For once, I think, the National Rifle Association (NRA)—a group of unrepentant evildoers—is feeling beleaguered. Americans, traumatized by a series of terrorist shootings here and abroad—many involving assault weapons—are starting to wonder if largely unrestricted access to guns is really so great after all. The governor of Connecticut has just issued an executive order banning sales of guns to those on the “no fly” list—about the weakest kind of gun reform we can enact, yet one opposed by Republicans. And the New York Daily News, a tabloid but also the fourth most circulated paper in America, has come out swinging against the NRA and in favor of gun control.
The headline after the Paris attacks:
The headline the San Bernardino shootings:
Of course the NRA being the unreflective and odious organization that it is, they immediately mustered one of their flaks, Dana Loesch, a conservative radio host, commentator, and author of that famous screed Hands Off My Gun: Defeating the Plot to Disarm America, which makes her eminently qualified to be the Voice of Evil. And so she put out a video, which I’ve embedded below and which The Washington Post describes like this:
After the mass shooting in San Bernardino, Calif., the Daily News deployed all of its tabloid cover in an attack on what it called America’s “gun scourge” and the “cowards,” meaning the politicians, hiding “behind meaningless platitudes” instead of fixing the problem. “GOD ISN’T FIXING THIS” was the headline. Now the National Rifle Association has fired back, with its own screaming headline, directed at the Daily News specifically and the “Godless Left” in general. Narrated by a grim-faced Dana Loesch, and interwoven with video footage of what appears to be first responders, the NRA video leaves no stone unturned and none of its demons unscathed as it connects the dots, as the video’s introduction says, between “the global alliance of elitists, media activists, Hollywood celebrities, campus radicals and political power mongers who have openly attacked sacred American values and the people who cherish them with ruthlessness, contempt and downright hatred,” and who share “the same fanatical fervor to tear apart the foundations of America as the terrorists who threaten our very survival. Only hours after an attack of radical jihadi terror on American soil,” says Loesch, a conservative radio host, in the video, “the New York Daily News became the loudest, vilest, most condescending voice for what many people call the Godless Left. “These false prophets at this failing excuse for a newspaper claimed to enjoy special knowledge of God’s plans somehow … even as they mocked the entire concept of religion. But they weren’t alone. As a horrific act of terror unfolded in real time, the majority of Americans turned to earnest prayer for the dead, the wounded, their families and the world — while political and media elites joined forces to insult and mock and disparage them … and in so doing, laid bare the utter moral depravity of the Godless Left.”
I can only imagine what Europeans would think of that video! But it embodies everything you need to know about the NRA
If you can handle any more of Loesch’s gun-nuttery, here’s a one-minute video in which she argues why a good American Mom should have a gun:
Loesch says “I am the National Rifle Association of America,” which is extremely scary. But the sick thing is that it’s true. I can only hope to see a day when the NRA loses all its credibility. Once an organization promoting gun safety, it’s now become a vicious pit bull defending the rights of anybody to have a gun of any kind, including assault rifles.
h/t: jsp
If I accept Jebus as my personal savior, where do I get my gun?
For some reason “Annie, go get your gun!” suddenly echoed through my ears.
Shortly followed by the new NRA line of clothing for the fashion-conscious muslim gun-toting woman – the Holster-in-a-Hijab?
What – that would bring the NRA into conflict with Trumpette? Oh goody – I’ll get … not popcorn. How does a good cheese selection and some dry crackers sound?
“Holster-in-a-Hijab”
That should be a skit on SNL.
“the Holster-in-a-Hijab?”
Must not be much of a market for it or they would certainly be selling it.
On the campus of Liberty University. Just ask for Jerry Falwell Jr.
The gun madness apparently knows no bounds.
To borrow a theme from Heinrich Heine: Where they shoot down reasonable ideas, they will ultimately shoot down people as well.
Has the NRA tried promoting the automatic issuing of automatic weapons to all American citizens, yet?
No, but there’s at least one city that requires it’s residents to have guns:
http://rense.com/general9/gunlaw.htm
Without irony, they mandated gun ownership to protect themselves from people with guns.
The Onion couldn’t have put it any better!
So, reading it, the law was passed as a stunt to get publicity, it’s never been enforced, and the small town was a low-crime area anyway.
cr
Supporting a comment I made below as to how a lot of the pro-gun screeds are just for show.
I,m speechless !!
Where did they find a person like Dana Loesch. Wait, some of my neighbors are like that.
It is heartening to see the NRA have to either make a new strategy or slip into the synonymous fringe with crazies. They should take a note from what the NFL is having to rectify as the pre-teen clinical concussions mount and mothers decide enough is enough.
I am the godless left, and I have come for your children. I will not rest until every kindergartner has been cruelly stripped of their twelve gauges and left defenceless in the middle of the sand-pit.
When I’m finished with you you’ll be broken. You’ll find yourself in a mall – some dusky-brown checkout guy’s eyeballing you, you’ve had a bad day, he shortchanged you too, probably, and you reach for your glock…but your holster’s empty…
On that day, when some jumped-up Muslim A-rab at the local supermarket charges you an extra 30 cents for a packet of peanut butter Oreos and you’ve no way of defending yourself besides your twelve inch hunting knife(which you’re saving for the Christmas party anyway)…that’s when you’ll know I’ve won.
I am the godless left. Be afraid.
8)
Well done!
cr
You know… this means war, as the wise philosopher Bugs Bunny used to say.
Is it just me, or do pro-gun advocates in the US behave like conspiracy theorists; convinced the rest of the US is out to get them? They seem to hit the right notes: belief in implausible alliances, acute paranoia, suspicion of authority, making plausible-sounding arguments in the absence or occasionally in the teeth of evidence, turning unconnected issues into parts of their case, etc. The conspicuous exception is the hapless victim narrative, and that’s only because it’s hard to characterize as hapless someone trying to solve the problem with guns.
I think I also see an atavistic combination of puritanism (treating religiosity and “Americanism” as sacred things to be protected) and tribalism (the whole them-versus-us way they refer to the “godless left” and others). Throw in their emotional zeal and extreme demonization of notable opponents, and I’m almost amazed the US hasn’t degenerated into a second civil war yet.
Naw, a lot of the bombast is just theatre.
I think you’re right on the money. My feeling is that if the general economic / water / food distribution situation goes south here, it will be civil war time, right along the old lines.
That second video, with the moody shot of the crucifix against the colour-corrected sky and the voiceover about American rights, is disgusting.
I’m from Toronto and this all seems surreal to me even though I read about it every day.
It is kinda ironic, the whole thing. Wanting to ban Muslims, while flooding the place with high powered firearms. Muslims don’t even warrant a background check, but any loon can get hold of as many assault weapons as they want.
Can someone please ask if he would ban US born Muslim citizens from waning guns.
If the answer is no, then why not since he clearly says they want to kill us.
If the answer is yes,mother he wants to get rid of the second amendment.
Check mate, I think.
Sorry, “Can someone please ask if he would…” should have specified he as Donald Trump.
The videos’ attempt to conflate God, guns, and American values will have great appeal to those who are already convinced that they are “losing” America. Whether these videos will recruit many new converts is doubtful. The right wing’s strategy, as exemplified by these videos and last night’s Republican debate, is to further expand the atmosphere of fear that grips this country. They are laying the groundwork for the rise of fascism and a strongman, like Trump, who promises to solve all the nation’s problems by the force of will. Many in the white middle and working classes who have been losing ground economically are quite susceptible to fascistic appeals as they grope blindly for scapegoats. This danger can best be averted by improving the economic condition of these people, but the Republicans have continually blocked any substantive legislation in this area. So, the people who most need help continually support those who hurt them the most. They are the classic dupes.
+1
We are the peaceful majority. We only want the truth and freedom of speech! Now shut the Fuck up you immoral heathen or we’re gonna shoot you in the face!
Pretty surreal stuff. I swear if I hadn’t known it was real I would have assumed I was watching a video from The Onion.
whaaaaa …. it’s not The Onion?!
“…sacred American values…,” indeed! And every time I hear or read the pathetic “thoughts and prayers” mantra, my blood begins to simmer.
To be honest I don’t remember seeing any public statement from her at all. I’m sure she gave one, but her media splash was nowhere near as big as Obama’s…which in turn, in this case, was nowhere near as big as the Daily Mail’s.
I am British (English) currently living and working in Canada and I think the videos and posts sent to this web-site are made up, in fact I think this post is made up!
Seriously, this sort of stuff is really frightening, almost worthy of Monty Python except they would never have given air time to such rubbish.
Do the people of the USA actually believe this nonsense? Do they really believe in the power of prayer? Where is the “godless left”?
If the news is to be trusted lots of then believe in the power of Donald Trump. I am not sure which is more frightening!
I think it might be time to go back to Norway!
Sadly, many of them (us) do believe this nonsense. They constitute the Republican Party.
“Do the people of the USA actually believe this nonsense? Do they really believe in the power of prayer?”
Oh, yeah, all 322 million of us. Lock, stock, and barrel.
You know what? after my quick post and after some good old Google & Wikepedia research, you could actually be statistically correct (no personal insult intended). Although Canada actually “stars” as statistically quite the opposite to the USA.
Not quite so frightening!
Nowhere near all of us, surely?
Nope, but a screaming, spittle spraying minority of some millions.
NRA membership: ~ 5 million (1.5% of US population)
You can probably multiply by 10 for the total number of gun nuts. So something like 10-15% of the population.
About 32% of US households have guns, and the number is declining.
Also, gun violence has been going down:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/12/03/weve-had-a-massive-decline-in-gun-violence-in-the-united-states-heres-why/
Sorry, I thought there for a minute Ann Coulter had run out of bleach. Apparently the NRA lobby thinks this feminine side will attract more members and soften the message. Not really. Makes me wonder what is the difference between Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh – about 150 pounds.
Sadly being as how people such as this don’t have a well developed sense of irony, but I wonder if any of them could imagine how much like jihadists they sound?
Like other non-USians, the level of denial and lack of logic here astound me.
It’s pretty ironic how she goes on about “the godless left” refusing to have an honest debate on the subject when it’s the NRA that is blocking BY LAW attempts to collect statistics to allow that honest debate to be held. What are they scared the data will show? The truth?
And I’ve never seen anything in the Bible about a God-given right to use a gun to ensure my survival. I remember stuff about turning the other cheek, the meek inheriting the earth, treating others as you’d like to be treated (e.g. not getting shot) and other similar sentiments.
In countries like mine where atheists aren’t a hated minority, we aren’t restricted to the political left, and the religious aren’t restricted to the right. In fact our centre-right PM is an atheist. (Granted the centre-left one before him was an atheist too.)
Most people in NZ are like me: completely bemused by the attitude to guns and gun safety in the US. We consider it weird.
Actually, I don’t think they find the guns for everyone in the bible. It is more delusional than a phrase in that book. The g*d given, comes from their idea that America was founded on the Christian g*d ideals and thereby the Constitution and every part of government. The second amendment just confirms g*d wants them to have guns because these were all g*d loving folks that made this government.
It’s all crap but if you say it enough times it is real, its gospel.
Jesus said to him, “Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword.”
I guess NRA interprets that as “the sword is useless, take AR-15.
Good point about the NRA blocking the collection of any statistics about gun use. I vaguely remember a study that was released shortly before the NRA-backed law was passed that, among other things, indicated that armed burglers outshot armed homeowners by about 4:1. Not something the NRA would want to admit or have well known.
Oh the joy of being the constituent of an atheist…
My MP is a staunch Catholic who voted against marriage equality, so it’s not all good. 🙁 I’ve since discovered he’s a relative too!
I didn’t know the NRA were blocking statistic-gathering on this. How are they doing so? How are they even allowed to?
The behaviour of the NRA is as deranged as anything I’ve seen from any mainstream political organisation in the west. This video in particular makes them look like some unhinged boyfriend/girlfriend who just goes nuclear on you when you threaten to walk out – ‘I hate you, you’re shit in bed, you’re ugly, my friends can’t stand you, I’ve been cheating on you, I want every present I’ve given you returned…’.
What can sane Americans do in the face of such a wave of furious, terrified, scorched-earth temper-tantrumming except be the grown up in the relationship and put their foot down? These are millions of adults who turn into mewling, foot-stamping children if even the slightest, most perfunctory compromise is proposed. They need to be shaken out of their entitlement.
Well they can’t block NGOs from trying to collect statistics, but they can certainly block legislation to have the government collect information on gun sales and use, and they can also block efforts to make public any information state/federal government office might already be collecting. They do so via campaign donations to legislators, who then make sure any such bills to collect/disseminate information get killed.
With some causes, this wouldn’t matter. If you’re talking about disease statistics or other things, NGOs can do a great job. In the case of gun use, however, the primary reporting and investigating bodies are police forces and the Department of Justice. Which are government. So preventing federal and state government collection of gun use statistics is pretty effective.
They get bits added to your laws specifically saying that particular data CANNOT be collected. For example, paediatricians aren’t allowed to ask about guns in the household. The excuse is stigmatizing parents. And it’s supposed to be liberals who are too PC?!
They usually cite Luke 22:35-39 as Jesus telling his disciples to arm themselves for their upcoming mission work. I disagree with that interpretation of the passage, but that’s a debate for another thread.
That’s not an interpretation I would ever make either.
However, a helluva lot of religious conversion was done at the point of a sword, and later the barrel of a gun. 🙁
As an example of the fear that has overwhelmed America, this is from a just released ABC News/ Washington Post poll.
————-
“A majority of Americans oppose banning assault weapons for the first time in more than 20 years of ABC News/Washington Post polls, with the public expressing vast doubt that the authorities can prevent “lone wolf” terrorist attacks and a substantial sense that armed citizens can help.”
“Just 45 percent in this national survey favor an assault weapons ban, down 11 percentage points from an ABC/Post poll in 2013 and down from a peak of 80 percent in 1994. Fifty-three percent oppose such a ban, the most on record.
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/now-oppose-assault-weapons-ban-doubts-stopping-lone/story?id=35778846”
——————-
Yes, everybody should go out and buy an assault weapon, right now! With such an overwhelming demand, there may be a shortage. In fact, to guarantee your safety, you should buy several and strategically place them throughout your house. Make sure they’re loaded and ready to fire. You can’t waste time loading should an intruder break in. Surely your young children are smart enough not to fool with them. Nothing to fear there.
Isn’t American great?
Its worth pointing out that this is pretty much just a symbolic gesture – political theater intended to mollify liberals – at this point, as state and local officials don’t have access to the no-fly lists. And although in principle it’s a good idea, it needs to be implemented carefully. Otherwise for every one instance of a person on the no-fly list getting a weapon, there will be thousands of instances of someone named like someone on the no-fly list getting falsely ‘outed’ as a terrorist by local officials or gun shop owners, and then becoming the target of some vigilante justice.
It’s also almost certainly unconstitutional, for multiple reasons.
See, that’s why we have things like The Patriot Act; for those times when you’ve just gotta suspend the ol’ Constitution.
The no-fly list in its current form is most likely unconstitutional, but banning people on it from buying guns could be acceptable, since we ban people with certain criminal convictions from buying guns, and not even the NRA seems to be opposed to that.
Someone named like someone on the no fly list? The ‘no fly’ list itself is quite possibly one of the most inaccurate and error-riddled documents in existence.
As I understand it, it’s secret. So no-one can check it for accuracy or dispute their inclusion on it. And the TSA (assuming they have a hand in it) is well-known for its outstanding competence and reliability. (That was sarcasm).
In reality, I would think being denied transportation is a far greater imposition than being refused the ‘right’ to buy guns.
cr
Damn. Close italics fail. Oops!
cr
“the same fanatical fervor to tear apart the foundations of America…”
Riiiiight. Wanting some common sense gun legislation is a “fanatical fervor” that is “tearing apart the foundations of America”. The right-wing is great at projecting. Who has ever considered the flintlock musket as a part of the foundations of America? What a bunch of cry babies- please grow-up. I truly believe that if you could identify cultures as mature or immature, I’d have to say America has the most immature culture in the world.
And just like children, a lot of them aren’t yet capable of understanding what’s wrong with their position.
It’s only a few days since a five year old shot both her parents. This is seen as acceptable collateral damage to the NRA and their advocates.
Dana Loesch is another reason to be proud to be part of the “godless left.”
Yes – I’ve been so frustrated at the behaviour of the illiberal left recently: this is a reminder that as bad as they can be there is still an absolute chasm between them and the right.
Yeah. At least the regressive left are trying to do good. They go about it in completely the wrong way, but their motives are usually positive.
To paraphrase Lady Bracknell from ‘The Importance Of Being Earnest’:
“To shoot one parent may be regarded as a misfortune; to shoot both looks like carelessness.”
It’s their defining characteristic.
‘the global alliance of elitists, media activists, Hollywood celebrities, campus radicals and political power mongers ”
Wait, if these are the “Allies”, what do we call the folks on the side of the NRA? The “Axis?” The “Horde”?
“The “godless left” is even blamed for creating the San Bernardino massacres, by promoting an environment in which the shooters’ neighbor didn’t want to report suspicious activity. ”
I didn’t hear any reports of any suspicious activity on the side of the shooters, was there any? Also, their neighbor actually participated by giving them the guns! Was that also something Queen Hillary wrought?
Nope. And the police investigating the incident are now reporting the couple did not post anything suspicious on social media either. They did say some things in personal emails about becoming more devout, but outside of personal messages to friends it sounds like they were pretty good at hiding their transformation.
Mike Huckabee is the author of a book called “God, Guns, Grits, and Gravy”.
A sign in someone’s office in the 1970s movie “Wolfen” says “God, Guns, and Guts made this nation great. Let’s keep all three.”
There is an album by the Southern rock group Lynyrd Skynyrd called “God and Guns”.
There is a Facebook page called “God, Guns, Freedom and the American Way”
There was a reality TV show called “God, Guns, and Automobiles” (portraying gun culture in not so favorable terms.) One of its producers wrote a book called “God, Guns, and Guts”.
(And a Christian feminist has an anti-gun editorial in HuffPo called “God, Guns, and Feminist Theology”)
OK, isn’t America just about the ONLY nation that associates the two G-words in this way??
And is it time for another a-word comparable to “atheist” that is for people against overly armed civilians?
Don’t forget Ted Nugent’s 2000 book, “God, Guns, and Government.”
Ted Nugent can read and write? Who knew?
Nugent’s book did not show up in the first 20 hits on this morning’s Google search of “God Guns”.
Don’t know if that’s due to how Google parses MY search history, or if it’s just not considered as significant.
Whoops, I just checked Wikipedia and the book was actually “God, Guns, & Rock and Roll.”
pAcifist?
[On the notion that it is the state, never a random militia, that has the monopoly on force, violence and guns. You elect your government, you don’t chose at gun point outside of revolutions.
Incidentally, how many revolutions has been made by an organized militia? I would guess 0, give or take a French revolution.]
I remember when Dana Loesch was on CNN after Sandy Hook claiming that the 2nd Amendment guarantees our right to own tanks and then carries on with the non sequitur that tank owners aren’t committing crimes. Here’s the complete transcript where Loesch implies we have the right to unrestricted access to arms. I assume she’d carry this logic beyond tanks, as apparently any restriction at all is too much for her.
I assume she’d like small tactical nuclear weapons — they even save you from having to practice enough to actually hit anything directly!
Right, back to rule by the biggest bully! Send the clock back 800 years.
Why am I not surprised?
“For once, I think, the National Rifle Association (NRA)—a group of unrepentant evildoers—is feeling beleaguered.”
I think this supports the idea that public favor could switch pretty rapidly towards gun control, in spite of the recent polling that suggests otherwise.
I think that one of the reasons that so many people don’t favor it is that they fear gun nut vitriol.
THE NRA solution is easy: Kill anyone you don’t like. Simple, straightforward, even teabaggers can understand it.
See that little panel on the front page equating the NRA to ISIS?
Ouch! That’s gotta sting!
cr
I just hope Dana Loesch never runs for president.
Hey, she could share a ticket with Palin!
Loesch seems smarter than Palin and speaks like an angry feminist! So I googled “Loesch and feminism” to see what I’d find. I see that there’s a video about this. I’m only about five minutes into watching it, and I won’t bother watching more, but I’ve transcribed how Loesch describes her former self and her conversion from being a liberal feminist into what she is today:
“a dirty, dirty liberal, like the ones that were, like the ones, like the liberal that was annoying. And Stephen, I’m like, I also talk with my hands a lot. I’m not, I used to not only be a dirty, dirty liberal, but I was also one of those annoying fembot feminists, like the type who would have gotten mad at the Budlight Saint Patrick’s Day tweet today. Ya, I used to be, I mean maybe not that bad. I mean wasn’t, I didn’t go into a rage spiral every time a man held a door open for me. But oh my, I hate me in the past. Like if we ever, if there were a time machine, I’d love to go back in the past and kick my own ass. That would be amazing. And this one would totally win. Uh but no, that’s, and the more educated I became, and the more I grew up and matured, that’s when I started very slowly converting. And being a mom was a huge part of it. But my, I mean, it’s kind when your whole family is liberal. I had no shot. My whole family was liberal, and they worked uh with uh the state party of the democrats in Missouri. My uncle was a delegate for Barack Obama in 2012. So, I really didn’t have. I mean I went to a very liberal arts university. So, liberal, liberal, liberal, liberal. Not the tofu kind. That’s just who I was surrounded by. So it was really hard.”
Is this a typical reaction in Dana’s world? I can’t say I’ve ever had a reaction more negative than simply indifference when I hold a door for someone. The majority of the time, the person says thanks, be it a man, a woman, or a fembot. But rage spirals? Can’t say I’ve seen that and I work in the middle of the U.S. capitol of godless leftism, New York City.
@chrisbuckley80: Exactly. I, too, was struck by how Dana exaggerates. But because she ties her exaggeration to caricature (rage-spiring fembot), the ken for brain-searing emotional imagery is interesting.
It’s scary because it is hard to compete with that. Reasoned discourse builds cautiously and slowly with multiple lines of evidence but also (out of necessity) often relies on experts to interpret field-specific knowledge.
But quick and exaggeratedly dirty images stick and spread.
Well, she and Palin do seem to share a gift for syntax…
As to the fembot/door-rage crap–can we all say, “strawwoman?” But what else would you expect from a Limbaugh/Hannity/O’Reilly–and yea, Palin–wannabe?
Maybe she’s actually a comedienne, and this is just a parody of an extreme, ultra-Right-wing crackpot. A joke, like Borat was, where people though he was for real, but he actually wasn’t.
That’s what I am hoping anyway.
The Left must over crowded with confused godless, religious apologetics, PC crusaders, moral relativistic freaks (oh behave) smelly sandals.. hold on, I wear sandals, ah! but only in the summer.
When one should.
The polarisation on display here is truly alarming and I can only think of one way at the moment to defeat it. Their young, and even as I hate saying that, to much like big brother, more has to be done by secular movements in the US to counter, and loudly.
That rant, ugly as it is, is free speech in full flight, no problem there, and I might be pandering to availability heuristics, heat of the moment stuff, but newspapers move on to the next issue that arises, the next big story. They are not dependable enough to show, as our host does repeatedly with all his passionate politeness what is a rational approach. The US secular need to illuminate ways to discard such a vile distortion of a peaceful freedom of existence.
I have only had 2 cups of coffee but that women grew horns as I watched her, and bugger me, she also blew my premise that the US need more women in powerful places to lend more political weight to fighting archaic gun laws. Perhaps I should be adding, caring women with humanist values because if you have men politicians like that, they suck.
Is this a deliberate ploy by the NRA to use women?
Where’s my stinky sandals I have to soak them in detergent.
I’m not defending the NRAs position, but the restriction of gun ownership from individuals under suspicion of terrorist activities could constitute severe government overreach. Federal agencies would have the power to label dissidents as “terrorists”, thereby restricting their capacity to own firearms. If an armed insurgent ever arose against the US government, or even a significant militia movement, this type of regulation would constitute an established administrative infrastructure for strangling the insurrection, for better or for worse. Although this is a separate issue, it seems pertinent that a significant number of citizens have ended up on the no-fly list, including (during the Bush administration) liberal critics, dissidents, and critics of the Iraq War and War on Terror; obviously, if there was a perfect list of terrorists, we should restrict those individuals from buying guns. But I think we are all aware, in relation, for example, to the experience of Guatanemo Bay, that allowing an executive body to unilaterally draft lists of “terrorists”, including US citizens, and preventing even US citizens from purchasing guns, without judicial oversight or even formal charges, is blatantly unconsistutional and an overstep of federal authority, as is the no-fly list, and is more likely to be abused to further government power than used for good. A right-wing government, bent on pursuing endless war abroad or widespread domestic surveillance (like the Bush administration) could use such a gun policy to persecute dissidents by labeling them “Terrorists!” “Traitors!” “Unpatriotic!” As vast corrupt pseudo-governmental military contractors and business interests subvert democracy, engaging in war, propaganda, and persecution to siphon profits from the public purse, we need armed militias like the NRA to defend Liberty against Tyranny. I daresay we should have risen against the Bush (Cheney) Administration and instituted a new government, to avoid the bloodshed of that pointless and corrupt war in Iraq. Against the oppression of these powerful institutions there lies only the collective voice of the common people; we must be armed in local militias, able to defend the common interests against the capitalist (or pseudo-governmental; if taking resources from the public purse, as military contractors and the energy interests sponsoring war do, can even be rightly labeled “capitalism”) elites that control our government through coercion, bribery, and propaganda! I am sad to see you, Dr. Coyne, succumbing to that very right-wing propaganda that supports security over Liberty, the pursuit of wealth over the pursuit of the common good, mass surveillance over privacy, the power of the few over the freedom of the many!
That is half right. The half that is suspicious of the political use of unchecked ‘terrorist’ list without the scrutiny o the courts.
The half that suggests the NRA is a rational counter to government tyranny is a bit like promoting ISIS as a counter to President Assad.
cr
I feel largely the same way about the no fly list. It’s quite questionable, especially when applied to citizens. Of course, so was the entire Patriot Act.
John, thank you for your thoughtful comments. I deem your last sentence regarding PCC as inappropriate and inaccurate, but your concern regarding unrestricted use of a ‘no fly list’ is spot on. I think that a ‘No Fly List’ of citizens should be completely unconstitutional without judicial oversight with the bar set very high. However, a ‘no fly list’ for non-US citizens, especially if crafted in coordination with Interopol or other international partners may be a very legitimate reason to restrict gun purchases.
Keeping it short, I’ll just say that the NRA is America’s own homegrown terrorist organization. If it’s members can’t be charged with shooting people directly, they certainly aid, abet and provide moral comfort to those who do.
I always knew it was bad over there, but by God, you’ve got some utterly insane people spouting nonsense.
If they are accusing ‘the Left’ of being godless, isn’t that actually a compliment? They’re basically saying, ‘These people – over to our left here – are rational, thoughtful, and don’t accept unfounded assertions, but we, on the other hand do. So there!’
That’s how I interpret this ridiculous ‘accusation’ of theirs. These people are so bereft of brains they actually think that to call someone ‘godless’ is an insult, when in fact it is the exact opposite.
Here’s a just out editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine on guns:
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe1515975