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[Strife26]

Big brother doesn't need to know what I have.

[Strife26]

Yeah, and I'm not too happy about the house, but there's ways to hide that. A car uses public roads, so that's clearly a public concern. If my vehicle never leaves my property, then the government doesn't need to know anything about it.

[Lord Shonus]

Given the amount of harassment a car registration gets you (at one point I was getting fifty solicitations a day from car insurance companies, "extended auto warranty" scammers, tire salesmen, etc.), that really doesn't sell the whole "registration is harmless, what do you have to hide?" line of bullshit.

[Willfor]

Given the amount of harassment a car registration gets you (at one point I was getting fifty solicitations a day from car insurance companies, "extended auto warranty" scammers, tire salesmen, etc.), that really doesn't sell the whole "registration is harmless, what do you have to hide?" line of bullshit.

I feel like that's entirely a cultural concern. I've got a car registration, and I have literally never been bothered by people going out of their way to sell me insurance for it. Like, is there a cultural mandate in America that y'all have to make a federal fucking issue out of everything? Have a house, get in it insured, no big deal. Have a car, get it registered and insured, no big deal. Own property, pay your taxes, no big deal. Own a gun, have it registered, no big deal.

It's the government's job to ask for paperwork delivered, and your job to bury them under so much of it that everyone's safe because they can do literally nothing else but try to cope with it. I feel like the only reason America's government can possibly be seen as dangerous is because y'all are leaving them so bored that they've got nothing better to do than to pick random people to black helicopter. Do you know how long it would take them to process 300 million simultaneous gun registries? You've just bought the rest of your decade free from government interference. So just be chill.

[Strife26]

No thank you. Giving power to the government should always be minimized. The standard isn't "they probably won't hurt anything with it" it's "they probably need this to function"

Yeah, in general, the government isn't going to do anything with all the power they take and take and take, but, at the end of the day, powerful governments are, on the whole, a liability, not a benefit.

[NullForceOmega]

And you have to remember that the primary reason the second amendment exists is so that, if need be, we can kill our government.

[Strife26]

Depending on interpretation. In general, the Bill of Rights all exist to stop the government from doing things.

[Willfor]

No thank you. Giving power to the government should always be minimized. The standard isn't "they probably won't hurt anything with it" it's "they probably need this to function"

Yeah, in general, the government isn't going to do anything with all the power they take and take and take, but, at the end of the day, powerful governments are, on the whole, a liability, not a benefit.

Damn, I got burned. I guess I'll just go to the hospital, without private insurance, and not fear that it's going to bankrupt me, because my super powerful government that spies on me sees that I've got this medicare card, and they're going to take care of it for me. And I'm just going to feel absolutely terrible that I gave them my health information so they could do that for the whole while. Just like, absolutely terrible. Because big government is always bad.

 

[Shadowlord]

And you have to remember that the primary reason the second amendment exists is so that, if need be, we can kill our government.

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

How do you get "overthrow the State" from "the security of a free State?"

[NullForceOmega]

"Free state."  That is the operative component here.

Excerpt from the Declaration of Independence:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

[Strife26]

No thank you. Giving power to the government should always be minimized. The standard isn't "they probably won't hurt anything with it" it's "they probably need this to function"

Yeah, in general, the government isn't going to do anything with all the power they take and take and take, but, at the end of the day, powerful governments are, on the whole, a liability, not a benefit.

Damn, I got burned. I guess I'll just go to the hospital, without private insurance, and not fear that it's going to bankrupt me, because my super powerful government that spies on me sees that I've got this medicare card, and they're going to take care of it for me. And I'm just going to feel absolutely terrible that I gave them my health information so they could do that for the whole while. Just like, absolutely terrible. Because big government is always bad.

 

I didn't say always bad, you'll note or not note as you wish. You can very easily chalk that up to either being a reasonable use of government to correct a market failure, justifiable government action, or sucks-to-be-you Randian philosophy.


Yeah, one can dive into the cesspool of trying to figure out Founder Intent, but that's not going to result in anything much productive.

[mainiac]

Would be quite easy for Clinton to propose a sweeping anti-gun bill that she knows is doomed to fail in Congress, and then say "Oh well, I tried. Blame Congress."

What would you say if that exact thing happened in a Sanders presidency?

Difference is that I don't expect Sanders to give up on policies if they fail the first time. I fully expect Clinton to raise certain issues once, maybe twice, purely as token efforts.

So without any difference what so ever in the facts, you make completely opposite conclusions.  Pretty much the textbook example of a double standard.

Yeah, in general, the government isn't going to do anything with all the power they take and take and take,

Nobody pays attention when the government funds research or services that changes the world or when government research or baseline services are blocked for bullshit reasons.  The government nannies you five ways before you ate breakfast and you didn't even notice.

[Strife26]

Would be quite easy for Clinton to propose a sweeping anti-gun bill that she knows is doomed to fail in Congress, and then say "Oh well, I tried. Blame Congress."

What would you say if that exact thing happened in a Sanders presidency?

Difference is that I don't expect Sanders to give up on policies if they fail the first time. I fully expect Clinton to raise certain issues once, maybe twice, purely as token efforts.

So without any difference what so ever in the facts, you make completely opposite conclusions.  Pretty much the textbook example of a double standard.

I'd call that the difference in how people difference in how people perceive Clinton vs Sanders

Yeah, in general, the government isn't going to do anything with all the power they take and take and take,

Nobody pays attention when the government funds research or services that changes the world or when government research or baseline services are blocked for bullshit reasons.  The government nannies you five ways before you ate breakfast and you didn't even notice.

Yep

[PTTG??]

Sometimes I think that the effort to bring about gun control isn't actually worth it. With 33,000 traffic deaths and something on the order of 9000 gun deaths (not counting ~20,000 gun suicides), cars are 3.6 times deadlier than guns. If we subtract about a thousand gun deaths that were in fact totally justified field executions of violent criminals, i.e., 100% of the people killed by police officers, it's more like 4.125 times less safe to get in a car than it is to simply be an American in a public space, school, workplace, or home.

So long as you avoid doing anything which might threaten a police officer, such as being black.

But in all seriousness, modern gun control legislation is utterly meaningless. In order to actually change things we'd actually need to bring in and retire guns AND do a massive wealth redistribution campaign to eliminate the causes of gun violence. The insane are a trivially small part of gun violence (assuming 1 mass shooting of 20 per month, that's an annual rate of 240, well under the rounding error on my figures); "mental health," though tragic and preventable, is not statistically significant until we solve crime-related gun death. THAT will only happen when the drug war is over and poverty isn't a problem.

[mainiac]

Yep

I'm sorry, I thought you were saying that the beltway nerd crowd wasn't doing anything with the power it rapaciously acquires.  Now you seem to be indicating the opposite view?