Well there was a Supreme Court case that upheld private gun rights, so I don't think we'll have to worry until new Supreme Court justices are appointed
As glad as I am that Heller was decided the way it was, I doubt it will make any real difference here in New York for a long time to come. I'd still wager on the NYS Legislature passing more gun control laws. The fact that those laws might eventually get struck down is small comfort -- that will take years and in the meanwhile our rights are infringed upon.
On the Federal level, Obama's own website states that he is in favor of a new assault weapons ban and "child proofing" guns (whatever the hell that means). Sorry, I don't have much faith in our rights not being attacked in the next four years. I hope I'm wrong but history suggests I'm not.
The war wasn't launched to end slavery. The war was launched to bring the southern states back into the union. Lincoln actually went out of his way to say that ending slavery wasn't the goal during the beginning. Ending slavery become the goal later for a variety of reasons -- not the least of which was keeping France and England out of the war.
I think the point where Bush loss is when the economy turned to crap
Bush's approval ratings were in the shitter long before the economy crashed. You might have a point that the economic crisis was the final nail in McCain's coffin though.....
What was he supposed to do, Fly to Baton Rouge and bully her into making a decision that she felt was unnecessary?
Get on the bully pulpit and point out how many people are suffering and dying? Appoint someone to FEMA who had experience in disaster management instead of horse racing? Appeal to the Louisiana Congressional Delegation to kick the Governor out of her complacency? There are a lot of things he could have decided to do. He did none of them. In any event, whether deserved or not, I still think this is the point at which the GOP lost the independent vote.
ignoramus' butt out of the fire because she felt she didn't need federal help
Really, what happened to "The Buck Stops Here"? In the military it's called "Command Responsibility". If some Junior Officer of the Deck parks his ship on a sandbar do you really think the Capitan of that ship gets to say "It wasn't my fault, I wasn't on the bridge at the time"?
Apparently pointing this out earns one a 0, troll rating. I really don't care -- I have lots of karma and I stand behind my point.
I believe the State of Louisiana spoke as to who was actually responsible for the Katrina & Rita mess when it didn't even give Kathleen Blanco a chance to run for re-election...
As true as that might be the fact remains that POTUS has the biggest bully pulpit in the World. It seems inexcusable to me that he opted not to use that bully pulpit when Americans were suffering and dying. I got modded into oblivion for pointing this out but really, what happened to "The Buck Stops Here"?
Would Reagan have been content to let Americans die because of incompetent state government? Would FDR? Eisenhower? It just seems like a really piss poor excuse, IMHO.
I'm more paranoid about Albany than I am about Washington. The State Senate just got taken over by the Democrats. The State Assembly regularly passes more gun control laws but they were always dead on arrival in the Republican State Senate. Now they will be rubber-stamped and the NYC'ers will seek to impose their gun control regime on the rest of the state.
The worst part is I actually like what Governor Paterson is trying to do to fix our budgetary woes. Problem is that he'll sign any gun control legislation that the Legislature passes and I suspect he's going to screw over Upstate and appoint Kennedy to Clinton's seat when she gets confirmed. I really hope that I'm wrong about the latter but I know I'm right about the former....
I helped campaign for him on the weekends with my sister... got on stage when he came to Newport News and was on the tv, and got to shake his hand and stuff...
I never got that close. I did get to shake Governor Sebelius' hand, for what that's worth. I don't actually have that many regrets about campaigning for him as I did have a blast doing it. The highlight of my trip was getting an elderly voter to the polls (in my own automobile, the one the campaign rented was somewhere else at the time) 30 seconds before they closed. She got to vote and I have to say that was a pretty good feeling.
I did stand on principle after the FISA reversal and wrote them a letter demanding a refund of my contributions. I actually got it too. Donated every single penny to the EFF.
But in VA, you don't need a permit to own a gun
In New York State you need a permit to own a handgun. In New York City you need a permit to own a long gun. As far as pistol permits go it's really up to the counties here. I'm lucky enough to live in an Upstate County where I can actually get a carry permit. In the Peoples Republic of New York City you can't even get a premise permit half the time, let alone a carry permit. Unless you are rich or well connected of course and then different rules apply.
actually, sales records are destroyed 30 days after purchase
In NYS they do ballistic fingerprinting of all handguns. It's been around for six or seven years ago and cost the state millions of dollars. Guess how many crimes it's solved? Zero.
while having an RNC card in my wallet
I've never been able to reconcile the GOP's embrace of the religious right with my own beliefs. That's probably the biggest reason I'm not a Republican. I'm still a registered Democrat. If I get disillusioned enough to leave the party (I'm close but not there yet) I'll just wind up registering without any party enrollment.
I just want someone sane and relatively moderate
I'll give you that much. At least Obama is going to be competent. I wish McCain had managed to defeat Bush back in 2000. I think things would have worked out quite differently if he had.
The solution is simple if Israel is willing to roll back complete settlement and illegal occupation and ask the Arab/neighboring countries to give a written UN mediated assurance for peace in return.
No, it's really not that simple. If it was that simple it would already be solved. The settlers aren't particularly popular in Israel and there'd be no point to the occupation if the Arabs weren't busy conducting terrorist attacks against Israel.
I'm sorry but that doesn't fly with me. I don't care how incompetent the state government was -- the fact remains that George W. Bush went to bed while Americans suffered and died. What the fuck happened to "The Buck Stops Here"?
It's exactly that kind of "See, it's not really my fault!" rationalization that cost the GOP the independent vote.
Only one thing will fix our broken democracy at this point -- revolution.
Things will have to get pretty fucking bad before the average American bothers to turn off American idol and vote -- let alone come up with the wherewithal to alter or abolish the Government.
Now I'm laughing at all the drones here that fell for the Messiah's clever PR campaign
I think it had less to do with his PR campaign and more to do with Republican incompetence. Independents in this country have historically broke Republican in Presidential elections -- Katrina was probably the point at which the GOP lost them.
RIAA types are allowed into the discussion, but they don't CONTROL the debate or its terms.
His picks for the Justice Department are pretty fucking scary. He picks a pro-gun control/pro-war on drugs person to lead it and a former RIAA lawyer for #3? Unless John Ashcroft is #2 I don't really see how this could be any worse.
but I feel exceptionally taken by Obama's bait and switch.
I don't. The bait and switch was telegraphed months before the election. If you voted for him anyway you don't really have anyone to blame but yourself.
I actually took a week off work and campaigned for him during the primaries. Adding insult to injury was the fact that Hillary (whom I helped him defeat) had the spine to vote against the FISA "compromise". My response to his victory was to apply for my pistol permit before Albany or Washington decides that I shouldn't be able to do so.
There's nothing wrong with empathy for the victims. There's everything wrong with blaming Israel for their predicament. If Hamas obeyed the laws of war and fought in the open under uniform I suspect that civilian casualties would be greatly reduced.
They call for the destruction of Israel in present form because it has occupied a lot of other's land and kicked a lot from their home.
Israel didn't occupy anybody else's land beyond the original mandate until she was attacked by her neighbors. And what of all the Jews that were kicked out of their homes in the neighboring countries? Why don't we see any mention of them? Your sympathy is pretty one-sided.
If you were kicked out of your home, wouldn't you fight against the occupier ? or just sit idle and pray for him ?
When my country launches a war of aggression with the intent of destroying a neighbor and loses said war then I'll worry about being kicked out of my home.
that when the Allies broke the enigma code in WWII they didn't act on all the advance warning they had of German attacks because it would be too obvious that the German commmunications had been intercepted
You are indeed correct. And even when they acted on the advance warning they had to take precautions. Example: During the campaign in Africa we used our code breaking abilities to locate German supply convoys. Before attacking them the Allies would arrange for a scout plane to "discover" the convoy in question. The Germans took the bait and assumed they were located via aerial reconnaissance.
Not much. Bush lived up to his promises of a humble foreign policy free of nation-building, reformed our educational system and changed the way that Washington works.
The persons who refused to obey that law should be charged with Constitutional treason.
You might want to actually read the Constitution and see how it defines treason before you go suggesting that refusing to obey a law constitutes treason.....
Once precedent has been set to deny one American citizen his rights
That precedent wasn't set. His case eventually wound it's way through the court system and the Government had to try him or let him go. He choose to accept a plea-bargain. Seems like it worked just fine in this case, albeit at the glacial pace of the judicial branch.
If judges stop enforcing State and U.S. Constitutions
They've already stopped enforcing them. Which parts of the Constitution they aren't likely to enforce depends on the political/idealogical alignment of the judge in question. A right-wing judge isn't as likely to uphold the 4th or 5th amendments. A left-wing judge isn't as likely to uphold the 2nd amendment.
There are exceptions of course but by and large judges view the Constitution through their own idealogical lens.
Slashdot Mirror
Every other aspect of the outcome was bad.
Now how can you say that when it provided us with civil war reenactments? ;)
Well there was a Supreme Court case that upheld private gun rights, so I don't think we'll have to worry until new Supreme Court justices are appointed
As glad as I am that Heller was decided the way it was, I doubt it will make any real difference here in New York for a long time to come. I'd still wager on the NYS Legislature passing more gun control laws. The fact that those laws might eventually get struck down is small comfort -- that will take years and in the meanwhile our rights are infringed upon.
On the Federal level, Obama's own website states that he is in favor of a new assault weapons ban and "child proofing" guns (whatever the hell that means). Sorry, I don't have much faith in our rights not being attacked in the next four years. I hope I'm wrong but history suggests I'm not.
think that a war to end slavery was justified
The war wasn't launched to end slavery. The war was launched to bring the southern states back into the union. Lincoln actually went out of his way to say that ending slavery wasn't the goal during the beginning. Ending slavery become the goal later for a variety of reasons -- not the least of which was keeping France and England out of the war.
Trust me, you would not want a federal government that could simply decide to go into a state and take over
Did I say he should have taken over?
I think the point where Bush loss is when the economy turned to crap
Bush's approval ratings were in the shitter long before the economy crashed. You might have a point that the economic crisis was the final nail in McCain's coffin though.....
What was he supposed to do, Fly to Baton Rouge and bully her into making a decision that she felt was unnecessary?
Get on the bully pulpit and point out how many people are suffering and dying? Appoint someone to FEMA who had experience in disaster management instead of horse racing? Appeal to the Louisiana Congressional Delegation to kick the Governor out of her complacency? There are a lot of things he could have decided to do. He did none of them. In any event, whether deserved or not, I still think this is the point at which the GOP lost the independent vote.
ignoramus' butt out of the fire because she felt she didn't need federal help
Really, what happened to "The Buck Stops Here"? In the military it's called "Command Responsibility". If some Junior Officer of the Deck parks his ship on a sandbar do you really think the Capitan of that ship gets to say "It wasn't my fault, I wasn't on the bridge at the time"?
Apparently pointing this out earns one a 0, troll rating. I really don't care -- I have lots of karma and I stand behind my point.
I believe the State of Louisiana spoke as to who was actually responsible for the Katrina & Rita mess when it didn't even give Kathleen Blanco a chance to run for re-election...
As true as that might be the fact remains that POTUS has the biggest bully pulpit in the World. It seems inexcusable to me that he opted not to use that bully pulpit when Americans were suffering and dying. I got modded into oblivion for pointing this out but really, what happened to "The Buck Stops Here"?
Would Reagan have been content to let Americans die because of incompetent state government? Would FDR? Eisenhower? It just seems like a really piss poor excuse, IMHO.
Don't be so paranoid.
I'm more paranoid about Albany than I am about Washington. The State Senate just got taken over by the Democrats. The State Assembly regularly passes more gun control laws but they were always dead on arrival in the Republican State Senate. Now they will be rubber-stamped and the NYC'ers will seek to impose their gun control regime on the rest of the state.
The worst part is I actually like what Governor Paterson is trying to do to fix our budgetary woes. Problem is that he'll sign any gun control legislation that the Legislature passes and I suspect he's going to screw over Upstate and appoint Kennedy to Clinton's seat when she gets confirmed. I really hope that I'm wrong about the latter but I know I'm right about the former....
I helped campaign for him on the weekends with my sister... got on stage when he came to Newport News and was on the tv, and got to shake his hand and stuff...
I never got that close. I did get to shake Governor Sebelius' hand, for what that's worth. I don't actually have that many regrets about campaigning for him as I did have a blast doing it. The highlight of my trip was getting an elderly voter to the polls (in my own automobile, the one the campaign rented was somewhere else at the time) 30 seconds before they closed. She got to vote and I have to say that was a pretty good feeling.
I did stand on principle after the FISA reversal and wrote them a letter demanding a refund of my contributions. I actually got it too. Donated every single penny to the EFF.
But in VA, you don't need a permit to own a gun
In New York State you need a permit to own a handgun. In New York City you need a permit to own a long gun. As far as pistol permits go it's really up to the counties here. I'm lucky enough to live in an Upstate County where I can actually get a carry permit. In the Peoples Republic of New York City you can't even get a premise permit half the time, let alone a carry permit. Unless you are rich or well connected of course and then different rules apply.
actually, sales records are destroyed 30 days after purchase
In NYS they do ballistic fingerprinting of all handguns. It's been around for six or seven years ago and cost the state millions of dollars. Guess how many crimes it's solved? Zero.
while having an RNC card in my wallet
I've never been able to reconcile the GOP's embrace of the religious right with my own beliefs. That's probably the biggest reason I'm not a Republican. I'm still a registered Democrat. If I get disillusioned enough to leave the party (I'm close but not there yet) I'll just wind up registering without any party enrollment.
I just want someone sane and relatively moderate
I'll give you that much. At least Obama is going to be competent. I wish McCain had managed to defeat Bush back in 2000. I think things would have worked out quite differently if he had.
The solution is simple if Israel is willing to roll back complete settlement and illegal occupation and ask the Arab/neighboring countries to give a written UN mediated assurance for peace in return.
No, it's really not that simple. If it was that simple it would already be solved. The settlers aren't particularly popular in Israel and there'd be no point to the occupation if the Arabs weren't busy conducting terrorist attacks against Israel.
There - fixed that for you.
I'm sorry but that doesn't fly with me. I don't care how incompetent the state government was -- the fact remains that George W. Bush went to bed while Americans suffered and died. What the fuck happened to "The Buck Stops Here"?
It's exactly that kind of "See, it's not really my fault!" rationalization that cost the GOP the independent vote.
Only one thing will fix our broken democracy at this point -- revolution.
Things will have to get pretty fucking bad before the average American bothers to turn off American idol and vote -- let alone come up with the wherewithal to alter or abolish the Government.
Now I'm laughing at all the drones here that fell for the Messiah's clever PR campaign
I think it had less to do with his PR campaign and more to do with Republican incompetence. Independents in this country have historically broke Republican in Presidential elections -- Katrina was probably the point at which the GOP lost them.
RIAA types are allowed into the discussion, but they don't CONTROL the debate or its terms.
His picks for the Justice Department are pretty fucking scary. He picks a pro-gun control/pro-war on drugs person to lead it and a former RIAA lawyer for #3? Unless John Ashcroft is #2 I don't really see how this could be any worse.
but I feel exceptionally taken by Obama's bait and switch.
I don't. The bait and switch was telegraphed months before the election. If you voted for him anyway you don't really have anyone to blame but yourself.
I actually took a week off work and campaigned for him during the primaries. Adding insult to injury was the fact that Hillary (whom I helped him defeat) had the spine to vote against the FISA "compromise". My response to his victory was to apply for my pistol permit before Albany or Washington decides that I shouldn't be able to do so.
Where is the evidence to your allegations that many jews were kicked out of their home in neighboring countries ?
Evidence
You are framing "stripper" as some sort of "last resort opportunity"
Umm, I did no such thing. All I said was that most strippers don't really look all that good naked, at least in my experience. YMMV.
it's not that easy to get "exotic dancer" jobs.
Did I say it was?
empathy for the victims, not increase them.
There's nothing wrong with empathy for the victims. There's everything wrong with blaming Israel for their predicament. If Hamas obeyed the laws of war and fought in the open under uniform I suspect that civilian casualties would be greatly reduced.
They call for the destruction of Israel in present form because it has occupied a lot of other's land and kicked a lot from their home.
Israel didn't occupy anybody else's land beyond the original mandate until she was attacked by her neighbors. And what of all the Jews that were kicked out of their homes in the neighboring countries? Why don't we see any mention of them? Your sympathy is pretty one-sided.
If you were kicked out of your home, wouldn't you fight against the occupier ? or just sit idle and pray for him ?
When my country launches a war of aggression with the intent of destroying a neighbor and loses said war then I'll worry about being kicked out of my home.
that when the Allies broke the enigma code in WWII they didn't act on all the advance warning they had of German attacks because it would be too obvious that the German commmunications had been intercepted
You are indeed correct. And even when they acted on the advance warning they had to take precautions. Example: During the campaign in Africa we used our code breaking abilities to locate German supply convoys. Before attacking them the Allies would arrange for a scout plane to "discover" the convoy in question. The Germans took the bait and assumed they were located via aerial reconnaissance.
Maybe we need more judges, then
Yes, that's what the United States needs. More lawyers.
(My apologies in advance to NewYorkCountryLawyer ;)
Why, what did I miss?
Not much. Bush lived up to his promises of a humble foreign policy free of nation-building, reformed our educational system and changed the way that Washington works.
The persons who refused to obey that law should be charged with Constitutional treason.
You might want to actually read the Constitution and see how it defines treason before you go suggesting that refusing to obey a law constitutes treason.....
Once precedent has been set to deny one American citizen his rights
That precedent wasn't set. His case eventually wound it's way through the court system and the Government had to try him or let him go. He choose to accept a plea-bargain. Seems like it worked just fine in this case, albeit at the glacial pace of the judicial branch.
If judges stop enforcing State and U.S. Constitutions
They've already stopped enforcing them. Which parts of the Constitution they aren't likely to enforce depends on the political/idealogical alignment of the judge in question. A right-wing judge isn't as likely to uphold the 4th or 5th amendments. A left-wing judge isn't as likely to uphold the 2nd amendment.
There are exceptions of course but by and large judges view the Constitution through their own idealogical lens.
The second rule is: You get out before you're big enough to be worth taking down.
I wouldn't have the balls to get into dealing. The risk to reward ratio just isn't there for pot and I don't believe in any of the harder stuff.