Gun Control Redux - Part 2

Well this conversation has gone on and I think I'm obliged to post the follow up.
I think I may have lost a friend and I'm very sorry about that. He's a good guy and means well, he's just stuck in a loop imo and can't get out... on the other hand I could just be maligning him unnecessarily.

K:

I don't particularly care about Trump or the Democratic party.

They seem all equally corrupt to me.

But you are totally wrong about gun control.

It is dead.

Ignorant kids can fall for it for awhile, but kids don't vote.

Nor do I think the police or military would actually try to implement the kind of gun control the democrats are pushing.

It is suicide for the whole party, once you go down that road.

Unions, labor, poor people, etc., none of them are going to support gun control to that level.

I lived through 2 students being killed in my senior year, and I can tell you that all the students were very happy there were armed teachers and janitors.  

If modern students don't get it, then they are insane and part of the problem.

You can't possibly make any one safer by disarming the honest people.

Me:

We do disagree a lot but that's OK, I think because we are both looking for the larger truth.

Nobody in this country really cares about the ME or the people in it. If they did we would have been out of there a long time ago as you suggest.

But they DO care about their children and now you are siding with the people who killed their children. Times are changing my friend, the kind of libertarian individualism you espouse is beginning to have the odor of dead fish about it. People who once might have railed against Ruby Ridge and Janet Reno are pretty much over that now and you have Mr Trump to thank for that. You and other old people may see him as a beneficial disruptor but the kids are very much aware that he's pathological liar who cares for no one but himself. He made a Yuuuuge mistake when he started to go after the FBI. He lost the youth (and rightly so). He may well survive on the backs of the white racists he has courted so avidly but the future belongs to the Florida high school kids. I believe the tide has turned. If you want to keep your guns better find a good deep hole to bury them.

Me, again:
Y’know I don’t think you guys have thought this through, any of you.

What do you imagine would happen if your plans for resisting the government actually came to the top of the soup? 

I’ll tell you what would happen:

There are approximately 17,985 state and local police offices in the US employing 765,000 sworn police officers, about 100,000 part time officers and 44, 000 deputies. This doesn’t count the 120,000 full time federal officers (US Marshalls and such).

This is about 1 million police officers… how many people who would willingly pick up their firearms and fire upon the police have you got?

And of course this doesn’t even count the National Guard (remember them? The guardians of the constitution within our borders? Armed with military grade weapons)

Currently the National Guard has about 210,000 active members on duty. You should really have a look at this document in regards to the national guard in case you had any fantasies of various governors rising up to support your insurrection.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurrection_Act

And if that was not enough there is the US armed forces which is authorized, on the President’s command, to suppress insurrection and or revolution in the United States and Posse Comitatus be damned.

Btw the US Armed force has about 2,280,000 soldiers

That's about 3,476,000 trained crowd control officers and professional warriors to face your...? What? 100,000 do or die guys? 10,000? Or do think Captain Moroder will save you?

They have howitzers and Bradley fighting vehicles. They have Abrams tanks and LAWS rockets and .50 caliber machine guns and flamethrowers, They have bunker buster bombs and nuclear weapons ferchrisakes.

And what do you have? A bunch of AR-15s and a lot of handguns… are you kidding me?

Use the tools that are available without the patently false bullshit like Scalias twisted interpretation of the 2^nd. Stop with the NRA, they don’t give a shit about you and your individual rights, they are there to promote gun sales. Run as far away from them as you can.

Get together in a real gun rights organization and hire really good lawyers to preserve as much of your rights as you can.

Disabuse yourselves of the notion that you can ‘win’ this fight. The children are really pissed at you, it’s too late. Get used to a lot more strict oversight and monitoring of your gun privileges, if you’re very very smart or have very very smart lawyers, it might be as easy as having a driving license. If you’re intransigent (ie, stupid) it’ll be a lot more like getting an FBI high level security pass… with full body cavity search.

There may be perks with this. I can easily see a Presidential National Emergency directive ordering any criminal and/or gang member/and or ‘raping’ mexicans shot on sight. Trump really likes Duterte… this may be his chance...

Gun Control Redux

I and some friends have had an ongoing - over several years - discussion about guns and gun control.

At one point I even bought a gun to see how I felt about owning one. I didn't feel any increase in godlike power nor did I feel like the world was now my oyster. I didn't feel safer for me or my family nor did I feel any increase in hostility for my fellow man.

I should say that I'm a fair shot with a bow - I can consistently hit a man-sized bale of hay at a distance of 100 yards. I own a couple of knives and I know how to use them. So absent a team of dedicated assassins, I am fairly confident about surviving for the next few years or so.

I have also had a very fast car: E39 M5, supercharged. So I've gotten that out of my system and I have every expectation of continued longevity (my Dad just turned 94 and seems to be in good health).

That all being said, the discussion has continued.

At first it was a bit hot and heavy, then I came to understand that it wasn't a condition that was amenable to discussion or persuasion. Gun owners acted like members of a cult. No amount of logic or reason would ever sway their opinions. Well, I said to myself: "So be it."

The other part of this is... [painful truth ahead, you won't like it but...] there are some 350 million people in this country and some 370 million guns. This means two awful things:

1) You'll never get the guns away from people, there are simply too many of them.

2) It doesn't really matter anyway because: statistically speaking gun deaths are insignificant - too small to matter on the great scales of history.

I know it seems horrible to think that but the numbers don't lie. Gun deaths, whether by cop or suicide or massacre just don't raise a blip compared to how many people there are in this country.

They don't matter.

So why am I raising the matter yet again?

I had another exchange with my group - and I should say that these guys are very open to discussion and are willing to talk and explain and even consider change (sometimes).

I got a statement from one of them and gave him my response: 

K:

You miss the point about gun control.

Sure other there are other countries with much stricter gun control, but they are not committing mass murder like our government did in Iraq, Waco, etc., and they were always somewhat draconian to start with

The US is committing mass murder, torture, and lots of other war crimes.

The US is the most dangerous country in the world right now, and it is attempting to stifle any and all resistance.

So gun control in the US is a far bigger issue than anywhere else in the world.

And yes it is worth killing and dying over I think.

Me:

Ah, but you miss the point. What has been shown time and time again is just how easy it is to commit mass murder with guns... even a child can do it. No one is worried about a G..... or a K... (my friends) going out and mowing down swathes of immigrants or children.

We are all a bit worried about so-called hunters getting plastered during hunting season and shooting anything or anyone who makes the underbrush twitch.

We're a little more worried about some dipshit teenager who doesn't have a clue to how his brain works and only has to decide whether to go to Syria and join ISIS or stay here and be a 'lone wolf' and mow down some defenseless teenagers or better yet some completely innocent children or settle for a few hundred country music fans. Funny I never notice them attacking a gun club or a police station.

I'm kinda surprised that gun people haven't formed some kind of vigilante society to detect, monitor and stop these idiots. It must have occurred to some people at least that this can't go on. Maybe you've shut down the outrage for this season or this generation but the anger against you is getting louder and louder. Do you thinks those kids in Florida are going to forgive or forget? The longer you guys cling to your guns the more certain will come the day when people have had it. And when that day comes they really will take your guns, all of them - no matter what it takes to do it. You are in the process of becoming pariahs and soon no one will care about your precious individual rights because they will see you as threatening theirs.

You guys really need to wake up and smell the cordite.

So that's where I'm at these days about guns, I'd be interested in your thoughts...