Conservative and insurrectionist aren't mutually inclusive. It's the conservatives' time in the shade. They're pissed. This thread sort of reminds me of McCarthyism. If all democrats are pinko commies, then all republicans must be right wing fascists. You're mostly assuming that since a very small fraction of conservatives want to get rid of obama (the Nazi vs Wiemar way), then all conservatives do. As much as I hate obama and the way this country has mostly been going to shit the past thirty years or so, I would be the first to take up arms against any and all insurrectionists. I'm an American first and borderline conservative second. As an American I seek discussion and moderation, not paranoia and revolution.

I'm aware that conservatism and insurectionism aren't mutually inclusive. In fact I'm quite sure that your average American conservative has little more than a mild dislike of President Obama. My issue is we don't seem to see liberal insurrectionists. In fact, the only liberal terrorists out there are the ones trying to stop whaling boats. Liberals are generally a lot more interested in civil disobedience than armed revolution, even the loons.

When I said that those crazy and paranoid morons all happen to be conservative, I was driving at an important question. Why do you suppose that is? Why aren't there liberal Tim McVeighs or liberal Scott Roeders (the man that killed Dr. Tiller)? Why is it that religious Olbermann watchers aren't showing up to town hall meetings with guns?

I don't know Will. I truly don't. But I have to dispute one point; there are liberal terrorists: The Weathermen, eco-terrorists, hell, even the black panthers for a short while. Both sides have plenty of loons. We just have to keep our wits about us until natural selection roots them out.:thumbsup:

and my issue is that when Bush/Cheney was running roughshod over the constitution, some of us more liberty minded people were also pissed, but all we heard from the liberal side is why didn't we 'gunners' do something about it then? WTF do you want from us? If the liberals aren't going to stand with us, why should we stand with you?

good question? maybe I can get a decent answer without hearing some bullshit about penis size or IQ handicaps. do liberals have issues with individual rights?

Alright, the answer is really quite simple and it's going to come off as an attack but I swear it's not meant that way.

Liberals oppose gun culture. We hate guns and generally we don't trust people that like guns. It took me years to trust you, even thought you gave me no reason not to trust you. Its not meant as personal, I never made a conscious decision not to trust you, but there's such an aversion to things like war and shootings on the left that we develop a hypersensitivity. We ourselves are so removed from that kind of violence we don't grasp the culture. Because we're so separate from that way of thinking—that "as a last resort, I can always pull my piece" option—it doesn't even occur to our radical elements to go shoot up a town hall or blow up Monsanto or whatever types of attacks a liberal might be inclined to be a part of. It never even enters our mind as an option. Speaking from personal experience, when something violates my personal code to my very core, like someone attacking people close to me, my first instinct isn't to put my hand on the holster, ready to draw. My first instinct is to put myself between them and danger and react non-lethally. It's an entirely different mindset. Thinking of the different progressive people I know IRL and here on TFP, I suspect they wouldn't have that instinct to use deadly force either. It's not that we're all pacifists, we're not, but most of us share a strong aversion to violence and war. It's why liberals have always been underrepresented in the armed forces. We're not cowards, we just have a different way of fighting that involves less violence.

I'm not at all suggesting that every 2nd Amendment loving American is a terrorist, or is even violent by nature. All I'm saying is that the most radical elements of gun culture, the rare exceptions to the mostly responsible people, are the ones that are going to be using acts of violence like shooting up a holocaust museum or blowing up a Federal building. I cannot imagine a liberal shooting up the George W. Bush library or blowing up a weapons factory. Really, the closest liberals get to that is eco-terrorism, which is generally just things like lighting an SUV on fire or spiking trees, things that are more about property damage than putting people in danger.

One thing I can never understand is the idea that you can stop a violent agression with non violence. It isn't possible. I understand Will that some people may have an aversion to violence, I hate violence, but If I'm walking down the street with my wife, and someone gets it in their head that they want to a)rob us or b) rape my wife with the threat of a weapon, how is anything short of pulling my gun in defense of my or my wife's life going to stop this person? No amount of rationalizing with said person is going to stop him, no amount of debate.

Sometimes you can't, but killing someone for trying to kill you makes you the same as that person. Anyway, I'm not talking about debating the person, I'm talking about just how willing one is to kill someone else. Why would I want to kill someone for the $80 in my pocket? Even if I was poor, such a thing could not be just, could it? And why are the only choices lethal force or talking? Tasers and mace are perfectly legitimate methods of non-lethal force which can deter an attacker.

I know that when you're trained to use a gun, one of the primary rules is "shoot to kill". You're not taught to shoot out a leg like they do on TV, you're taught to shoot at the head or more commonly the torso.

rahl just proved Will's point. Of COURSE a position of violence-aversion seems impossibly naive to a position of violence-acceptance. Just like a position of violence-acceptance seems needlessly brutish to a position of violence-aversion. My position seems best to me, but only because it's mine. Objectively, I can see it's no better than the opposite.

You may be right, will. You may have your finger on the thing that makes (in my view) conservative fanatics so much more dangerous than liberal fanatics. I don't mean dangerous in the "push through policies that are bad for the country" sense. I mean dangerous in the "stalk you, hunt you down, and mother fucking shoot you" sense.

Precisely. If violence is against one's nature, even if one is incredibly radical, the temptation to do violence will be overruled by personal ethics.

What we should concentrate on is real life consequences for radicalization of conservatives vs. liberals. Radicalized liberals will protest, cause property damage, and use other civil disobedience methods. Radicalized conservatives do not have those limitations as they're already willing to use deadly force in certain situations.

The worst case of conservative terrorism I'm aware of would be the bombing of the Murrah Building:
http://lefteyeonthemedia.files.wordp...dg-bombing.jpg
Tim McVeigh and Terry Nichols are (was, in the case of McVeigh) conservative terrorists, spurred into radicalism because of Waco and Ruby Ridge. They created a simple fertilizer bomb and detonated it right in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal building on April 19, 1995. 168 people died, 680 people were injured, 324 buildings were destroyed, and caused a total of about $653 million in damage.

Waco and Ruby Ridge have always been rallying points for the pro-gun crowd to justify their wanting to be armed against a tyrannical government, but now that seems to be shifting away from actual instances of the government acting in a tyrannical fashion to a president acting in a moderate way. As someone that's pretended to be a conservative on a radical conservative forum for over 2 years now, I can tell you without any doubt that Barack Obama will be the excuse for the next large attack by a radical conservative. This has to be stopped, and the only way I can see that happening is for those few moderate conservatives that are left to aggressively challenge the radical elements. If someone is repeating lies about H.R. 3200, stand up to them and correct them citing verifiable sources. Force them to face their true enemy: their own fear and ignorance. I'd like to think I'm doing my part via deception, but a liberal can only wear a conservative mask so well.

..

Good old Chuck Manson wasn't exactly a buttoned up, god-fearing, 3-piece suit type.

Being sure of something hardly makes it true. Please supply verifiable statistics to back this up.
Most welfare recipients are children, and thus do not have a political affiliation. And before you start on the "well I'm sure their parents are..." line, I'll again ask for statistics.
I see. "If you're not willing to commit murder, you don't care about your life or the lives of your family". That's simply not true. I don't love or value my family any less than you do yours. I recognize the probability of being in one of the nightmare scenarios that gun owners cook up to excuse their brandishing weapons everywhere they go is incredibly low. How often is someone going to break into my house with the sole purpose of murdering/raping me and my family?
You have no reason to be so afraid of me. Even if I did take your gun, which I won't, I'm of no threat to you. Instead of fearing me, maybe you should get to know me.

---------- Post added at 07:48 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:47 PM ----------

Charles Manson isn't a radical liberal, though.

I'm a liberal who supports the right to bear arms. RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!!

Most liberals actually are okay with the Second Amendment. Some of us are even armed. I'm more talking about what rat called "violence-aversion", which is much more common among liberals than it is conservatives.

I agree people are different and have different mindsets. I completely respect anyones way of protecting themselves or their families. If you prefer mace or taser, great. I would never judge anyone based on whether they carry a gun or not. I just happen to carry, I'm not a crazy conservative nutjob, I'm not even republican. I honestly hope to never ever have to use my weapon. I guess I'm just the "I'd rather have it and not need it" kinda guy.

Please don't misunderstand. I don't think people that carry guns are crazy, I think they have a different mindset than my own. rahl, I'm certain that you will use your gun responsibly if that nightmare situation ever does find you. There are other gun-folk, however, that cannot act as responsibly. There are other people that are comfortable with the prospect of acting violently under the right circumstances, only their understanding of what circumstances require such action are skewed for whatever reason.

Timothy McVeigh convinced himself that the FBI and ATF's actions at Waco legitimized his attack on the Murrah building. I'm sure you would agree with me that Waco did not legitimize such an attack, even though we have different philosophies about violence. Likewise, there are liberal versions of Tim McVeigh out there, people with a skewed perception of when it's necessary to act in an extreme way. The difference is that the liberal, or more precisely the aggression-aversion Tim McVeigh probably wouldn't consider murder to be a legitimate response regardless of how he felt.

I would equate the tim mcveighs out there to muslim suicide bombers. They truely believe in their heart they are doing the right thing.

That's a good comparison. Those willing to commit acts of murder in the name of principle, ideology, or belief should be regarded similarly to one another.

So far, Will and I are having one conversation, with rahl sort of dipping his toes in it. Everyone else on this thread is having a different conversation.

The one Will and rahl and I are having is new, in my experience of this board. We've never really peeked behind the curtain quite this way before. I invite you to join THIS conversation, rather than simply repeating the mechanized talking points of your entrenched position.

timalkin, powerclown, and FuglyStick: You're missing the point, and in so doing you're demonstrating what the rest of us are talking about. Go back and read Will's post #105 and my post #108. Then note the shift in tone between rahl in post #106 and rahl in post #115. THAT'S an interesting thing to be talking about.

Actually there have been leftist organizations willing and able and successful in committing murder, but most of them died out in the 1970's. They didn't find purchase in a self-perpetuating culture as militia groups and assorted race-based hate groups have managed to do. I will agree that, currently, right-based political violence seems to be more likely at the present time, though. It's pretty well documented simply in the amount of death threats being received at the White House - not that all of them are serious, of course, but it belies an alarming amount of extreme psychological discomfort about the fact that we have not only a democrat, but a black democrat in the White House. It's disingenuous, though, to purport that all liberals are averse to violence. I have seen conversations right here at TFP where the idea of violent revolution was purported during the Bush presidency. And I remember being very disgusted by it.

As for the comment about 'men' acting like 'gigantic vaginas' - I find it interesting that:
1. women are being equated with cowards
and
2. men are being purported to be cowards (ie, women) if they don't have a gun they are willing to shoot someone with
and
3. fools expect anyone to take anything they say seriously when they say stupid shit like that

I don't see your answer as an attack on me, so it's all good.

'Liberals' as a whole, do not oppose gun culture. I've met quite a few liberals who are very ardent 2nd Amendment supporters and gun owners. That subset of liberals who ARE anti-gun, are just anti gun.....or as rat put it, violence averse. That's a good segue in to another part of the conversation, by the way.

there are different types on both sides but get largely ignored in the effort to cage ones arguments in definable tracts. I'll come back to this later though, i'm being told to get ready for work.

Yeah I don't see the connection between liberals and anti-gun sentiments, I think this was pulled out of thin air. If you're saying that far left liberals are somehow less extreme in their views I have prime real estate in the Everglades you may be interested in purchasing.

I'm only basing my opinion of how common gun-aversion liberals are on how many of us vote in favor of gun control. It's not all Democrats, but it's most of us.

Edit: And right now the Democrats have the bulk of the anti-war movement. Forgot to mention that.

well, i position myself pretty much on the left (surprise) and my position about guns actually varies quite alot depending on who i am talking to and what the situation is. i'm not particularly opposed to guns per se, i just don't like them being carried around alot in, say, a city. i don't assume that everyone who buys, uses, enjoys having guns is a nutcase, nor do i assume that the only reason anyone would buy or use a gun is violence. but for some reason, it's alot easier to have a conversation about this when you're not writing stuff on a messageboard and have the nuances of your position come through. i think messageboards may push people toward speaking in generalities because there's a pressure to keep things short. and because these are typically argument-based encounters.

if you know anything about the history of the political left, there is certainly no history of being violence-adverse or being shy about guns. almost from the start of the modern left, there has been a school of thought about revolutionary tactics that sees it on the model of a civil war. within that, some folk saw violence and organizing for it as a necessary response to what they assumed would be a violent state response to the surfacing of a revolutionary threat to it. others saw violence as a necessary weapon, something to be proactive about, to organize around. whichever way you see it, within the left there's long been a tendency toward military-style organization. the history of that organization hasn't worked out so well at times--you know, when these organizations actually took power and deployed themselves not only around what they said they were after, but also in ways shaped by their own organizational periods in the underground. think lenin.

there's also been a more diffuse anarchist tradition, which was overlayed with another tradition that reacted against leninism and it's unfortunate (um....yeah) effects on the soviet union. this tradition typically thought alot about general strikes, so about a non-violent way to accomplish revolutionary goals predicated on a mass withdrawal of consent from the existing order. personally, i like the idea of this, even though in the present world i can't quite figure out how exactly folk would go about withdrawing consent and have it register, given that the existing media apparatus tends to focus only on those sections which have not withdrawn consent and positions everything else outside it. whence "terrorism" and other fictions. image effects.

the point of all this is that it simply is not true that there's any coherent opposition between the political left and guns--or violence as a political weapon. what there are mostly are projections--if folk themselves oppose violence and construct a sense of the tradition they align with, they tend to make it over into the image of their preferences.

personally i have a hard time doing that because i've spent way way way too much time working on the history of the left and thinking about it's collapse.

i tend to oppose guns when i oppose the politics that people trot out that inform their use, really.
this because i see guns as neutral, as objects, and focus instead on how people seem to think about political objectives that they imagine would inform how they define which types of violence would be acceptable to them.


so in a conversation about the appearance that the ultra-right might be organizing some kind of putsch, i will definitely argue against the politics--which i oppose entirely---and by extension against the idea that this kind of politics should inform how "legitimate" violence is defined.
and i find it a bit alarming that there are still ongoing consequences which benefit the ultra-right which follow from the nra getting in bed with them at the organizational level (as an organization, then, which isn't the same as the membership)


this because not only do i oppose these politics on principle and logically--but also because i know that if such a "revolution" were to happen, people like me would end up in nice rural camps somewhere in all likelihood, learning the errors of our ways by digging canals or moving rocks back and forth.

just thought this an interesting place to say this.

I really think people try to read too much into this. The vast majority of people who own guns do so for varioius reasons. Among them are hunting, protection, collection(antiques), or just general target shooting. the ones who use them for protection genuinely see it as a last resort defensive weapon, not offensive. It's the batshit crazy 1% who take all the focus on this issue, and muddy the waters. Just my opinion.

---------- Post added at 02:28 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:12 PM ----------

I just heard on msnbc that there is a police standoff with a man in LA who allegedly made threats against the whitehouse.
here comes the revolution

I have no problem with people owning guns for hunting. I have no problem with people having non-working guns as a part of a collection (I even have a few rifles from the civil war era from my grandfather in a big ceder chest). I can't understand the necessity of being constantly armed due to fear of eminent attack, as it's something that runs counter to my way of thinking, but I've learned to accept that mostly it's harmless. Most liberals are mainly like this, and many have even backed off gun control more recently. My point about many people on the left is that we don't buy into the "someone is probably going to break into your house and rape you, and you have the right to murder this phantom" way of thinking. We're also less likely to buy into war rhetoric. It's not that we're less naive on average, our naivete just manifests in different ways.

I think the aim of discussion should be mainly about the relationship between modern far-right conservative politics, extremist gun culture, insrectionism (a made up word meaning individuals that live in a constant state of readiness to insurrection), and the willingness to commit attacks against innocent or pseudo-innocent people. It's where those avenues meet that we find our most recent generation of home-grown terrorists, people willing to blow up abortion clinics or shoot up holocaust museums.

I wasn't surprised to find out that James von Brunn, the man indicted in the shooting at the holocaust museum, is a "birther", someone that believes that President Obama's birth certificate is a fake. I was also unsurprised to find out that he has been militantly opposed to the existence of the Federal Reserve since at least the early 1980s. I was not surprised to find out that James von Brunn had very conservative views on illegal immigration, rooted in his own racism.
James Von Brunn: A Profile | TPMMuckraker

I don't know at what point extremely uneducated, conspiracy theorist, gun fanatic, zealous religious nutjobs became the republican base. That isn't directed at anyone by the way. I just don't remember the Republican party catering to these people 15-20 years ago. Or why people in conservative media put forth this insane propoganda. All it is doing is fueling the hate and further dividing this country

I’m not a fan of gun owners being labeled as extremists…or even conservatives. I don’t consider myself either though I do own firearms and agree with some conservative principles.

The recent explosion in gun sales isn’t indicative of any collective effort to arm a revolutionary militia. Rather, it’s in response to the current administrations gun control rhetoric. President Obama has repeatedly stated that he is in favor of renewing the 1994 assault weapons ban as well as enacting other far reaching gun control measures. Gun enthusiasts are simply responding by buying what they can, while they can.

This imminent national threat from right-wing radicals seems to be a bit blown out of proportion. The fair and unbiased media seems to be focusing on a select few extremists who have mentally created a scenario in which armed government officials go door to door, forcibly taking away privately owned guns. I would venture a guess that most of these people are living unremarkable lives. Creating an enemy in the government gives them a cause in which they can play the role of the lone hero. Owning firearms is a necessity, then as it gives these select few a legitimacy that they would otherwise be without – kinda like North Korea and its nuclear weapons program.

The only realistic way for the government to confiscate private firearms is through a long series of small legislative acts. These acts would have to make it so hard and expensive to own a firearm, that folks would have no choice but to give them up. Because of the cyclical nature of politics, I don’t see this scenario ever playing out in full.

I’m guess that the reason that people were willing to hand over their weapons during Katrina was simply because they were scared. They were scared and believed that the government would help them if they surrendered to its demands. I can’t see people willingly giving up their firearms unless they were under extreme duress. They would need to be motivated by the kind of fear that’s created in a “holy shit, the worlds gonna end!” disaster.

We all suffered massive invasions of privacy under the previous administration. Yes, there was outrage but there was also a lack of violence in the form of an uprising. Electronic surveillance is a vague idea for most, leaving those who were upset no tangible villain.

Dk nailed it when he talked about drawing a line in the sand. Political ideology aside, there are more than a few average citizens out there who are willing to fight and die should armed government officials come into their home and demand that they hand over their legally owned firearms. Being willing to go down swinging over a hunk of steel and wood may sound silly and overly dramatic to some. To others, it’s a matter of principle.

I think it has a lot to do with the failure of Reagen-based conservatism both politically and economically. What happens when your party reinvents itself and 30 years later (20 years of which were Republican) nearly everything about that reinvention has failed? Reaganomics failed, the military industrial complex has failed, the marriage of the right and the evangelicals has failed, fiscal conservatism turned out to be a promise no Republican could keep, etc.

So the right has to either face the truth, that it's time for another reinvention, or they can radicalize and go into denial. Some conservatives are waking up to the fact that it's time to reexamine the ideology and clean house, but the right wing media has chosen the other path for the most part, and the right wing of the media does represent the center of conservative power and influence right now. In order for conservatism to survive, it has to do something it's not comfortable with: change and adapt. I know conservatives willing to change, but they're not in the seats of power or influence, so they're largely marginalized by their fellow conservatives. What we need is a moderate conservative on the Republican ticket in 2012 to bring with him or her a new conservative vision, followed by replacing Beck and ORly and Hannity on Fox News with more moderate conservatives.

I think you're reading too much into this. I'd be SHOCKED if 2% of the extremists from BG's videos could define "socialism", let alone the tenets of Reaganomics.

I think its more likely that these extremists are unremarkable people, leading unremarkable lives. Tyler Durden summed it up nicely in Fight Club when he said "Man, I see in fight club the strongest and smartest men who've ever lived. I see all this potential, and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off."

People need something to fight for/against. The guv'mint is as good an enemy as any.

This would assume that television politics is really about politics and not about making money. Dream on.

If they disagreed with the one deemed the future of the party that was energizing the base, they'd simply drop out of the conservatives' interest.

Perhaps, but I do not see a trend away from absolute conflict. Any more than I see a trend away from any other form of pornography.

..

How do I interpret what is going on it Iran right now? Much the way I interpret my life right now. Having a gun would make minimal difference in the face of state-empowered brutality.
You are soft. A soft, naive dreamer.

Oh I admit it's totally wishful thinking that 2012 will bring the next Ronald Reagan-esque conservative reformer. I'd be surprised if it happened in the next 20 years. I'm pretty sure it will happen, though. Eventually.

Ronald Reagan brough Mobutu to Washington and called him a "a voice of good sense and goodwill."

got anything else?

The thing to realize is that it has been a charade for all of your lifetime...and mine. Who can say when it was real.
Therefore any and all reaction is facile. Sham. Sorry, but there is no going back.

I wasn't being clear. Ronald Reagan demonstrated a new generation in conservative thinking, an actual change in conservative vision. The fact that I happen to think he was one of the worse presidents isn't relevant to the point I was trying to make.

Perhaps he was the beginning of the end of true activist politics in America.
sorry, but I can't buy into your argument, because I do not buy into the perspective at all.
I'm not sure when politics started being sold to us, but I am sure it preceded Eisenhower.

politics has been politics for thousands of years, predating roman times. Why are people suprised by this?

This wet dream that folks with guns will establish democracy is just a wet dream. Iraq, Angola, Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, Somalia and Uganda are all nations where the population has (or had) plenty of guns and were far from being a democratic paradise, to say the least. This wet dream presumes that the only source of conflicts are between "the people" vs "the state," and that "the people" all speak with one voice.

In fact, I am quite certain that if one were to look at the big picture throughout history, one would find absolutely no indication that guns=>democracy. Yeah, in some occasions folks with guns overthrew a tyrannical government. And in some occasions folks with guns established a tyrannical government. Much like "guns dont kill people, people kill people," guns don't create democracy, people create democracy.

As for Iran, I find the current reaction of American conservatives about what is going on there to be one of the biggest examples of cognitive dissonance available. The losing party and the protesters there that are now being so idealized are the same ones that were in power up until 2005, long after being branded "axis of evil."

people do create democracy, but what keeps it that way in the face of oppression?

certainly not guns, as those have been used to know down democracies at least as often as they have been used to set them up.

Certinaly you don't expect the answer to such a complex and loaded question to simply be "guns" or "armament". The delicate balance necessary to maintain economic and social prosperity while also maintaining a fair balance of power between people, government, and market couldn't be summed up in 100,000 words, let alone one. Could one of those 100,000 words be something related to weapons? Very possibly. Unfortunately, there is no simple answer to earning and maintaining a republic.

I realize this, but I am taking the conversation off track. My comments are pertaining to American politics and the delusion that our political system is actually 'what it seems.'

/end threadjack.

well, it isn't a threadjack, ms media. you could see gun fantasies as reactions against a combination of things---picking a couple: a society of the spectacle in which everything is image and every image has it's place on the one hand and both the fact of significant socio-economic dislocation and (even more) anxiety about that.

revolution is the introduction of a new product line into a system of products that's legitimated through the new product lines that are introduced. anything and everything is narrated as a variant of the same. on the basis of narratives that make anything and everything variants of the same, image collages are produced and soon elements from these collages end up devices in other collages and so politics becomes entirely a matter of combination and recombination, a sort of shopping for elements as much as a shopping of objects and the personal identities that come packaged along with those objects.

so you can look at guns as they circulate in far right contexts as commodities that come with the consumer identity "free" appended to them. free is an element in a collage that gets abstracted and pasted into other collages: so "free" becomes strapped becomes like a minuteman becomes strict constructionist: "free" means resistant to any and all change that's happened since the 18th century back when scale made sense and there were fewer in the ways of institutionalized Superegos running about, watching, meting out punishments---all of which are decoys behind which the Reality lurks, which is an image of the Persecuting Father....

but there are many possible combinations

"free" can operate in assemblages that enframe a notion of personal space, and a notion of personal space made inviolable can be a way to compensate for the sense that in socio-economic and political terms the ground is dissolving beneath your feet or (more widespread) anxiety about the possibility that in socio-economic and political terms the ground may well be dissolving beneath your feet or be about to and maybe your consumer identity will allow you to see it maybe it won't.

free can mean that there is some possibility of enforcing a separation between an entirely colonized space of desire and dreaming (ideology, advertisement...no real difference) and some object world that you can pretend is separate from that entirely colonized space, even as you try to enforce that sense of separation using the same kind of device (a commodity) enframed using the same devices (advertisements in the largest sense) and so are acting through what they call an interpellation (through a social identity that follows from the way commodities are framed, so a position for the user of a commodity).

the irony i suppose is that this way you can imagine a gun gets you Outside the entirely colonized spaces of desires and dreams which shape the entirely colonized spaces we (sometimes laughingly) call reality because you can potentially shoot people with it and that, goddamn it, is real. but dying is just an inevitability: it is no more or less real than anything else. killing can be a largely imaginary act---so if you shoot some atf guy who enters your imaginary house under some imaginary scenario to take away your imaginary freedom by taking away your imaginary gun and see in that imaginary act something of a rebellion and not an enactment of a consumer scenario outlined from the beginning, one which appeals to a demographic that you happen to be part of....you're not doing anything but following a script.

all having a gun does is make you a consumer of a particular type of commodity.

the answer is quite simple, in reality.

what keeps a democracy in the face of oppression is the threat of violence. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. When the government fears the people, there is liberty.

Q.E.D.

No, the answer is quite simple in your wet dreams, but unfortunately reality does not correspond to that.

Im sure the Czar really feared the Bolsheviks, Im sure that the Angola government realy feared UNITA, Im sure the Sierra Leone government really feared RUF, and on and on and one.

the answer is plain as day. why do you think law enforcement actions use overwhelming numbers? its all about the threat of force. choosing not to believe that moves you outside of reality.

they do that in both democracies and dictatorships.

For every American revolution you have a coup.

This little binary system if you assume that the only groups in the world are "the people" and "the state," and that both act as one.

The whole "guns create democracy" is simply magical thinking from, ironically, the same group of people who say "guns don't kill people, people do."

did you miss the point or are you obtuse?


lets be more accurate. I said PEOPLE create democracies, guns keep them that way. Can guns also destroy them? yes, but in the face of violent oppression your right to free speech only gets you killed.

Stating your conclusion is not demonstrating your conclusion.

you want a videotaped occurrence or something? What i've stated has been demonstrated on both sides numerous times.

I just love this beautiful world of make believe where actual history doesn't matter.

But hey, Im guessing the UK isnt a democracy then. Or India. Or Spain. Or Brazil. The real democracies must be Somalia, Angola, Iraq and Sierra Leone.
This is not to say that guns are bad, but the real point is that from a democracy point of view, they are irrelevant.

If you want to defend your gun rights because they are your rights, great.

But let's not substitute dreams for actual history. Never mind that most of democracies established during the so called third wave of democratization happened without a gun in sight or the threat of violence use. Solidarnosc, "Diretas Ja," "Revolucao dos Cravos," "Pactos de la Moncloa," and on and on...

whence the interest in mapping this whole gun=freedom business into an area of neurotic responses to socio-economic dislocation.

..

Inflamed rhetoric and patriotism are not substitutes for reality.

Guns have been used just as often to overthrow democracy as to sustain it, and unarmed populations have been able to sustain democracies just as well as armed ones.

Why the insistance that Democracy is a good thing? Democracy poisoned Socrates, Democracy gave us the French Revolution, Democracy is the rule of the many and powerful over the few and powerless. Why does everyone assume this is a good? Because they assume that the majority will always be on their side?

FREEDOM is the needful thing in question.

Democracy is a vague concept that just means "rule of the people." It doesn't imply majority elections. And in any case, the point remains.

This is what I don't get about some gun advocates. I think "i have the freedom to own guns and the government shouldn't do anything about it" is a perfectly valid ethical argument. I don't see why the need to make utilitarian claims about all the ills guns magically heal, especially when there really is no substantial evidence for it. What we know, from hundreds of studies and statistical analysis, is, even when people find an effect of guns on some other variable, that effect is quite small. The best conclusion we can arrive at, if we are trying to empirically determine what effect guns have on other variables, is that they are mostly irrelevant. I think an argument that underscores that, along with the ethical questions around banning guns, is a much more powerful pro gun argument than the sort of magical thinking where they solve everything.

No argument here.

Because Statists usually refuse to make the acknowledgment you did above. Statism/collectivism is a largely result-oriented paradigm, whereas Individualism is a rights/ethics-based paradigm. Since Statists are the ones trying to ban guns, the only hope Individualists have of convincing them not to do so (absent violence), is by persuading them on a results-based level. I personally and philosophically agree with you. However, since the gun-grabbers are unwilling to even acknowledge, much less work with, the ethical arguement, utilitarian arguments prevail.

No really. Guns = Safety. That's why no cop has ever been killed in the line of duty. That's why no armed rebellion has ever been overwhelmed by state controlled military. That's certainly why there's never been a successful armed rebellion that, once established as the state resulted in crippling oppression. People with guns, because they have guns, are the only thing standing between us and crushing state oppression.

I don't know if "statist" is the right term for the antithesis of individualist in this context. I'd be more comfortable with something a bit more general, like collectivist.

Collectivist it is, then. That's the level it all gets down to in the end, after all.

so we flip from militia speak to von mises language then.

it seems to me that the central question here is what democracy consists in. is it a matter of procedures? is it a matter of a polity being able to access information so that they can make informed judgement based on one or another types of deliberative process? is it a matter of representation? when can polity revoke a representative's status? every two years? every four? every six? at any time? or does democracy hinge on being left alone?

when are you free? what does that word mean really?

everyone throws these words around as if the meanings are obvious.
i dont think they're obvious.
so what do you think they mean?

I see this little thread I created has found new life while I was a Canadian urbanite touring touristy areas of the lovely communist Cuba. (You must see Old Havana; it's a delight.)

I also see we've come down to a common denominator: What is freedom?

This is good. Freedom cannot be compartmentalized into a single idea or thing. Freedom is a complex state.

In Canada, I believe I have many freedoms. I would argue that I might even have more freedoms than many of my American counterparts.

I have no guns, and it's very hard for me to own one. And if I do wish to own one, there are only a select few types that aren't illegal here.

What is the source of my freedom? Oh, let's see: a government set up to ensure these freedoms. One that functions and survives only when these freedoms (and other things) are upheld and kept chugging along. Unlike the U.S., the Canadian government can fall in a day at any time whenever a "motion of confidence" fails. When we lose faith in our government, we're off to the polls to engage in our rights in freedoms through an election. We don't have to wait out any terms or such, though it's nice when government plays ball and terms are fully served.

But where are our guns? Where is the threat of violence?

They aren't necessary. We have a system that works. And if it doesn't work, we press the reset button and we have another go at it. The threat is a threat of political failure—a loss of political power.

Not all aspects of democracy are good. But certain democratic systems (in this case, Canadian democracy) make living under good or even mediocre governance a valuable and cherished thing. Both conservatives and liberals (oh, and socialists too) take all of this quite seriously.

Sure it would be great if we as Americans could be as chill as Canada. I would love that. However you are comparing Sparta to Athens.

Perhaps we should compare the US to another gun-owning country instead of Canada.

If that's possible.

But this is my point. We are quite different culturally, socially, politically, and yet both of our nations provide levels of freedom that much of the rest of the world can only dream of. These states of freedom aren't of the same brand, they aren't derived from the same source, and yet there they are.

The threat of violence is not a prerequisite for maintaining freedom. However, one may find that violence is employed to protect it, as it has been in the past. But that's another story.

i'm really unclear about what you mean when you say that the united states & canada provide "levels of freedom that other countries can only dream of."
i think most of the "freedoms" particular to the united states are formal. it seems to me that, for example, a political system in which the polity is able to vote one day every two years and in which the options that are presented amount to little more than the option of engaging in faction rotation within an oligarchy, and in an information environment that is not at all about providing people with what is required to make informed or rational decisions about issues...that's not real free. being part of a market demographic in the context of which freedom is a word that gets associated with alot of products because it sounds nice, because it's flattering--that doesn't seem to me terribly free.

i think sometimes folk understand categories like authoritarian as requiring a particular type of state action, as if the state is the only institution capable of being such surveillance and management of a population. but those days are long past, and even in the earlier manifestations--say germany of the 1930s--state rule was accompanied by a single dominant media apparatus (radio) and a quite new for the time understanding of the close relation between politics and public relations (edward bernays anyone?)...in the historical treatments of that period, the centrality of radio as an opinion co-ordination mechanism tends to get downplayed and the role of state violence becomes the exclusive center. but that's to make how that particular form of fascism work incomprehensible. and it's always mystified me that this is the case.

i think you get something similar amongst folk who imagine that having a gun makes them anything beyond someone who has a gun--the exclusive object of concern regarding possible outcomes like "tyranny" is the state.

but think about the logic of neo-colonialism for a second: why bother with direct domination when it's much cheaper and more effective to convince people to dominate themselves?
better still if you can convince them that dominating themselves is in their own best interest.

this can only get started if you regard "freedom" as an attribute and not a process. so "freedom" is like the leg of a table. it doesn't require any particular action or doing or process. it's a part of an object that the Bad State can maybe take from you, in the way a bully could take your peanut butter & jelly sandwich from you at recess by the swingset.

The freedoms I speak of are largely those that are legislated and ingrained in the culture. There are many things we can do in North America that are illegal in other countries. Consider the plight of women that is still going on in other areas. Consider how religious and cultural minority groups are treated elsewhere.

I agree with what you are saying in that there is much that is dicey when it comes to freedom and authoritarianism, but then you consider the fact that virtually any one of us can go to a library or use the Internet to find out what's what, or maybe even contact certain helpful organizations and groups that are eager to help. Not so in some other areas.

Yes, BUT that has nothing to do with our freedoms, other than to say we don't want to follow their paths.


...I have about 5 different tangents that followed as I typed after that statement, but figured it best to try and stick with where we are now.

What do you mean by "follow their paths"? We moved away from those situations I mentioned.

There's been some lag, but I just wanted to comment after reading the majority of this thread (heck, I signed on here because I found a forum thread about an occasional difficulty I have with yawning): this thread has been dormant a while, so I figured I'd take the liberty to throw in my 2 cents:

Anytime there is political volatility, I worry. I worry that an armed revolution would take place in this country. Not because I think any armed revolution is bad in any circumstance (such as a theoretical internal armed revolution against NAZI Germany), but I worry about the outcome. I'm not a socialst by any means (I'm practically an anarco-capitalist), but a conservative armed revolution does worry me, primarily because of what would follow. Any time that the left side of a (pseudo) two-party system is in power and things go awry, the tendancy of the masses is to elect the extreme polar opposite. As much as I dislike the Obama administration, the Bush administration was worse in other ways. Both are seeking to reduce their citizens freedom, only in different ways. And what's really sick about it, is that the 4 or 8 year cycle fools the majority into crying out for more of their freedoms being taken away (either through survelance and police state tactics ala "security" and anti "terrorism" or through increased property confiscation and redistribution through socialist programs). The people who aren't pleased with the present administration (such as myself) may end up with a right-wing dicatator-tyrant for the next term. Yikes!

It was said earlier in the thread that the outrage at referring to recent policies as "socialistic" in nature is unjustified. I would agree. But not because I don't think they're socialistic, but because they're no more socialistic than most other policies pursued in the last 100 years or more, regardless of the right or left-wing status of the administration. It's nothing new at all.

My whole issue that some don't seem to understand about gun ownership is that each person owns him or herself. And therefore each person has a right not to be harmed by others. When one is not harming others, and yet is still aggressed upon by anyone (whether or not they wear a badge or government uniform), then an injustice has been done. If I am not harming another person, no one, regardless of the uniform they wear or the "authority" they claim to possess, has a right to do any harm towards me. When man A has lethal firepower and man B doesn't, it is morally wrong for man A to use his lethal firepower to threaten man B to do anything against his will. It makes no difference if man A is a woodsman at Ruby Ridge or if man A has a fancy badge and government uniform. Unless and until weapons are no longer in existence, the only way to prevent those with weapons from aggressing upon you is to be able to pose a significant counter threat. Can a counterthreat be posed without the posession of weapons? I'm not sure how.

James

Democracy is 2 wolves and 1 sheep voting on what's for dinner. --Oliver North

America has always been this way to some extent or another and for some reason militia/survivalist/whatever groups seem to become more vocal when a democrat is in office. I remember this same kind of stuff under Clinton, the nightly news focusing on "dangerous" groups running around the country side, drilling for the eventual armed take over. When Bush was elected these groups seemingly disappeared from the mainstream and nobody gave them much thought.

In the end it always seems to be nothing more then posturing, groups of American Nationalists who feel its their birthright and duty to defend their freedoms at the end of a gun. And why not, its always been ingrained in our culture to stand up and fight to the death when we feel we have something to fight for. I never really paid these people any mind and probably never will.

If the group in the above article were to try and take a stand we'll probably just wind up with another "Waco" style standoff that in the end accomplishes very little and will largely be forgotten.

What's disturbing to me about the Mother Jones article is that this concern for preparedness hinges on the issue of martial law. If the Obama government were to do so for any particular reason, it seems this group would construe that as some sort of excuse of the government for taking its "socialist totalitarianism" to some kind of "Phase 2." It's as though they view Obama's option for martial law as the one significant move that would enable him to galvanize his Stalinesque rule over America, placing people in concentration camps and perhaps executing those who become too resistant.

Though I don't doubt the existence of facilities for detention centres for both federal and military use, I can't think of a single nation who'd I suspect doesn't have these sorts of things. It's not that the concept of law and order is new or anything.

All of this to me is simply ludicrous. What makes it more so is the fact that these people are members of the armed forces, both military and civilian. To serve and protect, right?

What's funny to me, in the end, and no matter how sardonic, is the connection all of this has to the Tea Party movement and how it views the Obama administration as a socialist machine gearing up to take its agenda to Nazi-like proportions if necessary.

I don't know what to think anymore. At first the Tea Party movement just seemed like a bunch of whiny conservatives upset because their guy lost the election. Now I think the group under which the Tea Party flag flies is far too fragmented and multifaceted to apply any one value to it.

My greatest fear is that it's being co-opted by extremists: the kind we should be far more concerned about than anything that would come out of a decidedly centrist president. And it all starts with propaganda, as did most things to be ashamed of in our human history.

The common term for that soldier would be "nut job". They will always exist.

No we're not.

I think the problem is people are getting hung up on the words of a vocal minority that's bouncing around the usual conspiracy theories that always seems to permeate this culture (militia/survivalist) The vast majority of conservatives, while holding a strong disdain for Obama, don't really hold these view they simply disagree with his policies for better or worse. A very loud vocal minority is using the Tea Party movement (which is all over the map with its platform) as a means to get its message out, unfortunately its the one everyone is hearing. In turn the whole thing gets blown out of proportion by the media and becomes the only thing associated with a group. Its in some way similar to the 9/11 truthers getting all wrapped up and confused with any left wing group that opposed Bush.

I grew up in a place where these militia type groups were very active and it was rather common to see policemen, firemen, military members, town council men, pastors, ect all being involved. They view it as a patriotic duty to defend their freedom against a "tyrannical"govt...So I guess in a way they are protecting and serving. Honestly these people and groups have been around for ages and I just don't see this group as being any different than the countless others we've been hearing about for decades (complete with the usual conspiracy theories about concentration camps, confiscating guns and martial law.) Judging from recent history I just don't see much here to worry about.

Is this an isolated thing? Some say the number of militia groups is growing....

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36075836...news-security/

Questions:

1: How was this act provoked? Given the long history of federal agents provocateurs operating within Militiae and other anti-Gov't groups, and encouraging them to commit illegal acts, I look forward to seeing how this group was egged on. Remember that agents provocateurs were the instigators of violence during the Battle Of Seattle, the Ruby Ridge massacre, and that "Militia radio shock-jock" Hal Turner was recently revealed to have been on the FBI/ATF payroll for most of the last decade: time which he spent trying to stimulate and provoke violence among the FBI/ATF's target groups in the militia/patriot movement and being paid for doing so by the Federal Gov't. His whole job was to create violent criminals so that they could then be arrested and either "flipped" as informants or incarcerated as examples to the public and statistics for The Agency.

2: Was the group actually moving towards or committing an act of violence, or were they simply talking about it? "Seditious Conspiracy" has a lovely ring of Lefortovo and Pinochet about it. Knowing, or researching, or even -practicing- how to make bombs is not illegal. If you have the proper licenses (where required) making and using bombs is not illegal. It's even legal to discuss, in a theoretical sense, how an otherwise-legal bomb might be used in an insurgent or insurrectionist capacity. In my job I come into contact with large numbers of LEOs and Military personell, including a US Army bomb expert who is one of my best customers. Such conversations are hardly unusual among such people, despite the fact that neither I nor any of my customers are planning on blowing up anything more than disobliging boulders and tree-stumps. Furthermore, insurrectionist discussion and talk is likewise legal, is in fact protected by the Constitution. So long as no concrete violent act takes place or is palpably and imminently about to, discussion remains discussion, no matter how insane or ridiculous or dangerous the topic.

The provocation, ostensibly, would have been the appearance of the "Antichrist."

I think intent is important. Bomb-making for blowing stumps out of your property to make a road is one thing, but the "seditious conspiracy" mentioned would fall under the Smith Act, would it not?

Whoever, with intent to cause the overthrow or destruction of any such government, prints, publishes, edits, issues, circulates, sells, distributes, or publicly displays any written or printed matter advocating, advising, or teaching the duty, necessity, desirability, or propriety of overthrowing or destroying any government in the United States by force or violence, or attempts to do so; or Whoever organizes or helps or attempts to organize any society, group, or assembly of persons who teach, advocate, or encourage the overthrow or destruction of any such government by force or violence; or becomes or is a member of, or affiliates with, any such society, group, or assembly of persons, knowing the purposes thereof - Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both, and shall be ineligible for employment by the United States or any department or agency thereof, for the five years next following his conviction.

It was handy for purging Communists, apparently, but I suppose now it's deemed unconstitutional.

My question, though, is this: does treason truly need action? Is it treason if someone takes your information and training and uses it for their own ends? The Web is a great tool for disseminating information. Also, when does one become an enemy of the state?

I think all of this is very interesting.

For the record, certain forms of treason in Canada don't require action. It begins at the conspiracy to commit high treason or to use violence for the purpose of overthrowing a government body.

Something doesn't sound right about that whole story. There are plenty of militia groups around, is the government trying to send a message to them? Are they trying to get enough of them to plan or carry out violence against the government in order to make the voting public thing the right wing is crazy and shouldn't get voted for in Nov? Is there some other story that the media should be reporting on, but the feds are making news to distract? Are they trying to link the Tea Party movement to these 912ers, libertarian, truthers, birthers, religious and other groups?

Or are these people really wacko like I would think at first. I mean the first commandment is "Thou shall not kill.".

Anyway, their plan sucked.

ASU, you're making it sound like waiting to do battle with the Antichrist by preparing to kill a bunch of cops and eventually their mourners is something that can be incited by the government. How can that happen?

If busting up this organization sends a message to other nutjob organizations, I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not. They're nutjobs, right?

Anyway, I don't see how the government action in this case was in anyway an incitement. It was a reaction to evidence.

No. The US Constitution specifically defines Treason as either actively making war against the United States, or adhering to the enemies thereof in a declared war. Article 3, Section 3.

We don't know that yet. If this action was encouraged, financed, or facilitated by an agent provocateur as has happened in the past, that person needs to suffer the severest punishment, along with whomever was "running" them. If this -was- a case of violent wackos moments or days away from executing what was known to be an unprovoked attack of which they were capable and for which they had the means, I applaud the efforts of Law Enforcement in this case. Such people need to be interdicted and dealt with, by one means or another. However, given the history of the past several administrations and the complacency of the national media throughout, I remain skeptical.

I think there needs to be a clear distinction between Government and the Law Enforcement Officers that are carrying out these arrests.

While conspiracy theorists would like to think that Obama (or someone high up) is pulling the strings, one should remember that these Officers had their jobs before the current Admin was elected and will likely be around after they are out of office. They serve the law and are accountable to the law, not the Administration.

The problem is that this was one out of 512* or so groups across the country that wants to do what this group was planning to do. Now, not all of them are close to taking action, and not all of them want to go after local law enforcement. But, where does it end? What is just fantasy planning versus actual plans to carry out an attack?

* Hutaree: Why is the Midwest a hotbed of militia activity? - Yahoo! News

It's not that the government 'made' or 'pressured' these people into doing this, it's that I wonder why they only arrested this one group, and why did they do it prior to them actually trying to carry out this plan?

An interesting take from CNN's Ali Velshi and a University of Michigan Graduate student:

CNN.com - Transcripts

And an equally important reminder from The Independent about the past, and present, troubles of the FBI and their COINTELPRO programmes which the US Left somehow came to love:

How the Left Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the FBI | The Beacon

hence, the beauty of the government plant. Find a group of sufficiently questionable ideology, foster the fears from within, incite them to actively participate towards one of those goals, then bust them while parading FBI representatives in front of the media with outlandish stories of said nut jobs religiously wacko ideas to garner popular support for the operation. It's an ideal message to tell the saner militia groups out there 'we'll fuck your world up too'.

well, according to the southern poverty law center, there were 512 "patriot" organizations out there last year, 127 of which are militias.

Active 'Patriot' Groups in the United States in 2009 | Southern Poverty Law Center


the new issue of splc's "intelligence report" is of interest:

Rage on the Right | Southern Poverty Law Center

This must be an April Fool's joke

I'm not so sure about that. This is Tilted Paranoia.

---------- Post added at 02:16 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:13 PM ----------

Huh, that's kinda funny—"patriot" groups. Are universities considered among the non-militia variety?

HOLY CRAP, YOU'RE RIGHT! Once again, the "new posts" function has led me off the interstate of rationality into Crazytown. Back to the Land of Logic and Reason I go!

This is the best joke ever, conservatives preparing for an armed revolution? Conservatives have always had someone else fight their battles for em, especially the poor, unemployed, minorities and such as that. Perhaps they could hire some of the downtrodden to fight this battle for em too.

Join now, fight for the bankers, credit card co's, and all the ultra rich so they can buy their 50th vacation home in God knows where. Onward conservative soldier!

you really think that the US Government isn't willing and/or capable of that kind of scheming?

Especially since one of their most successful agents provocateur, Hal Turner, was just outed a few months ago?

Fuglystick, others, here's the thing about Mr. Turner. This guy was on the radio for 10+ years, [i]being paid by the FBI for the specific purpose of egging people on to violence and lawbreaking. That was his job. You paid for this inbred to try and turn people towards violence so the FBI could arrest them or flip them into informants. Mr Turner has admitted all of this in open court. His role as an agent provocateur is a matter of public record.[i]

You can't just say "The Feds don't do that!" when the Feds just admitted to doing it and paraded their agent (do-er) before the world.

As for the SPLC, PUH-LEEZE. Morris "Sleaze" Dees has been seeing Klansmen under his bed (and bilking similarly terrified morons out of their money) for twenty years. His entire fortune (which is considerable) and the political clout of his organization (which is considerable) depend entirely upon dreaming up crises involving legions of "haters" who are out to kill every kike, nigger, papist, and spic they can find. The problem is that the SPLC includes pretty much anyone to the right of John Lennon or Bobby Seale on these lists of "hate groups" and "haters" because, after all, More Haters = Sacrier. Scarier = More Money. I trust the SPLC and ADL about as far as I can throw Mark Potok. They are professional fearmongers and liars, nothing more and a great deal less.

It's a leftist gravy train in the same vein as the John Birch Society on the right, except with a somewhat less tenuous connection to reality.

gee, i've not heard anyone reference the southern poverty law center in those terms who was not part of a militia group. sometimes i used to listen to world wide christian radio for the christian identity and militia survivalist and black helicopter recognition call-in shows...in some of those programs the patriots would get pretty exercised about splc and would make all kind of outlandish statements in the process, statements that didn't really make sense beyond their situational function of indicating that the speaker just plain didn't like the splc and didn't like the information they'd gather and didn't like morris dees for being involved with the gathering because well splc talks about patriot groups and other neo-fascist outfits together and militia people like to pretend they're separate; and there's an attention to nativist and other racist groups and militia people like to think that they're just against illegal immigration on grounds that are often almost exactly like those of nativist groups so obviously the problem is pointing out the similarity.

yeah.

1. the Constitution forbids the government from keeping Americans from owning guns.
2. the Militia movement has nothing to do with any racism or oppression
3 Americans have the right to Change the government when the government is destructive to our freedom.
4.America is a constitutional republic
5. christian identify is not a Militia the kkk is not a Militia
6. slandering people who are experts at living at living off the land does not make your point come across as being logical
7 the SLPC is run by CAIR which had a reporter fired who voted for Obama just cause he questioned islam.

Slander? Where specifically?