Yeah but an armed populace will never stand in the way of a government. Just look at the United States, where the government had no problem with repealing the Posse Comitatus and deploy the army against armed civilians that thought they could separate from the United States.

No need to look to the US, how about closer to home?

22nd July 2005

"The death sparked an intense public debate over a shoot-to-kill practice known as Operation Kratos. The codename was dropped in 2007, but the policy continues."

Even the SAS does not kill unless it is absolutely necessary!

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Last I heard it only needed one or two more states to call for one.

A "Constitutional Convention" would be a hoot. The House the Senate and 50 State Legislatures in one room making amendments on the fly, two or three an hour.

Huh? What does the House and Senate have to do with it? They are out of the picture if the States call a Convention. If that happens, there is precious little that is not amendable in the Constitution (essentially the only unamendable part of the Constitution left is the requirement for equal representation in the US Senate for all the states). And the Federal Govt. has diddly-squat to say about it. And remember... not even the US Supreme Court can find parts of the Constitution 'un-Constitutional'.

If the States call a Constitutional Convention, the Federal Govt. is TOTALLY cut out of the process... The States can amend it in whatever way they see fit.

If the States structure the Convention correctly, the amendments would not even need ratification by the State Legislatures, since each State Delegation to the Convention could then convene as its OWN State's Convention and ratify the Amendments that way. The Constitutional Convention becomes, effectively, the Government until it is finally adjourned.

And it is up to the Convention, and the Convention ONLY what Amendments they will consider. This fact alone should scare the bejebus out of EVERYONE.

Remember, virtually the entire Constitution can be re-written by amendment. This is not a step to be taken lightly. But, if the actions of the Federal Government so totally piss-off the States, the States do have the means and Authority to change things.

Remember, the Federal Government is a creation of the States, not the other way around. The States hold the trump card. Whether or not they ever USE it is another matter...

Any hunter who runs through the woods shooting at everything is an idiot and not a hunter. Myself I like stalking a game animal. There are times just sitting at the base of a tree wont bring game in.

Oh yes, but in a combat scenario people do tend to run through the woods (or streets) shooting at everything that moves (roughly speaking). The AR was designed with that in mind. Or at least, it was not designed for a scenario where you have the luxury to stalk your target.

Have you ever watched film footage from the Viet Nam war? You see guys holding the so called MASS KILLER WEAPON over a wall with out aiming and wasteing 20 rounds of ammunition.
I dont care what the weapon is, If its unaimed its useless.
Ive shot full auto M-16 A1's and M60 machine guns. If you dont aim your not doing your job. That spray and pray crap is just that crap. The only time I can see for shooting off the hip is close quarter combat, That means in your face hand to hand combat. Why do you think most of the combat rifles have some type of scope mounted on them? For looks? Shooting from the hip? ITs for hitting the guy trying to kill you.

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Old James

Better INDIVIDUAL Tyrants, than GOVERNMENT Tyranny.

Governments MUST be restricted.

You made my point.

Except that in no way do these guns prevent the government from going tyrannical. Its moderate peoples votes voting for moderate political candidates that do that.

Have you ever watched film footage from the Viet Nam war? You see guys holding the so called MASS KILLER WEAPON over a wall with out aiming and wasteing 20 rounds of ammunition.

Pretty sure the soldiers in that kind of footage are providing covering/suppression fire. The point is not to aim but to shoot close enough to the enemy positions so they keep their heads down and don't shoot back. Generally also not a good idea to stick your head above the wall and take your time to get a decent aim while you are under fire. Given that its Vietnam that probably also means that soldiers aren't exactly sure the exact location of the enemy.

Better INDIVIDUAL Tyrants, than GOVERNMENT Tyranny.

Governments MUST be restricted.

You made my point.

Except that in no way do these guns prevent the government from going tyrannical. Its moderate peoples votes voting for moderate political candidates that do that.

Have you ever watched film footage from the Viet Nam war? You see guys holding the so called MASS KILLER WEAPON over a wall with out aiming and wasteing 20 rounds of ammunition.

Pretty sure the soldiers in that kind of footage are providing covering/suppression fire. The point is not to aim but to shoot close enough to the enemy positions so they keep their heads down and don't shoot back. Generally also not a good idea to stick your head above the wall and take your time to get a decent aim while you are under fire. Given that its Vietnam that probably also means that soldiers aren't exactly sure the exact location of the enemy.

Well then how do the hell do you know where to fire to suppress said incoming fire? I think your talking out of your hat. Its piss poor training and fire disciline. Shooting the tops of tress off wont suppress enemy fire.

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Old James

Well then how do the hell do you know where to fire to suppress said incoming fire? I think your talking out of your hat. Its piss poor training and fire disciline. Shooting the tops of tress off wont suppress enemy fire.

I assume they know generally where the fire is coming from. Just not good enough to have a sure chance on hitting them reliably, but good enough to get the enemy duck for cover.

And really, would you stick your head above a wall and take aim while bullets are flying over your head?

Well then how do the hell do you know where to fire to suppress said incoming fire? I think your talking out of your hat. Its piss poor training and fire disciline. Shooting the tops of tress off wont suppress enemy fire.

I assume they know generally where the fire is coming from. Just not good enough to have a sure chance on hitting them reliably, but good enough to get the enemy duck for cover.

And really, would you stick your head above a wall and take aim while bullets are flying over your head?

No not over the top of a wall, But showing your weapon above a wall is just asking for an RPG to be aimed at said wall.
Its piss poor tactics doing the spay and pray.

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[/quote]

Old James

Well then how do the hell do you know where to fire to suppress said incoming fire? I think your talking out of your hat. Its piss poor training and fire disciline. Shooting the tops of tress off wont suppress enemy fire.

I assume they know generally where the fire is coming from. Just not good enough to have a sure chance on hitting them reliably, but good enough to get the enemy duck for cover.

And really, would you stick your head above a wall and take aim while bullets are flying over your head?

No not over the top of a wall, But showing your weapon above a wall is just asking for an RPG to be aimed at said wall.
Its piss poor tactics doing the spay and pray.

Yes, James, I think that he has been watching too many 'war movies' or played too many 'war video games',,,,

Massive amounts of 'spray and pray' is just asking for not only the RPG that you mentioned but also mortar fire, artillery fire, heck maybe even an air-strike. Smoke during the day and muzzle flashes at night...

Not to mention that spray and pray is VERY wasteful of ammo. A couple of minutes of that and the soldier is gonna be out of ammo, and it may be DAYS if not longer before they can re-supply.

In a previous post you said:

The best handling hunting rifle I ever owned was Winchester model 94 lever action. I still regert selling it over 30 yeras ago. Any rifle or shotgun I ever owned was well balanced, wieghed what I wanted to carry all day and handled just fine in the real world of hunting. In fact my AR-15 comes in well over two pounds heavier than my Remington model 700 in 30.06 caliber with a scope.

My favorite hunting rifle is a M1903A4, (the 'sniper rifle' variant of the M1903 infantry rifle, dates from 1942 -- bolt action, 5 round capacity internal magazine, fires the 30-06 ammo.) but I *did* replace the crappy military telescopic sights on it with a *MUCH* better civilian one.

No *WAY* I would use one of those .50-caliber semi-auto sniper rifles that Мишель was going on about. My M1903A4 weighs about 9 pounds. Those things he was talking about... Over 30 pounds.. No WAY am I gonna lug one of those all over the place hunting... Not to mention that that high-powered of a round is likely gonna waste a LOT of the meat.

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https://youtu.be/iY57ErBkFFE

#Texit

Don't blame me, I voted for Johnson(L) in 2016.

Truth is dangerous... especially when it challenges those in power.

No not over the top of a wall, But showing your weapon above a wall is just asking for an RPG to be aimed at said wall.
Its piss poor tactics doing the spay and pray.

Yes, James, I think that he has been watching too many 'war movies' or played too many 'war video games',,,,

Massive amounts of 'spray and pray' is just asking for not only the RPG that you mentioned but also mortar fire, artillery fire, heck maybe even an air-strike. Smoke during the day and muzzle flashes at night...

Not to mention that spray and pray is VERY wasteful of ammo. A couple of minutes of that and the soldier is gonna be out of ammo, and it may be DAYS if not longer before they can re-supply.

Now we are getting into discussing a hypothetical combat scenario based on a short clip seen in a documentary or something. One can think of a dozen of reasons why it was an acceptable action or understandable situation and one can easily think of reasons why it was a sign of poor fire discipline and tactics. Given the lack of context it can go either way with no definite answer, so lets drop it.

No *WAY* I would use one of those .50-caliber semi-auto sniper rifles that Мишель was going on about. My M1903A4 weighs about 9 pounds. Those things he was talking about... Over 30 pounds.. No WAY am I gonna lug one of those all over the place hunting... Not to mention that that high-powered of a round is likely gonna waste a LOT of the meat.

Of course not. Who the hell goes deer hunting with a cannon? Once you hit a deer with that there is probably not a whole lot deer left. So the question is, given that civilians really have no need for such firepower, why give it to them? What is the rationale behind allowing civilians to have such powerful weapons? Really all you can come up with is 'because we can' and 'because it looks cool'. Do you think that are acceptable reasons for legalizing such firepower?

American Realism maturely understands there WILL be failure. The result, of just ONE failure, may be 10's of Millions Murdered. Therefore, Power MUST be limited.

Understands it maybe, but in practice it is still very much possible for those with power to make a mistake which had devastating consequences.

The Cold War was almost 50 years where one wrong move by someone in the White House could have led to the end of the world. Or more recently, the actions of a few people in the administration led to an illegal war in Iraq, which costs a few thousand American lives and hundreds of thousands of lives of Iraqi's.

Clearly the limitations you put on official power have failed. And to top that off, you have tried to limited government power by giving individuals more power, which has resulted in individuals turning to tyranny and hurting their environment: gun crime.

Clearly the limitations you put on official power have failed. And to top that off, you have tried to limited government power by giving individuals more power, which has resulted in individuals turning to tyranny and hurting their environment: gun crime.

Limitations Failed?

How many 10's of millions were killed in the 20th Century regarding Collective Power?

European Collective Power Thinking has, and always will, fail.

Individual Power may fail. Let's see if 10's of Million people are murdered, before saying Individual Power, is JUST AS BAD as European Thinking.

Yeah, but the point is that individual power doesn't in any way curb collective power. So you are still stuck with collective power failure and the disaster that leads to, and on top of that, you have the smaller scale atrocities caused by individual power.

In Europe we only have the collective power failure and not the individual one.

Someone just sent me a clip of a nasty armed robbery in the USA.

How the f*ck does a civilian get hold of an AKA 47?? WTF is that that about???

How do you let that sh*t happen? Does no one think that is nuts???

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Reality Internet Personality

Operation Fast and Furious
We give them away. (^;

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Clearly the limitations you put on official power have failed. And to top that off, you have tried to limited government power by giving individuals more power, which has resulted in individuals turning to tyranny and hurting their environment: gun crime.

Limitations Failed?

How many 10's of millions were killed in the 20th Century regarding Collective Power?

European Collective Power Thinking has, and always will, fail.

Individual Power may fail. Let's see if 10's of Million people are murdered, before saying Individual Power, is JUST AS BAD as European Thinking.

Yeah, but the point is that individual power doesn't in any way curb collective power. So you are still stuck with collective power failure and the disaster that leads to, and on top of that, you have the smaller scale atrocities caused by individual power.

In Europe we only have the collective power failure and not the individual one.

Bull-crap you don't. You don't need guns for 'atrocities caused by individual power.'

Quite powerful explosive devices can be made from commonly available household and/or agricultural chemicals. I recall a LONG string of bombings by IRA members against the UK. More recently, I recall bombings in public transportation systems in Europe.

I was almost the victim of one. Back in 1980, I was riding a bus in Spain when all of a sudden we were pulled over by either the Spanish police or army (not sure which they all were carrying automatic weapons at the time as far as I could tell, due to US President Carter's state visit to King Juan Carlos, in my opinion). We were all hurriedly evacuated from the bus, as it was searched. The military/police found a bomb, took it out into a field, and exploded it. Basque separatists had planted it, and at least they had the courtesy to phone in the bomb-threat to the authorities.

Do NOT feed me the line about how 'getting rid of the guns will STOP individual atrocities.' It isn't true.

You ever hear about the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City back in 1995? 168 dead, 680 injured. It was a fertilizer/diesel explosive device loaded into the back of a rented commercial truck. At least they caught the perps on that one... Or at least SOME of them. One got the death penalty, one got life in prison. The others turned state's evidence and received a shorter sentence in one case, (12 years) and nothing (total immunity) in the other.

168 dead, 680 injured... no guns needed or used.

Someone just sent me a clip of a nasty armed robbery in the USA.

How the f*ck does a civilian get hold of an AKA 47?? WTF is that that about???

How do you let that sh*t happen? Does no one think that is nuts???

I think it's nuts people can get a gun that easily in the States. Much more difficult to get a gun over here and the difference in violence death rate is quite noticeable I'd say!!

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rOZZ
Music
Pictures

We have that, both in the US and in Europe and the system that gives us collective responsibility is called Democracy. But even this system is open to abuse and will eventually fail.

Exactly!! That is why weapon ownership is allowed. So that when government stops protecting us, we can protect ourselves in the interim until we can fix things.

The system's eventual failure was understood by the 'founding fathers' and authors of the Constitution. They made provisions for it.

Even Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of Independence and 3rd President of the USA foresaw and in fact supported an armed revolution every so often to help clean out the corrupt crap from the Federal Government.

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is it's natural manure.

--Thomas Jefferson to William Stephens Smith, Paris, 13 Nov. 1787

We have that, both in the US and in Europe and the system that gives us collective responsibility is called Democracy. But even this system is open to abuse and will eventually fail.

Exactly!! That is why weapon ownership is allowed. So that when government stops protecting us, we can protect ourselves in the interim until we can fix things.

The true fact of "from my cold dead hand" was proven false in New Orleans after Katerina. All guns were confiscated from every citizen. They gave them up with out so much a s boo. I don't think they ever got them back ether.

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Yeah, but the point is that individual power doesn't in any way curb collective power. So you are still stuck with collective power failure and the disaster that leads to, and on top of that, you have the smaller scale atrocities caused by individual power.

In Europe we only have the collective power failure and not the individual one.

Мишель..

As you stated "you have the smaller scale atrocities caused by individual power."

So wouldn't it be better for Europe have "smaller scale atrocities caused by individual power", than your spasm's of MASS Atrocities.

Asking the question again: How is Europe going to stop the cycle of Mass Atrocities because of Powerful Governments?

I hope you are not ignoring the mass atrocities committed by America.

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Reality Internet Personality

Мишель..

As you stated "you have the smaller scale atrocities caused by individual power."

So wouldn't it be better for Europe have "smaller scale atrocities caused by individual power", than your spasm's of MASS Atrocities.

Asking the question again: How is Europe going to stop the cycle of Mass Atrocities because of Powerful Governments?

Well yeah, it would be better IF ONLY THOSE MASS ATROCITIES WOULD BE PREVENTED. Given US history, that has not and will not be the case. You founded the country on a rebellion, moved on to an ethnic cleansing, had institutional racism till deep into the 1960's, got involved in some very questionable political ventures with dictators, have not hesitated to bomb and/or invade countries that stood in the way or had policies you didn't like and 10 years ago started an illegal war in Iraq. So I ask again, how exactly do civilians with guns prevent your government from not even going crazy, but from inflicting horrors on other human beings on a regular basis? The only answer is that it doesn't.


So what does Europe do? Well, given that giving guns to civilians clearly doesn' t work and that the drawbacks of it are not worth it. So, what do we do? The EU is founded on the basis of trying to prevent more wars within Europe. So thats what we do. Integrate European countries, delegate some power to a supranational level, make the costs of war so high that it becomes impractical for anyone to even bother with. Has it succeeded? Well we now have what? Almost 70 years of consecutive peace in Europe? A historical record. So clearly we are doing something right this time.

Yep, for Europe I'm going with 'EU' as the way to prevent mass atrocities.

Мишель..

As you stated "you have the smaller scale atrocities caused by individual power."

So wouldn't it be better for Europe have "smaller scale atrocities caused by individual power", than your spasm's of MASS Atrocities.

Asking the question again: How is Europe going to stop the cycle of Mass Atrocities because of Powerful Governments?

Well yeah, it would be better IF ONLY THOSE MASS ATROCITIES WOULD BE PREVENTED. Given US history, that has not and will not be the case. You founded the country on a rebellion, moved on to an ethnic cleansing, had institutional racism till deep into the 1960's, got involved in some very questionable political ventures with dictators, have not hesitated to bomb and/or invade countries that stood in the way or had policies you didn't like and 10 years ago started an illegal war in Iraq. So I ask again, how exactly do civilians with guns prevent your government from not even going crazy, but from inflicting horrors on other human beings on a regular basis? The only answer is that it doesn't.


So what does Europe do? Well, given that giving guns to civilians clearly doesn' t work and that the drawbacks of it are not worth it. So, what do we do? The EU is founded on the basis of trying to prevent more wars within Europe. So thats what we do. Integrate European countries, delegate some power to a supranational level, make the costs of war so high that it becomes impractical for anyone to even bother with. Has it succeeded? Well we now have what? Almost 70 years of consecutive peace in Europe? A historical record. So clearly we are doing something right this time.

Yep, for Europe I'm going with 'EU' as the way to prevent mass atrocities.

So how is the EU going to stop Russia from annexing anymore territory from the Ukraine? I would love our President to just butt out and let your EU handle the whole thing and watch how it plays out.

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Old James