What Two Things...

So wouldn't you want better gun control - to keep guns away from all those democrat plebians?

Monkey: You make me smile.  The serious answer is that yes, I would, if legislation would take guns out of their hands as well as mine.  But it wouldn't, so I don't!

Oh, and while I admit to my post being an apologetic, no real man wants to characterize his utterances as "weak".    Rather, I would say that it was meant in a light hearted, though serious manner.

Maybe the solution is not to lock up the guns, but to lock up the Democrats instead!  No, no, NSA, Russ is only making a little jokey-pooh!

Russ

Cage match in the white house?

America has a terrible problem with guns. No amount of casuistry, elaborate wordplay or unreadable waffle from Russ (or anyone else) is going to convince me, and, I suspect, most people here in the UK, otherwise.

By the way Russ, there is an enormous difference between being "forced to surrender" your firearms and compulsory ID cards. If you cannot see that difference then you are more to be pitied than mocked.

I think that regardless of who is doing all the shooting ( allegedly )  guns should be banned throughout, it amazed me when Starbucks made the statement that they do not allow guns into their coffee shops although they cannot stop it, what is going on? Why would any decent citizen of any denomination want to own a bloody gun and carry it with him on his/her daily jaunt to have a coffee. I owned a toy gun when I was a child but I left that state of mind behind when I started to grow up. I know that some lobbyists may say it's for their own protection, but I am sure everyone who has a gun whether criminal or not is going to say that.

More alarming than side-splitting though.

I suppose there was a time when I had an ambition to visit the USA [from the UK]. Well I still do but it will only be to transit from an airport in Florida State to the Bahamas! If I could get to the Bahamas directly I would prefer that.

ATB from George

I'd go out of my way to avoid Miami airport at all costs if I were you George.

I'm sure it was perfectly charming and totally efficient in the 1930s when it was built, but now if Hieronymous Bosch was alive today, this is the place he would surely be using to represent hell. Easily the worst airport on the planet, with staff who clearly would rather be dead than working there and who make no effort to disguise the fact. Add to the mix the least good baggage handling and the most over-zealous "homeland security" in the States (most Americans seem to agree on this, and I suppose it is mildly understandable), and you really need to gird your loins with a rare and slightly scary combination of gin and valium just to survive. If your transit time through this mess is any less than four hours, you risk missing your connecting flight.

I have friends in the States who have re-routed to avoid MIA at a cost of $1000 and four hours, because of this place's potential to ruin a holiday.

Might be easier if you took a gun I suppose.

Dear Rod,

It is fairly unlikely as the Atlantic crossing would be too expensive, but my Aunt lives in the Bahamas. It is storm season at the moment, so she is elsewhere! She has told me that she will not use "certain airports" without ever telling me which!

ATB from George

Hi Russ,

I know my continuing musings on the Second Amendment will drive you to homicidal tendencies, but I think I am on the verge of purging this monkey.

Perhaps Kant was afraid to venture far from his ivory tower, not for fear of meeting the Frenchman but that pesky Austrian...who would surely declare Kant (and anyone else who loathes guns) sexually repressive. Personally, I have never taken Freud seriously.

However,

"Again, while the amendment may be somewhat outdated with regard to its prefatory clause, it is still the law. You are absolutely correct that there are some mouth-breathers on my side of the question who still cling to Jefferson's contention that begins "When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands.." etc. etc., maintaining that this creates a right in the American People to overthrow their own government. This of course is a crock of bullshit, completely worthy of being termed "paranoid". "

There was that one fella (and approx 60,000 others) who certainly do take this seriously and why shouldn't they? Although you may call it "bullshit" and "paranoid" it's exactly what is required of them to prepare for. By them, I refer to the Possi Comitatus or various festering militia groups and one of its most famous sympathisers Timothy James McVeigh. He managed to slaughter 168 people through believing that the Second Amendment gave him the constitutional right to act upon the idea that the gun (or in this case a WMD), was a perfectly legitimate tool to redefine himself in a state that did not suit his idealogical leanings. If your whole worldview is governed by a lawful code that legitimises targeting your neighbour, by an act of violence, when you feel disaffected, then fear is all pervasive. If one reads further into this guy, one can see how over time, he became a direct product, not only defined by his final 'action', but many, many hateful musings, letters and diatribes extolling his right to protect the Second Amendment from those putrid lefties...oh and he mentions taxes quite a lot too, of you know what. Okay, his main motivation 'may' have been the 'over zealous' handling of the Waco siege by the 'agents', of the state (bearing in mind that Koresh and his friends were packing a plethora of loathsome weapons...illegally...that any greedy militia would be envious).

He was also very upset about;

"Taxes are a joke. Regardless of what a political candidate "promises," they will increase. More taxes are always the answer to government mismanagement. They mess up. We suffer. Taxes are reaching cataclysmic levels, with no slowdown in sight. [...] Is a Civil War Imminent? Do we have to shed blood to reform the current system? I hope it doesn't come to that. But it might."

On the hypothetical scenario where I have just been held up at gun point and you have thrown me a gun and what would my reaction be, firstly, I would probably think..."now what would (Jesus) Kant do?" Having just been declared sexually retarded, I would probably piss my pants.

I have actually been held up at knife point (technically it was kidnap) and lived to tell the tale, my weapon of choice...WMR....Weapon of Mass Reasoning. To cut a long storey short, he got £75 of my money for his drug addiction and a prison sentence, and I got my dignity left intact.

"I have no doubt that my country is hell-bound to follow Europe down the shit chute into oblivion--even ironically, as Europe is showing some signs of trying to paddle backward. But while there is still room to breath free, I intend to breath deeply".

I missed something here, what's happening down the shit chute? Are you suggesting that Europe, with all its interfering welfare statism and not allowing its citizens to pack shooters, are therefore not 'free' to breath. Are you still equating that truly bizarre (product of America) notion that gun = freedom? We all have our own definitions of what it is to be 'free', the pro gunners define it with a gun, everyone else defines it with everything that excludes a gun.

I guess its difficult to square your reasoning on gun ownership, with McVeigh, when you both set your standards to the same code (boringly referring to the Second Amendment again), I guess the difference is Russ, you are a nice guy and of sound mind. But for me that is not enough, you and other well behaved gun owners, can not make up for all that fear and violence, or one single death perpetrated under the justification of the 'right to bear arms' . In another way, this could be understood as, your enemy is your neighbour, or taxes are the work of un-American socialists or prepare for End Times, etc, etc.

I think I have just about exhausted this point Russ, probably very repetitive too. But thanks for giving me the opportunity to sound it out

Jason.

A recent article circulating FB from the Guardian....seems theres an echo.

http://www.theguardian.com/com...n-out-control-porter

Jason.