did I say I was making the comparison between Europe and the US? I don't even recall using the word "Europe". It's amazing how you can read so many things into my posts that aren't there. Can you teach me this skill?
If you need a gun to go to a grocery store, than you have BIG problems.
You don't need a gun until you run into a thug intent on using violence against you. Since I can't choose when or where that will happen I choose to carry a firearm wherever it is legal to do so. I'm sorry if that offends your evolved sensibilities, but thankfully I still have my freedoms in my country.
I take it you've never seen the movie Sneakers? Please put the geek card down and back away slowly......
Nope. I'm talking about how USELESS are handguns in a REAL warfare or civil war. And I'd lived quite close (less than 100km at one point, we've heard explosions in our home) to one.
So now you are making more assumptions about what I wrote, unsupported by the actual text of my comments? Please point out the post of mine in this thread where I used the word "handgun".
I'd like to see you going out with your handgun against a gang of AK-74-wielding thugs. And don't think that they'll run if you shoot one of them.
I don't have to use my handgun. I've got a Mini-14 and M-1 Garand for that scenario. The handgun is primarily useful against thugs of the more mundane (criminal) variety and as a last resort in a pitched battle. The only advantage to the handgun is that it's easy to carry around with you. Rather hard to conceal the AK for the trip to the grocery store.
Join army/militia - you'll be armed there at no cost with _real_ weapons, not toys.
As an American male between the age of 17 and 45 I'm already a member of the militia :)
I recommend that you read the newspapers in Europe immediately prior to both the first & the second world wars
It's not limited to Europe either. Guess who Japan's biggest trading partner was on 6 December 1941?
If the specter of nuclear holocaust is taken off the table for any of a number of plausible reasons
That's the bit that kills me about Obama wanting total nuclear disarmament. For better or worse nuclear weapons are the main reason that humanity hasn't fought World War III. What happens when you take them off the table? You don't even need to get rid of them all either. You just need people to assume they won't be used. There's precedent for this too -- chemical weapons weren't used in WW2 despite being readily available to both sides.
I sleep very well at night knowing that my nation can unleash nuclear fire on anyone stupid enough to try and attack us. Nuclear weapons keep the peace. Getting rid of them is extremely shortsighted.
China is the next superpower, unless they screw up something bad time
History suggests they might just do that. This isn't the first time that China has opened her borders to trade and investment. Every time she does so the coastal regions get rich while the rural interior rots on the vine. Eventually the country collapses and turns back inward for a few generations.
Among the most worrying signals is that research papers I read from the US are most often authored by people with foreign names; not just surnames, but first names as well, indicating they are likely immigrants
Why is that a worrying signal? The fact that the US can still attract immigrants intelligent enough to write research papers would seem to be an asset, not a liability. People want to come here. That's an advantage that we've had since the beginning of the Republic and something that China isn't likely to have for the foreseeable future if ever. Monolithic societies dominated by a single ethic group/culture/language don't have much appeal for someone looking to find a new home.
you USians are probably not used to the world expecting you to speak a language other than English.
It's American, not USian.
Victims of 9/11: 40,000/y [dot.gov]
That's a stupid comparison. You assume that the only impact of the 9/11 attacks were the fatalities. How many traffic accidents result in billions of dollars of economic damage, the invocation of article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty and the collapse of a major industry?