The Goat Pen

You have to have a class III permit to possess any automatic weapons. This involves a lot of money, time, and significant background checks by ATF/FBI including being fingerprinted etc.

Wouldn't you need universal background checks and/or banning private sales to make this true?

Dr. Strangelove wrote:

hedge wrote:And look how that turned out...

It resulted in the election of the most liberal Congress in US history and one of history's biggest landslides. I say, let them keep thinking that a more extreme candidate is the only way they can win.

Assuming by "extreme" you mean "conservative," at least a conservative R nominee would have succeeded in turning out the base of the party, which both Romney and McCain spectacularly failed to do. A hypothetical conservative R nominee at least has a chance to draw conservative voters to the polls, whereas drawing moderate voters to the polls is questionable at best. Moderate voters are probably going to vote Democrat anyway. If a conservative nominee drives off a moderate voter with his conservatism, he'll draw three conservatives in return.

The GOP has followed the theory that they've got to nominate a moderate or they'll lose the moderate independent voters, and so the election. That theory has utterly failed every single time it has been tried. All we have learned from the GOP's long and growing string of moderate nominee losers is that, if you give American voters a choice between a liberal and a liberal, they will pick a liberal 100% of the time.

I didn't realize that Conservatives didn't turn out and vote this time. President Obama received on 17% of Conservative votes in 2012 (as opposed to 20% in 2008) against McCain.

In 2012, Conservatives were 35% of the electorate, moderates 41%, and liberals 25% (by self-identification)
In 2008, Conservatives were 34% of the electorate, moderates 44%, and liberals 22% (by self-identification)

Who ran that was a better candidate than Romney?

Owlman wrote:

You have to have a class III permit to possess any automatic weapons. This involves a lot of money, time, and significant background checks by ATF/FBI including being fingerprinted etc.

Wouldn't you need universal background checks and/or banning private sales to make this true?

Excuse me...to legally possess. People that take the time and effort to submit to CC permit requirements have extremely low rates of committing gun crimes. Even lower with class III permit holders. Despite the media disinformation campaign that tries to intimate that every gun out there is an automatic weapon I can only think of one instance where full auto weapons were used and that was the LA bank robbery in 1997. And in in that case only the two criminals were killed despite them firing over a thousand rounds. I'm sure there are a few more over 30 years or so, but I can't think of any and those are almost assuredly from illegally possessed weapons in the first place.

Gangbangers aren't dumb. They know the penalty for even having an automatic weapon is very harsh compared to a semi-auto so they don't use them, plus they cost significantly more than the semi-auto model.

http://www.cga.ct.gov/2009/rpt/2009-R-0020.htm

SUMMARY

Federal law strictly regulates machine guns (firearms that fire many rounds of ammunition, without manual reloading, with a single pull of the trigger).

Among other things, federal law:

1. requires all machine guns, except antique firearms, not in the U.S. government's possession to be registered with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF);

2. bars private individuals from transferring or acquiring machine guns except those lawfully possessed and registered before May 19, 1986;

3. requires anyone transferring or manufacturing machine guns to get prior ATF approval and register the firearms;

4. with very limited exceptions, imposes a $200 excise tax whenever a machine gun is transferred;

5. bars interstate transport of machine guns without ATF approval; and

6. imposes harsh penalties for machine gun violations, including imprisonment of up to 10 years, a fine of up to $250,000, or both for possessing an unregistered machine gun.

It was a legitimate question about the permit. If you are going to require a permit, how do you insure that those with the guns actually get a permit without some sort of record? The amount of crime that is committed by the owners really doesn't enter into it all (percentage wise, I suspect the owners of guns that commit crimes is very low). Now if all these types of guns are registered and required to notify of all sales, that would appear to solve the issue.

Professor Tiger wrote:
Assuming by "extreme" you mean "conservative," at least a conservative R nominee would have succeeded in turning out the base of the party, which both Romney and McCain spectacularly failed to do. A hypothetical conservative R nominee at least has a chance to draw conservative voters to the polls, whereas drawing moderate voters to the polls is questionable at best.]Moderate voters are probably going to vote Democrat anyway. If a conservative nominee drives off a moderate voter with his conservatism, he'll draw three conservatives in return.

The GOP has followed the theory that they've got to nominate a moderate or they'll lose the moderate independent voters, and so the election. That theory has utterly failed every single time it has been tried. All we have learned from the GOP's long and growing string of moderate nominee losers is that, if you give American voters a choice between a liberal and a liberal, they will pick a liberal 100% of the time.

The last truly conservative republican nominee was Goldwater. Seems like he only managed 30something pct. of the vote.

I've lived under moderate republican presidents for most of my post-adolescent life... 28 years of Nixon/Ford, Reagan, and the Bushes. It's odd to hear you say the republican push for moderate voters has failed every single time. Maybe you were referring to the last couple of presidential elections only.

Of course we could never, ever go too far regulating guns....




A 5-year-old girl was suspended from school earlier this week after she made what the school called a “terrorist threat.”

Her weapon of choice? A small, Hello Kitty automatic bubble blower.

The kindergartner, who attends Mount Carmel Area Elementary School in Pennsylvania, caught administrators’ attention after suggesting she and a classmate should shoot each other with bubbles.

“I think people know how harmless a bubble is. It doesn’t hurt,” said Robin Ficker, an attorney for the girl’s family. According to Ficker, the girl, whose identity has not been released, didn’t even have the bubble gun toy with her at school.

The kindergartner was ordered to undergo a psychological evaluation during her 10-day suspension, which was later reduced to two days. The evaluation deemed the girl normal and not a threat to others, Ficker said.

bluetick wrote:

Professor Tiger wrote:
Assuming by "extreme" you mean "conservative," at least a conservative R nominee would have succeeded in turning out the base of the party, which both Romney and McCain spectacularly failed to do. A hypothetical conservative R nominee at least has a chance to draw conservative voters to the polls, whereas drawing moderate voters to the polls is questionable at best.]Moderate voters are probably going to vote Democrat anyway. If a conservative nominee drives off a moderate voter with his conservatism, he'll draw three conservatives in return.

The GOP has followed the theory that they've got to nominate a moderate or they'll lose the moderate independent voters, and so the election. That theory has utterly failed every single time it has been tried. All we have learned from the GOP's long and growing string of moderate nominee losers is that, if you give American voters a choice between a liberal and a liberal, they will pick a liberal 100% of the time.

The last truly conservative republican nominee was Goldwater. Seems like he only managed 30something pct. of the vote.

That is because he wasn't conservative. Goldwater supported a woman's right to murder her unborn child. There is nothing conservative about that.

Toemeesleather wrote:Of course we could never, ever go to far regulating guns....




A 5-year-old girl was suspended from school earlier this week after she made what the school called a “terrorist threat.”

Her weapon of choice? A small, Hello Kitty automatic bubble blower.

The kindergartner, who attends Mount Carmel Area Elementary School in Pennsylvania, caught administrators’ attention after suggesting she and a classmate should shoot each other with bubbles.

“I think people know how harmless a bubble is. It doesn’t hurt,” said Robin Ficker, an attorney for the girl’s family. According to Ficker, the girl, whose identity has not been released, didn’t even have the bubble gun toy with her at school.

The kindergartner was ordered to undergo a psychological evaluation during her 10-day suspension, which was later reduced to two days. The evaluation deemed the girl normal and not a threat to others, Ficker said.

Rule one with liberalism:

#1) Don't think critically. If you could think critically (and lived your life in that manner) you would already BE a conservative and are therefore of no further use to liberalism. Those who think critically are the enemy and are to be discredited or (failing that) shunned.

Rule number two with liberalism:

#2) Never-ever challenge those who live a life refusing to think critically.

Conservatism by definition implies a lack of critical thinking. Conservatism means holding onto traditional values, laws, social institutions. The motto of a true conservative is not...

after thinking it over , I have come to the conclusion we should do X

...but more like...

we always done X, thats how it always oughta be!

The American political definitions are bastardized, particularly because the terms are associated with particular political parties, which are conservative and liberal regarding different aspects of their platforms and not consistently one or the other despite the rhetoric. (Dems are socially liberal and economically conservative while Repubs are generally the opposite)

aTm wrote:Conservatism by definition implies a lack of critical thinking. Conservatism means holding onto traditional values, laws, social institutions. The motto of a true conservative is not...

after thinking it over , I have come to the conclusion we should do X

...but more like...

we always done X, thats how it always oughta be!

The American political definitions are bastardized, particularly because the terms are associated with particular political parties, which are conservative and liberal regarding different aspects of their platforms and not consistently one or the other despite the rhetoric. (Dems are socially liberal and economically conservative while Repubs are generally the opposite)

No.

Democrats hold on to the traditions. That is because they don't think. If they thought they would be Republicans.

The South was very Democratic after the Civil War. Part of those "Dixiecrat/Democrat" principles were holding on to the "traditions" that black people were animals because (as you so aptly put it) "...that's how it always aught to be!" Those are your words. If you ad watched the movie Lincoln and saw what the Democratic Party thought of blacks in the 19th century, you'd be horrified to be associated with them.

Okay, so lets fast forward 100 years.

LBJ was a true 1960s Democrat. He didn't "think." The way it always "was", was that poor people would always be poor (there was absolutely nothing they could do for themselves) so we had to make them whole with his Great Society. Black people were always going to breed out of wedlock children so we had to make those moms whole with his Great Soceity. He never once started to "think" about why some people grow rich and others poor NOR did he "think" about why a greater percentage of black parents were raising bastards, nor did he "think" about what might happen to our country the moment he started creating program after program. If he could think, he would have been a Republican and JFK would never have had him as his running mate and all of history would be different.

aTm, we just had Martin Luther King Day. There were a myriad of reasons why that man was a Republican, mostly because he used his common sense to "think."

Fast forward to today.

In order to be a true conservative, you need to understand WHY you want to conserve things the way they are and when things need to change (and why.) You need a very strong understanding of civics and history, two things lacking in far too many Americans these days. In fact, too many Americans don't even understand the basics of human nature (what motivates people to do what they do.) The liberal way to fix problems in the 21st century is to REACT and never to THINK. Look at all these gun control idea being passed around, it is all just a REACTION to Sandy Hook. If people started to THINK about things they would understand that the problem here is mental health/insane-young-men who have less in life than they feel they are entitled, not lawful access to guns.

innocentbystander wrote:

bluetick wrote:

Professor Tiger wrote:
Assuming by "extreme" you mean "conservative," at least a conservative R nominee would have succeeded in turning out the base of the party, which both Romney and McCain spectacularly failed to do. A hypothetical conservative R nominee at least has a chance to draw conservative voters to the polls, whereas drawing moderate voters to the polls is questionable at best.]Moderate voters are probably going to vote Democrat anyway. If a conservative nominee drives off a moderate voter with his conservatism, he'll draw three conservatives in return.

The GOP has followed the theory that they've got to nominate a moderate or they'll lose the moderate independent voters, and so the election. That theory has utterly failed every single time it has been tried. All we have learned from the GOP's long and growing string of moderate nominee losers is that, if you give American voters a choice between a liberal and a liberal, they will pick a liberal 100% of the time.

The last truly conservative republican nominee was Goldwater. Seems like he only managed 30something pct. of the vote.

That is because he wasn't conservative. Goldwater supported a woman's right to murder her unborn child. There is nothing conservative about that.

Abortion wasn't even a political issue in 1964. Goldwater didn't stake a position on it until 1980's.

I applaud innocent bystander's courage, as he is usually the only conservative here willing to call out the blacks concerning their irresponsible breeding habits.

bluetick wrote:I applaud innocent bystander's courage, as he is usually the only conservative here willing to call out the blacks concerning their irresponsible breeding habits.

I applaud blue tick's issue reframing, as he is one of many liberals here that take the time to reframe a point they know they can't win. Failing that, they follow liberal rule #2 and attack the conservative in an effort to make their conservative point taboo or simply put it out of bounds.

Tick, that didn't work for Maureen Dowd's inane defense of the Jersey girls screed, it doesn't work here.

sardis wrote:

innocentbystander wrote:That is because he wasn't conservative. Goldwater supported a woman's right to murder her unborn child. There is nothing conservative about that.

Abortion wasn't even a political issue in 1964. Goldwater didn't stake a position on it until 1980's.

Abortion has always been a political issue. What has changed is the public's outlook on how that affects everything that touches our society (now to the tune of 60,000,000 unborn dead.) In the 1950s it was very hush-hush and performed behind the scenes with filthy doctors who lost their board certifications (for whatever reason.) Today, it is a very lucrative, multi-billion dollar industry.

Goldwater lost because of three things, #1) JFK had just been murdered a year earlier and the country still mourning that nice young man thought that LBJ believed in everything JFK did, #2) Goldwater publically said he wanted to drop the Atom Bomb on the North Vietnamese, and #3) Goldwater was pro-abortion. In 1964, there was NO CONFLICT AT ALL with Roman Catholics on voting Democrat! Goldwater was a Republican who believed in abortion, he was the Devil incarnate, vote LBJ or go to Hell.

innocentbystander wrote:
If people started to THINK about things they would understand that the problem here is mental health/insane-young-men who have less in life than they feel they are entitled, not lawful access to guns.

I believe you are uniquely qualified to make assertions about mental health and insanity, so I applaud you again.

You are on a roll.

bluetick wrote:

innocentbystander wrote:
If people started to THINK about things they would understand that the problem here is mental health/insane-young-men who have less in life than they feel they are entitled, not lawful access to guns.

I believe you are uniquely qualified to make assertions about mental health and insanity, so I applaud you again.

You are on a roll.

You are the reason why conservatives have pretty much given up on ever trying to communicate with liberals. You are too focused on attacking your debator, not the issue. I know why you are doing this (it is because you can't WIN the debate.) So you are forced to try and discredit me. In your mind, that is the only way you win (kind of like those two assholes who tried to throw a pie in the face of Ann Coulter down in Tuscon.) If you cant debate, then humiliate. But ultimately what happens here is (by your own actions of insulting me) you are focing me to shun you.

You are forcing my hand. You are doing this. This is your fault.

You are a fucking nutcase.

Believe what you want about conservative vs liberal, you can be just as off as everyone else is.

aTm, we just had Martin Luther King Day. There were a myriad of reasons why that man was a Republican, mostly because he used his common sense to "think."

LBJ and MLK? That was 50 fuckin years ago. You might as well be talking Whigs or Torries or Democratic-Republicans for all that it means today in 20 fucking 13.

aTm wrote:Believe what you want about conservative vs liberal, you can be just as off as everyone else is.

aTm, we just had Martin Luther King Day. There were a myriad of reasons why that man was a Republican, mostly because he used his common sense to "think."

You might as well be talking Whigs or Torries or Democratic-Republicans for all that it means today in 20 fucking 13.

Not if you understand the history of the parties and where they parted ways. It all boils down to responsibility.

http://www.ejectejecteject.com/archives/000062.html

Its always been this way, 50 years back, 100 years back, 150 years even. Depending on how you look at the individual and how responsible that individual is, pretty much determines your political outlook in this country.