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Ted Cruz

7 (6.5%)

Rick Santorum

16 (14.8%)

Michelle Bachmann

13 (12%)

Chris Christie

23 (21.3%)

Rand Paul

49 (45.4%)

Total Members Voted: 107

[FearfulJesuit]

Another threat of government shutdown could be on the horizon.

Ordinarily, I'd refuse to believe anybody could actually be that stupid. But these are the House Republicans, so here we are, I guess.

Not...stupid, exactly. Just responding to bad incentives (the threat of being primaried in very conservative districts).

(At least, that's what I like to believe...)

[Graknorke]

which makes it actually a quite reasonable weapon type to consider for a "protecting against an unjust military" conception of the 2nd amendment.

There is no way that the weaponry available to the general population is going to be able to hold off the government. It's an outdated concept that has no practical application, only catering to that big old gun fetish.

[FearfulJesuit]

which makes it actually a quite reasonable weapon type to consider for a "protecting against an unjust military" conception of the 2nd amendment.

There is no way that the weaponry available to the general population is going to be able to hold off the government. It's an outdated concept that has no practical application, only catering to that big old gun fetish.

Not entirely. Sure, they might not be able to take out a tyrannical government entirely.

But tyranny isn't really about who's at the top, it's about who's at the bottom. You can't run a totalitarian regime if your bureaucrats and secret policemen are being shot up all the time.

[Lord Shonus]

Very little (if any) legislative change is needed. Like all fully-automatic weapons, Uzi's are already illegal under Federal law (barring an extremely small number of pre-1983 examples) without special (and extremely expensive) permit, and reckless endangerment is already a serious crime. All that really needs to be done is to revoke the establishment's full-auto permit  (not certain if the law allows confiscation of the weapons under permit, as bill of attainder would apply unless special provision was made in the permit law), but it would absolutely prohibit them from allowing any non-permit holder to fire them, and arrest the management staff for reckless endangerment homicide.

Oh. Fair enough - I had, apparently naively, assumed their business was legal. I'll withhold judgment until the law's actually had an opportunity to be enforced, and just expect a surge of people to come to their defense because it's a gun issue, and there is a big chunk of society for whom that means "we need to protect our rights".

It is probably legal, as they probably have the necessary permits. My point is that all that is needed to shut them down is to revoke said permits, and the mere fact that they put a notoriously uncontrollable SMG in the hands of an extremely small girl means that an indictment on reckless endangerment charges is about as open-and-shut as it's possible to be.

[Helgoland]

which makes it actually a quite reasonable weapon type to consider for a "protecting against an unjust military" conception of the 2nd amendment.

There is no way that the weaponry available to the general population is going to be able to hold off the government. It's an outdated concept that has no practical application, only catering to that big old gun fetish.

Not entirely. Sure, they might not be able to take out a tyrannical government entirely.

But tyranny isn't really about who's at the top, it's about who's at the bottom. You can't run a totalitarian regime if your bureaucrats and secret policemen are being shot up all the time.

Hunting rifles are perfectly sufficient for that. Urban insurgency lives off of mobility - what good would a heavy machine gun do?

[EnigmaticHat]

In theory if a revolution happens the military should stay neutral.  Who the hell knows what would happen in practice.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

In theory if a revolution happens the military should stay neutral.  Who the hell knows what would happen in practice.

48% of the military would support one side and 48% the other, in proper American fashion.

[Lord Shonus]

which makes it actually a quite reasonable weapon type to consider for a "protecting against an unjust military" conception of the 2nd amendment.

There is no way that the weaponry available to the general population is going to be able to hold off the government. It's an outdated concept that has no practical application, only catering to that big old gun fetish.

Not entirely. Sure, they might not be able to take out a tyrannical government entirely.

But tyranny isn't really about who's at the top, it's about who's at the bottom. You can't run a totalitarian regime if your bureaucrats and secret policemen are being shot up all the time.

Hunting rifles are perfectly sufficient for that. Urban insurgency lives off of mobility - what good would a heavy machine gun do?

Few people are advocating for ready access to heavy machine guns. The .50 caliber weapon that kicked off this tanget was a .50 caliber semiautomatic rifle. The (extremely common) confusion likely arises from the name of the cartridge, which is designated .50 caliber Browning Machine Gun to differentiate from other 12.7mm ammunition.

[stabbymcstabstab]

Regarding the US military, if a revolution happens the military would probably support the people cause you know that little oath they swear, with very few actually supporting the Federal Government.

oath

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God."

[Frumple]

... that oath doesn't say a damn thing about supporting the people of the united states.

E: Actually, that oath would by all appearances appear to be an explicit declaration of allegiance to the federal government. Guess we better hope there's a lot of oathbreakers in the military if the rebellion ever comes around.

[stabbymcstabstab]

One of the damn things do the fifty of the damn things for the army ALONE, give me the second to find it.

Edit: http://oathkeepers.org/oath/ this is relevant since at least four years ago they made up a third of the military, they also have a page detailing what orders hey wouldn't follow(basically one which would cause a civil war/ Revolution.)

still googleing.

[Frumple]

... if some other one does, it, well. Wouldn't really matter if that one is one of the ones sworn. One way or another, an army that does anything is going to be oathbreakers by the end of the day in the case of a large scale rebellion, if you've got one like that among the rest.

Point being, I would probably suggest not putting much weight on the things when it comes to figuring out which way the military would jump. Those kinda' sworn oaths very rarely matter to any notable extent, anyway.

[GavJ]

There is no way that the weaponry available to the general population is going to be able to hold off the government. It's an outdated concept that has no practical application, only catering to that big old gun fetish.

What are you talking about? This isn't a yes/no thing, it's a proportions thing.

In any given rebellion, you're going to have:
1) Some proportion of the population actively rebelling
2) Some people who don't fight / don't offer much help to anybody
3) Some loyalists who will actively side with the standing government

The better armed the civilian population is, simply the lower the relative advantage group #1 can have and still succeed, versus a less well armed population.

For example, if there were no military at all, then all other things equal, you'd expect a rebellion to succeed with a 51% ratio of group #1:#3

With a military, rebels have to have a larger proportional advantage to compensate for the more prepared and trained standing army. But there's always an upper limit, because at the maximum 100% group #1:#3 ratio, the government obviously couldn't ever win, since they'd have zero supply lines with no civilian support (and most of the soldiers would be defecting as well)

So the reality is always in between those two extremes somewhere. And wherever the magical number might be right now for any given proportion of the population in revolt, it moves up by some amount, in a continuous, incremental fashion, as citizens get more modern armaments, and it moves down in a continuous fashion as they get fewer and more outdated armaments.

Generally, I would suspect that most Americans would want the ratio to be somewhere much higher than 51% (unstable) but also much lower than 100% (implying completely unsupported totalitarian reign of horror). And at the same time, we want to balance not too much crime. So there's a balancing act in there, and everybody simply has different opinions, but it all MATTERS.

[scriver]

Another threat of government shutdown could be on the horizon.

Ordinarily, I'd refuse to believe anybody could actually be that stupid. But these are the House Republicans, so here we are, I guess.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the Republicans loose both the political battle the last shut down was over as well as the public opinion fight? Why would they even want to repeat that?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Another threat of government shutdown could be on the horizon.

Ordinarily, I'd refuse to believe anybody could actually be that stupid. But these are the House Republicans, so here we are, I guess.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the Republicans loose both the political battle the last shut down was over as well as the public opinion fight? Why would they even want to repeat that?

Because they live in a different world from the rest of us. Also, right-wing populist grandstanding right before elections.