Archive for the ‘Politics’ Category
ASUA Public Forum After Action Report
Here’s a video of the proceedings from the ASUA meeting tonight.
Sorry for the poor quality video and audio — I recorded it with my cellphone video camera, which is clearly not the best recording tool. Such is life.
I’ll go through the videos and add annotations/captions in the future.
At several points, I wanted to say to the pro-gun people, “Stop it. You’re not helping.” — we’re not talking about the Second Amendment, nor guns in parking lots, nor anything else. We’re talking about whether the ASUA, the University of Arizona student government, should support or oppose a state senate bill that would allow faculty with valid CCW permits to carry concealed firearms on campus. Your efforts basically confirm every negative stereotype, though most of the pro-gun females who spoke were clear, articulate, and made some good points. This is a matter of giving responsible adults — professors, specifically — the choice to carry a firearm on campus if they wish.
The ASUA is holding a voting meeting tomorrow in the Ventana Room at the Student Union at 5:00pm. They’ll allow a brief period of public discussion on the topics (the gun issue is the first thing on the schedule, so show up promptly), but then the ASUA Senate will have their own discussions and vote on the matter. I highly encourage decent public speakers (i.e. not like those who spoke tonight) to attend and speak tomorrow. If we get good public speakers, particularly those who don’t fit into classic stereotypes of gun owners (e.g. women, disabled, professors, etc.), that could go a long way toward getting the ASUA to support this measure.
PA State Firearm?
A state senator in Pennsylvania wants to pass legislation naming the Pennsylvania Long Rifle as the state’s official firearm. Report here.
While I think that such legislation is silly, I otherwise don’t have any objection to it. Some, however, do:
[O]opponents say the idea of designating a state firearm is unthinkable, especially since Pennsylvania cities are scarred by gun-related crimes.
Said opponents are not named in the article, nor is their reasoning — such as it is — explained. How does naming a historical, blackpowder, single-shot, longer-than-four-feet-long rifle as the state’s official firearm have anything to do with violent crime? Whoever these opponents are, they need to unbunch their panties.
On Congressional Seats
It is not “Ted Kennedy’s senate seat”, it is the seat for one of the two congressmen representing Massachusetts.
For a while, Kennedy held such a seat, but that doesn’t make it “his seat” after he no longer holds it.
Too Soon?
Today, when riding to work, I passed a Toyota Prius going the other direction.
Now, this is not an unusual occurrence — (plural form of Prius) are hardly rare cars, and one sees quite a few in Tucson.
This particular Prius, however, was completely decked out in “Obama 2012″ livery. This didn’t appear to be the work of some guy with a white car and a few bumper stickers, but rather a professionally-done thing.
If this is some sort of official campaign vehicle, I think it’s a bit too bloody early: the President was inaugurated 6 months and 22 days ago and still has 3 years, 5 months, and 9 days until the next inauguration. He’s barely 14% through his term and people are already gearing up for the next election…that seems…crazy.
Why don’t we wait a bit to see how he’s been doing at, say, the 25% and 50% marks in his term, and then see if he should run for reelection. As far as I can tell, there hasn’t been any of the promised “change” he talked about — Washington seems to be conducting business as usual.
Fisking the Daily Star
The Arizona Daily Star published an article in their Sunday Edition that stood out to me when I was grocery shopping today: it had a large, above-the-fold headline entitled, “US makes it easy for gun traffickers.”
While their article is long and makes a weak attempt at appearing balanced, it has some absurdities that I really must point out. I’ve made a few statements in my response that are likely to be common knowledge to gunny folks, though I’d appreciate it if readers could point out where I might find good sources for such statements so I can cite them properly.
Also, I wrote this post rather late at night, so I’m likely to have a few spelling or grammar mistakes. Mea cupla. Read the rest of this entry »
On Iran
Friend: “Based on news reports, one would think that Iran is about to explode. However, it seems as though they go through this every election cycle.”
Me: “I know nothing about Iranian politics, but I’m just happy that the most recent city-engulfing riot in the US that I can recall is when the Red Sox won the World Series.”
That said, if there’s any bloggers, journalists, or other such folks in Iran who need a private, secure tunnel out to the public internet, I’m willing to provide an SSH tunnel and/or a SSL web-based proxy. Free speech and all that. Simply contact me by email for details; if privacy is a concern, my PGP key is also available on the contact information page. If you are unable to send email to that address, leave a comment and we can arrange alternate communications.
Perspective
I’ve recently been reading The Huffington Post1 and find it amusing how people on both sides of the political aisle view politicians on “their side” and “the other side” in much the same way.
Many of the commenters seem to believe that, on the topic of health care reform2, the current Democrats in office are “Republicans lite.”
From my discussions with Republicans, many people believe that on many issues, Republican politicians are “Democrats lite.”
I’ve seen and heard any number of uncivil words written and spoken by members of both major parties directed against members of their opposition.
While people may disagree, sometimes vehemently, on various policy decisions, I think people need to find a bit of perspective: in the end, we’re all citizens of this great nation, and we all want what’s best for it. The Founding Fathers disagreed on many things, but they were able to work out their differences as best they could. Is it too much to ask that today’s citizenry do the same?
- Why? Maybe my blood pressure was too low. I dunno. [↩]
- “The government will pay for everything.” without mentioning where the money will come from. [↩]
First Principles
Over the years, I’ve met several people who opposed the right to keep and bear arms. In some cases, these meetings resulted in discussion and debates on US firearm law and policy.
For the first year or two that I had these discussions, I found it very difficult to understand the other person’s position, and they had difficulty understanding mine. Eventually, I discovered why: we each held fundamentally different first principles.
For example, I hold the belief that the default state of rights is “on” — if someone wishes to create a new law or restriction, the onus is on them to justify their restriction. I’m consistent in the application of this belief: all rights default to “on,” whether they’re the right to speak freely, possess and use arms, maintain one’s privacy, have sex with any other consenting adult, end one’s life, ingest or otherwise consume intoxicating substances1, operate a vehicle, and so on so long as one exercises those rights in a manner that is safe, does not infringe on the rights of others, and takes responsibility for any effects of their actions.
Some people I know hold an opposite belief: that the default state of rights is (or should) be “off,” and that unless a specific thing or behavior is allowed, it is forbidden.
Some people straddle the line in that they believe that certian rights default to “off” and others default to “on” — a person may have a right to speak freely, but needs to justify their desire to possess arms. Perhaps they think that a person may have a right to own arms, but simultaneously think that one may not have consensual sex with another adult that does not fit with their personal beliefs. Another common one is that that one may own arms, but has no right to privacy.
When it comes to guns in particular, some believe that guns serve no useful purpose, and so one must demonstrate a “need” (such as being a member of the police or military) prior to being allowed to own one, while I believe that guns are useful, and one must demonstrate a “need” to justify a restriction on their ownership.
Once I discovered this fundamental difference in first principles, I realized why I was having so much difficulty understanding and being understood: discussions and debates are impossible if the participants do not agree upon a common set of first principles.
As such, I’ve stopped figuratively bashing my head against a brick wall when it comes to debating gun-specific issues, but instead focus on the two of us agreeing on compatible first principles, if possible.
- With the caveat that some substances may require a doctor’s perscription, as they might have harmful side-effects if not taken in a particular manner. [↩]
Offered Without Comment
Obama in Mexico
The Arizona Republic published an article discussing the various details of Obama’s recent trip to Mexico. While it covered a wide range of details, I was mostly concerned with the gun-related issues. I’ve taken some excerpts and made some comments below:
President Barack Obama, outlining plans to help Mexico combat drug violence, promised Thursday to resurrect a treaty against arms trafficking that has been stuck in Congress for 12 years, but rebuffed Mexico’s demands to curb sales of assault weapons that Mexico is demanding.
While I’m glad that he doesn’t seem inclined to promote an assault weapons scary-looking-gun ban, the fact that Mexico is “demanding” changes to American laws, particularly fundamental ones like the right to arms, is troubling.
Obama showed little appetite for reviving the 1994-2004 Assault Weapons Ban. During a joint press conference in Mexico City, Mexican President Felipe Calderón blamed the end of the ban for the increasing firepower wielded by drug cartels.
Well, then Calderón is an idiot. The now-expired AWB didn’t have any effect on the availability of certain scary-looking guns. Ban-compliant AR-15s and AK variants, for example, were easily found during the decade it was in effect, and are functionally identical to guns that were banned. Guns affected by the ban were simply semi-auto lookalikes of their select-fire military brethren, and are now the most common sporting arms in the country. They are used by no military in the world. The guns used in violent crimes in Mexico are almost certainly the select-fire variants which are effectively unavailable to US citizens, and not available in US gun shops.
Obama said he still believes the assault weapons ban “made sense,” but that he wants to concentrate on measures against gun smuggling, not gun sales themselves. Many Congress members, including Democrats, have vowed to fiercely oppose any revival of the ban.
If Obama believes the AWB “made sense,” then he’s a fool. It was about as effective as banning red cars (but not banning non-red versions of the same car), because red cars are obviously go faster and are more dangerous than every other car. Anyway, good on Congress for vowing to oppose any such ban.
The ban prohibited sales of semi-automatic weapons with certain combinations of military-style features, such as folding stocks, large magazines and flash suppressors. Opponents of the ban say the weapons actually fire smaller bullets than some other rifles, and that it is unconstitutional to ban a gun simply because of how it looks.
I’m not sure about the constitutionality of a ban(( My gut instinct says a ban would be unconstitutional, but I’m not a lawyer and Constitutional law can get rather muddied and complex. )), but simply having “smaller bullets” doesn’t make a gun any less dangerous than any other. 7.62mm NATO is certainly more lethal than, say, .32 ACP, but the .32 has a slightly larger bullet.
It’s nice to see a media outlet describe, with reasonable accuracy, the gist of the AWB, rather than claiming it banned machine guns or other such stuff.