;)
The Commentariat -- Dec. 4, 2012
Cliff Notes
Jackie Calmes of the New York Times (post time Dec. 4, 3:09 am): "Democratic luminaries with ties to the Obama and Clinton administrations, including two former Treasury secretaries and two former White House chiefs of staff, on Tuesday will enter the tax debate with an overhaul plan that would raise an additional $1.8 trillion in the first decade. That is $200 billion more than President Obama has proposed and $1 trillion more than Republicans in Congress support. It would mostly result from a simplification of the tax code that produces higher taxes from the wealthy, but would also involve higher taxes on cigarettes, alcoholic beverages and Internet gambling that would hit people of all incomes." Here's the plan (pdf). CW: Maybe they could have submitted it a tad sooner.
White House Hits the Reject Button. Michael Memoli of the Los Angeles Times: "Dan Pfeiffer, the White House communications director, said in a statement that what congressional Republicans had billed as a 'good-faith effort' to move toward compromise contained 'nothing new' and offered no specifics on how they'd achieve revenue targets included in the plan. Until the Republicans in Congress are willing to get serious about asking the wealthiest to pay slightly higher tax rates, we won't be able to achieve a significant, balanced approach to reduce our deficit,' Pfeiffer said in the statement, released two hours after details of the GOP offer emerged."
Jonathan Karl of ABC News: "Republicans are seriously considering a Doomsday Plan if fiscal cliff talks collapse entirely. It's quite simple: House Republicans would allow a vote on extending the Bush middle class tax cuts (the bill passed in August by the Senate) and offer the President nothing more: no extension of the debt ceiling, nothing on unemployment, nothing on closing loopholes. Congress would recess for the holidays and the president would face a big battle early in the year over the debt ceiling." ...
... Because Doomsday Plan Sounds More Badass than Capitulation Plan. Jonathan Chait of New York: "The evolving Republican position appears to be a response to the recognition that the [Republican] party doesn't have any leverage to fight Obama over the Bush tax cuts and doesn't seem to know what it wants to do on spending."
While I'm flattered the Speaker would call something 'the Bowles plan,' the approach outlined in the letter Speaker Boehner sent to the President does not represent the Simpson-Bowles plan, nor is it the Bowles plan. -- Erskine Bowles ...
... New York Times Editors: "Republicans didn't even bother to assemble their own package of spending cuts and revenue increases; they did a simple copy and paste of a few proposals made extemporaneously at a hearing last year by Erskine Bowles.... Mr. Bowles quickly disavowed" authorship of the GOP proposal. "The offer was a transparent attempt to appear responsive to Mr. Obama's detailed proposal from last week, without doing any actual math or hard work."
Paul Krugman: "... the Republican 'counteroffer' is basically fake. It calls for $800 billion in revenue from closing loopholes, but doesn't specify a single loophole to be closed; it calls for huge spending cuts, but aside from raising the Medicare age and cutting the Social Security inflation adjustment -- moves worth only around $300 billion -- it doesn't specify how these cuts are to be achieved. So it's basically the Paul Ryan method: scribble down some numbers and pretend that you're a budget wonk with a Serious plan.... [See definition of 'Serious' below.] Oh, and for all the seniors or near-seniors who voted Republican because you thought they would protect Medicare from that bad guy Obama: you've been had." ...
... ** Krugman on controlling healthcare costs to rein in the deficit. Bottom line: "... pay no attention when [Republicans] talk about how much they hate deficits. If they were serious about deficits, they'd be willing to consider policies that might actually work; instead, they cling to free-market fantasies that have failed repeatedly in practice."
Josh Barro of Bloomberg News: "House Republicans are out with their response to the President's opening bid on the fiscal cliff, and it's not very impressive. Here are three big problems with the letter they sent to the White House: 1. It's not really a proposal -- it's just a set of headline numbers without specific policies.... 2. The description of tax reform makes little sense.... 3. The proposal does not fully avert the fiscal cliff.
Steve Benen: "Under the GOP plan, Republicans get the more than $1 trillion in spending cuts Obama already gave them; Republicans get the entitlement cuts they want; Republicans get hundreds of billions of dollars in additional cuts to programs they haven't identified; and Republicans get all of the Bush-era tax rates they've prioritized. This isn't a 'counteroffer'; it's a Christmas wish list written by kids without access to calculators."
Kevin Drum of Mother Jones updates his dictionary to define the latest meanings of "serious" and "unserious" proposals:
Serious (ser’ ee uhs) adj. any of a group of proposals that immiserates large numbers of ordinary people, either immediately or in the future, via cuts to broad-based social welfare programs.
Unserious (un ser’ ee uhs) adj. any proposal that slightly inconveniences rich people via modest tax increases or annoys military contractors via small cuts to the Defense Department.
CW: As Congressional Republicans continue their fight to protect the rich (their so-called counter-proposal actually lowers the top marginal tax rate) & undermine the government, keep this Think Progress headline in mind: "Corporate profits hit record high while worker wages hit record low." Pat Garofalo has the story.
** Frank Bruni: "There’s something rotten in the N.F.L., an obviously dysfunctional culture that either brings out sad, destructive behavior in its fearsome gladiators or fails to protect them and those around them from it. And while it's too soon to say whether [Jovan] Belcher himself was a victim of that culture, it's worth noting that the known facts and emerging details of his story echo themes all too familiar in pro football over recent years: domestic violence, substance abuse, erratic behavior, gun possession, bullets fired, suicide." ...
... AP: "Bob Costas'; 'Sunday Night Football' halftime commentary supporting gun control sparked a Fox News Channel debate Monday on whether NBC should fire him and a Twitter storm involving Ted Nugent, Rosie O'Donnell, Herman Cain and many more." CW: Costas' remarks should not be controversial. And the AP should not bother to report what Nugent, O'Donnell & Cain have to say about anything -- especially Nugent. ...
... NEW. Charles Pierce: "That what Costas said is reckoned to be brave -- and it was, especially judging by the hysteria it set off on the gun-happy right -- is a measure of how truncated our national discussion has become."
Louise Story of the New York Times: Pontiac, Michigan, tries to go Hollywood, but there is no happy ending -- just a lot of lost tax revenue. "Hollywood may make movies about the evils of capitalism, but it rarely works without incentives, which are paid for by taxpayers. Nationwide, about $1.5 billion in tax breaks is awarded to the film industry each year...."
Dana Milbank: Obama's "transparent" presidency has become increasingly -- and ominously -- opaque.
Jonathan Capehart of the Washington Post: "... what is not in doubt to me is Ann Romney's strong belief that not only was she going to be first lady but also she deserved to be first lady. The presidency and the role of first lady are earned. They are neither a matter of whose turn it is nor destiny. Like so many others, Ann Romney apparently had to learn this the hard way." ...
... Mitt Gets a Job. Samantha Bomkamp of the AP: "... Mitt Romney is rejoining Marriott International's board of directors."
In our continuing He-Might-Have-Been-President series, Bob Woodward of the Washington Post writes that "in spring 2011, [Fox "News" chief Roger] Ailes asked a Fox News analyst" to tell David Petraeus that Ailes advised Petraeus to "turn down an expected offer from President Obama to become CIA director and accept nothing less than the chairmanship of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the top military post. If Obama did not offer the Joint Chiefs post, Petraeus should resign from the military and run for president, Ailes suggested." The audio (top of the page) is interesting. Petraeus uses the interview to try to get Fox "News" to be more supportive of the Afghanistan war & complains -- evah so politely -- that as Fox goes after Obama they're also "unduly undermining" the war effort.
Oh, Heartbreak All Around. David Corn & Andy Kroll of Mother Jones: Dick Armey, the former House Majority Leader (RTP-Texas) "has resigned as chairman of FreedomWorks, one of the main political outfits of the conservative movement and an instrumental force within the tea party." The break-up was definitely not amicable.
Rebecca Schoenkopf of Wonkette writes a terrific retort to the latest outraged reaction to whatever the Obamas are doing. The Horror This Time: the White House has 54 Christmas trees at a time the entire nation is about to go over the fiscal cliff! So sez Andrew Malcolm, who must have got booted from the L.A. Times because he's writing about the outrageous Obamas someplace else now. Here was Alex Pareene's take on Malcolm in 2010.
News Ledes
AP: "The Palestinians will ask the U.N. Security Council to call for an Israeli settlement freeze, President Mahmoud Abbas and his advisers decided Tuesday, as part of an escalating showdown over Israel's new plans to build thousands more homes on war-won land in and around Jerusalem."
AP: "Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher told officers who found him sleeping in his car outside an apartment complex hours before he committed a murder-suicide that he was there to visit a woman he described as his 'girlfriend,' but that she wasn't home. The apartment complex is about 10 miles from the Kansas City home Belcher shared with 22-year-old Kasandra Perkins, the mother of their 3-month-old daughter Zoey."
Washington Post: "The Senate has failed to ratify an international treaty intended to protect the rights of those with disabilities, as a bloc of conservatives opposed the treaty believing it could interfere with U.S. law. The Senate voted 61 to 38 to ratify the Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities, a tally that fell short of the two-thirds needed to sign on to an international treaty."
Washington Post: "Thousands of protesters massed outside the presidential palace and in Tahrir Square in Cairo on Tuesday, as Egyptians voiced their opposition to President Mohamed Morsi for a 12th straight day."
New York Times: "Calling a California law that bans gay 'conversion therapies' for minors an unconstitutional infringement on speech, a federal judge blocked the law's enforcement late Monday."
New York Times: "Fierce fighting on the battlefield and setbacks on the diplomatic front increased pressure on the embattled Syrian government as fresh signs emerged on Tuesday of a sustained battle for control of the capital.... The latest reports followed developments on Monday when a senior Turkish official said that Russia had agreed to a new diplomatic approach to seek ways to persuade President Bashar al-Assad to relinquish power...."
Star Ledger: In a "meeting with White House officials and Congressional leaders in D.C. today," New Jersey Gov. Chris "Christie asked that the federal government reimburse 100 percent of costs related to Sandy recovery, beyond the usual 75 percent or the 90 percent President Obama can authorize."
AP: "Iran claimed Tuesday it had captured a U.S. drone after it entered Iranian airspace over the Persian Gulf -- even showing an image of a purportedly downed craft on state TV -- but the U.S. Navy said all its unmanned aircraft in the region were 'fully accounted for.'"
AP: "NATO foreign ministers are expected Tuesday to approve Turkey's request for Patriot anti-missile systems to bolster its defense against strikes from neighboring Syria, NATO's top official said." ...
... Washington Post Update: "NATO agreed Tuesday to send new American-made air defenses to Turkey's volatile southern border with Syria, a boost to an alliance member on the front lines of the civil war and a potential backstop for wider U.S. or NATO air operations if Syria deteriorates further."
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Reader Comments (23)
Off topic, but Bob Costas is my current (apologies to Kranky Keith) Best Person in the World. No, make that Best Person in the Solar System. He should be everyone's. Best Person in the Solar System
And, what do you know--Keith is quoted in the piece. I miss Keith, though I doubt Current does.
Wow. ""Corporate profits hit record high while worker wages hit record low" threatens to replace "Unrest in the Middle East" as the no-shit headline of our time.
That is to say, as the "All systems normal" of current journalism.
@Akhilleus. @cowichan is right. Let's not call Benedict a pederast or NAMBLA president. There is no doubt he is a pederast-enabler but no evidence of which I'm aware that he's a pedophile himself.
Benedict is one of the few public figures whom it is fair to call a Nazi, but even there I cut him a little slack. When my husband was in grade school, he had to regularly attend Mussolini days (that's not what they were called but they were definitely indoctrination camps). By the time he got to high school, all the boys were sent away -- involuntarily -- to Mussolini camp. My husband, who was a dutiful student, snuck away from the camp so he didn't have to listen to the bullshit. He tried to get his best friend to cut with him, but the friend wouldn't go. The friend later became a Harvard professor. My husband never forgave him, and not for the Harvard part. A year or two after the boys' camp incident, my husband joined the resistance, at great personal danger to himself. I assume his friend did not. So I'd say Benedict is no worse than your typical Harvard professor, at least in regard to his turn in the Hitler Youth.
Marie
Yesterday I mentioned Rick Santorum and last night Rachel reported that this man, a heartbeat away from being the GOP front runner, has joined the wacky political conspiracy theory site World Net Daily as a columnist. This is the place where Obama is secretly gay and has hidden children in Kenya and is plotting to turn America into a fascist state.
Then I learn that smarmy Dick Army is leaving his Freedom Works junket. I always found the man most distasteful, but how interesting that he has abandoned that false grass roots ship.
Next I watch a hilarious Jon Stewart segment about Fox's annual WAR ON CHRISTMAS yelp along with Bill O'Reilly during a discussion––I use the word loosely––with an atheist and says "Christianity is NOT a religion, it's a philosophy."
So things are looking up and I was throughly entertained; didn't have to watch "Friends" to get some laughs for the day.
Cowichan,
First, I never said the pope was a member of NAMBLA. My post was, I thought it obvious, fairly dripping with sarcasm. What I was wondering, again sarcastically, was whether one of his first tweets would be a link to NAMBLA picture galleries. My suggestion that his Twitter handle might well have been "pederast" rather than "pontifex" was also not serious, as at least one other commenter understood perfectly.
It is, of course, true--at least as far as we know--that Benedict had no improper interactions with children, but he certainly has had plenty of interaction with those who have, and that IS quite serious. Serious enough that the parish church I grew up in was closed some years ago, along with many, many others, to pay court awarded penalties for the actions of actual pederasts whose activities were not only known but ENCOURAGED by sending these men from one parish to the next for DECADES.
Instead of being removed from any interaction with children, these predators were allowed to rip the innocence out of the hearts of thousands of children; allowed by people like Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict) who, instead of punishing those enablers, rewarded them with cushy jobs in the fucking Vatican surrounded by gold and gemstones and precious art instead of being surrounded by goddamn bars and chains where they belong.
So, no, he isn't (at least to my knowledge) a member, or the president of NAMBLA. But he IS and HAS been running one of the most efficient and proficient organizations for the promotion and protection of pederasty in the world.
So unfortunately I cannot fulfill your requests for documentary evidence, but I hope you'll forgive my momentary lapse into sarcasm because he and the child molesters he has protected for decades deserve far worse than sarcastic posts, but short of taking a pipe wrench to their skulls, snarky comments engendered by the rank hypocrisy of someone like the pope making a big show of communicating things like "faith" and "truth" and "justice" to the world is about the best I can do right now.
On this site (and many others) during the recent election, many of us (myself included) referred quite often to the Romneys as "Lord and Lady Romney" but I don't recall anyone asking for proof of their appearance in some guide to contemporary peerage. I think we all got it.
In any event, my apologies for not being clearer about my use of sarcasm.
Marie,
My reference to the pope's Nazi past is more opportunistic than serious, since, as you say, he actually was a member of the Hitler Youth. But so were a lot of others who dropped all traces of fascism at the first opportunity.
What I am more serious about, however, and the way in which the brand of "Nazi" is much more apparent and dangerous, is the way in which the former Cardinal Ratzinger has imposed an iron-fisted right-wing form of fascism on the church, ramping up an already authoritarian organization in an attempt to create a monolithic edifice approachable by none but those kept in line by discipline and indoctrination.
If Catholics thought Wojtyla was a staunch conservative who strove to drag the church back to the 19th century, Ratzinger, as head of the Holy See and now as Pontiff, has been shooting for the 12th century, and he's done it through implementation of many standard fascist techniques.
Others can disagree on nomenclature, but this church has decided that there is no place for even the most subtle disagreements in matters of interpretation, no place for women, for gays or lesbians, no place for any who do not obey the commands of the Leader.
Sounds pretty authoritarian to me.
So, maybe he wasn't, like your husband and many others (not so sure about the Harvard guy), a dyed in the wool fascist as a young man, but he sure has donned the mantle as a leader of millions of Catholics around the world.
But my real question is this: Can he make the trains run on time?
Thank-you for the heads up Marie. I raced through the fiscal plan from the Center for American Progress this morning. (need to transport husband to work - Scotty informs me the transporter is on the fritz) It made a lot of sense and was written in straightforward language. In fact, I was excited after speed reading it. I have been bristling at the mention of losing the mortgage interest deduction ( I live in CA), but this plan had merit around that issue. I wonder if Obama asked for the Center to write a plan?
After the initial gag reflex when I saw Lawrence Summers listed as one of the authors, I thought about my experience that truly smart people make difficult concepts simple to understand. Simplicity of the written word and the ease of understanding is the product of a lot of work, thought and brainpower. In politics and in everyday work life, there is so little will to put in the work to master a concept or a subject. The GOP is a great example of the lazy slug mentality. See their MENSA poster boy Paul Ryan. Its not that the policy positions are well reasoned and I just don't agree - they are stupid, without merit and have no empirical support. If you got no ideas - bluster. The GOP position on the evolutionary scale is falling as we speak.
Looking forward to a more thorough reading of the plan later today.
Terrific! There need to be more individuals such as Bob Costas stepping up on the issue of gun control —or rather, the lack thereof that seems to be increasing. The opinions of: Ted Nugent (a rock STAR???) ? Herman Cain? Fox? Well, consider the sources!
Where I grew up, guns and hunting were part of the everyday life in a country community. What was 'normal' then was the annual start of rabbit/pheasant season and followed by deer hunting. Familes were poor, this was meat on the dinner table. This era doesn't exist. Very few seem to be the hunter/sportsmen of ye olden tymes! Today, owing guns is a macho ego thing with aggressive behaviors too, too prevalent.
I am appalled by states that permit carrying a gun openly in public places. Frightening! If I should ever encounter any of these it's-my-right-to-bear-arms-because-the CONSTITUTION-sez-so in any restaurant, any retail store, anywhere, anytime...pleez Mr./Mrs. Biz Owners don't expect me to be your customer. Shades of the Wild West, I would be totally out of your place of business.
@Akhilleus. What you wrote yesterday was this: "And his Twitter handle apparently is going to be 'Pontifex'. Better, I suppose, than 'Pederast'. And not as long as 'Ponti-fixes for other pederasts'." And "Oh, and one more slightly humorous thing about the Top Pederast on Twitter."
When you refer to Benedict as "Top Pederast" & when you write "other pederasts," it's pretty clear you're calling Benedict a pederast. And, as we all agree, there's no evidence Benedict has been boydiddling, but there is plenty on his enabling priests & members of the Roman Catholic hierarchy to continue abusing young people. Because he is a part of that scandal, I expect many people think Benedict himself is a player. It's a common assumption about supposedly celibate priests.
There's a fine line between satire & slander, and it is not a fixed fine line, so it's sometimes hard to know when you've crossed it. Probably no genre of writing is more dependent upon reader response than satire. If a satirist's intended audience doesn't "get it," then he has crossed the line. A good example was a 2008 New Yorker cover by Barry Blitt that portrayed the Obamas as terrorists. Particularly because Blitt provided no context by, say, placing the illustration of the Obamas in the mind of Rush Limbaugh, a lot of people saw the cover as demeaning to the Obamas, not to their ridiculous detractors. David Remnick, the New Yorker editor, apologized for the cover.
Both today & yesterday I posted a Photoshopped pic of Ann Romney as Queen Elizabeth. Is that offensive? Well, yeah, to Ann Romney & her fans it is. But nobody who reads politically-oriented Websites thinks Ann Romney really dresses that way for dinner. (In fact, Romney himself made a joke -- at his expense -- that dressing up in black tie was the way the Romneys always dined.) Nor do they think she is really "Lady Romney." But the characterizations are apt because of remarks she has made suggesting she was entitled to "the throne." (See the Jonathan Capehart post, linked above, for a run-down of Romney's regalesque public statements.)
In the lede to my NYTX column yesterday I wrote, "... the paper’s Vatican correspondent Brother Ross Douthat...." I don't think any NYTX readers believe that Friar Puck there is really in the employ of the Vatican or that he is an actual monk. If Douthat were not a well-known columnist, but maybe an op-ed contributor from Podunk U., I could not have got away with that line.
I let quite a few things go in the Comments section during the election season because people were pretty excited about it -- things I thought were over-the-top but could reasonably be construed as satirical remarks. I'm no fan of Pope Benedict nor of the Roman Catholic hierarchy in general, but I do think we have to be at least a little careful not to purposely offend the sensibilities of religious believers, and I don't find it unreasonable to be offended by remarks that indicate Benedict himself abuses boys.
I was fairly aghast when I learned that CNN had hired a "news analyst" who called David Souter "a goat-fucking child molester," even though I don't belong to the Church of David Souter. I think the comparison is apt: jokes about ostensibly celibate men (I have no idea what Souter does with his free time) implying or saying outright that these men express their sexuality in ways that shock the conscience.
At any rate, this is a public forum, & we should bear that in mind when we write. None of us, myself included, is always going to make the right call, and it's both amusing & effective to push the envelope. But when we write, we do have to ask ourselves how much we want to offend readers and how many we want to offend.
Marie
@Akhilleus. Not to worry. Not stop sign, just a caution flag. As you might have noted, I'm one of sarcasm's diminishing legion of fans but have learned using sarcasm as a weapon is a petard on which one is too easily hoist.
Had a talk with an older man last night who regularly reads my letters to the local paper, I was happy to learn, most often with approval. He said, tho', he didn't understand the last one. Fortunately he gave me five minute to 'splain myself. Here's the letter:
"Dear Editor:
I see the dreaded black helicopters have arrived.
Last week at a meeting of the Skagit County Council of Governments, some local residents spoke against the Council's planning efforts, claiming its desire to prepare for our county's future was really a thinly disguised attempt to impose the horror of the United Nations Agenda 21 on our beautiful valley.
In fact, Agenda 21's non-binding suggestions for sustainable development, originally adopted in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, speak to such frightening goals as eliminating poverty, improving human health and protecting the air, water and forests on which we all depend. To no surprise, the Republican Party, the one that likes to scare people, has described Agenda 21 as "erosive of American sovereignty."
Those worried about a toothless United Nations takeover of Skagit County were right to worry about sovereignty, but they attended the wrong meeting.
As they spoke to the SCCoG, the secret meetings hammering out the details of the Trans Pacific Partnership trade agreement continue. As a letter from Congress to United States Trade Representative Ron Kirk stated, the TPP “will create binding policies on future Congresses in numerous areas,” including labor, environmental and property rights.
The proposed agreement also says that foreign corporations operating in the United States would no longer be subject to domestic U.S. laws regarding protections for the environment, finance or labor rights and could appeal to an "international tribunal,” which would have the power to overrule American law in favor of the new TPP-guaranteed "rights" of corporations.
Anyone concerned about an imagined United Nations threat to our nation’s sovereignty might look instead at the helicopters displaying multi-national corporation logos, decorated with dollar signs.
The helicopters carrying cargoes of destructive trade agreements, such as NAFTA and the WTO, are already here."
I thought the letter's message plain enough, but in talking to him without the text in front of us, I gathered that by calling Agenda 21's provisions a "horror" and "frightening," tongue-firmly-in-cheek descriptions I thought obvious to everyone, I only confused him. He didn't get the joke....and I didn't communicate.
So...a decision I will keep in mind in the future when I rail in the local paper: Is my amusement worth the price of the reader's puzzlement? Sometimes it is and sometimes not, but it is a choice.
Even an "innocent" question about a "missing e," I've recently found, can confound as much as it entertains.
But I'm still smiling.
Marie and Ken,
Good points, all of which I will keep in mind.
Thanks for the feedback.
MAG: at the risk of going against the grain: there are a whole bunch of liberals in the fly-over states that think the best gun control is hitting what you're aiming at. That said, I totally agree that if you don't like a businesses politics, don't or do support them. I won't buy Brawny or any Georgia Pacific paper products because Koch owns them.
I feel the great good fortune to live in a place where the undressed animals outnumber the dressed animals. Uniformity of laws and legality is what makes TSA security theatre a joke most places in the States. Uniformity is what makes Al Sharpton the same selfish striver as Sarah Palin. In this day an age when I can read New England Journal of Medicine articles from my bed in my small town, why must everything like laws be "supersized". Because it is easy and nuance is hard. The duality mind-set that infects so much of the American psyche does a disservice to who we are and what we can become.
That the NFL and its advertisers send young men out to maim themselves and others and we cheer is to me, really, the question that needs review.
@MAG--
Like @citizen265, I'm going to go a little against the grain, too.
I'm a gun owner and concealed carry permit holder who uses his guns on a weekly basis for sporting purposes as well as to practice self-defense skills. Though I don't see it much here in New Mexico--which is an "open carry" state--when I visit Arizona I frequently see individuals carrying openly.
Now, it doesn't bother me particularly to see a holstered handgun in public, but that's just the consequence of years of familiarity with guns and gun owners: someone who carries openly is unlikely to be a potential mass-murderer. Those generally keep their weapons concealed until they begin their deadly attacks.
But I agree with you, at least to this extent. It's just plain bad advertising for the Second Amendment for individuals to carry handguns openly in public simply because they can. Far too many people these days are intimidated by the mere sight of a firearm, so why do it with an almost deliberate intent to prove to such people that gun owners are scary, even crazy people?
Hardly the way to win support for lawful, responsible gun ownership.
@ citizen625 & Zee Just so you know...I've owned a gun. I know how to handle a gun, clean a gun, etc. I'm not anti gun ownership for sportsmen/hunters! But, I am against casually carrying guns into public venues–i.e, going out for dinner, waltzing into the mall— "shades of the Wild West"—just because one can, etc. That's where I draw a line. I don't want to feel uncomfortable and unsafe.
Zee, you are correct...it is ALL about RESPONSIBLE gun ownership.
Zee: I grew up in Canada, where it's almost impossible to get a permit to carry a handgun. Haven't noticed that Canadians are any less free or more oppressed by Government than Americans. What they are is much less oppressed by violent crime and gun deaths, particularly those gun deaths caused by law abiding, permit holding gun owners whose weapons are most likely to be used in family altercations rather than for "self protection."
I missed yesterday's discussion on carbon taxes, but would also like to offer an "against-the-grain" comment on that topic, too.
Out here in the West, the land of wide, open spaces, (poor) rural living and near-zero public transit, the automobile is an absolute necessity to get anywhere.
Particularly for our poorer, rural residents, who may live many miles from the nearest grocery store, post office or doctor, an added carbon tax on gasoline would be terribly regressive. And no matter how high the tax is, these people won't be "encouraged" to trade in their polluting, low-mpg, 1987 Chevy pickup truck for a Toyota Prius anytime soon. They don't have the money, and a regressive tax isn't going to help that problem.
Even in urban centers, middle-class people still rely heavily on their private automobiles, simply because of the way Western cities developed in the twentieth century. During the last two gasoline-price "crises," in about 2008 and now, the middle-class kept on driving 'cause they had to get to work, and mass transit use--though it did see an "uptick,"--generally wasn't up to the task. And it won't be anytime soon.
The middle-class paid the going price no matter what, because they had to get to work. What Joe and JoAnne Sixpack didn't do was take the Sixpack family to the beach, or lake, or a National Park, or the mountains for a little soul-restoration beyond the heat and crowding of the city. It was back in 2008 that I think the term "stay-cation" was invented. Just another "hit" to middle-class (and lower-class) quality of life.
And they will keep paying the going price even if a regressive carbon tax is imposed, because they will still need to get to work. Their families will just become that much less familiar with nature, in direct proportion to the size of the tax.
So, maybe the tax will reduce driving, and hence, emissions, some tiny amount, but at the expense of making life just that much more miserable for the middle- and lower-classes than it already is.
The rich, and people like myself, tending towards the upper middle-class, will probably just keep on driving unless the tax becomes so high that all traffic in America virtually stops, which, I suppose, is what some environmental extremists actually want.
So because a carbon tax on gasoline is collected "at the pump," and can't tell a poor purchaser from a rich one, in order not to be horribly regressive, there will have to be some end-of-tax-year adjustment for those whom the tax hurts most.
I'm curious to know what kind of record-keeping burden that will impose on the beleagured lower- and middle-class.
@MAG--
Thank you for your clarification. It sounds like we are of similar mind on the topic of gun ownership.
@Calyban--
I can't argue with the facts: Canada has an intentional homicide rate of 1.6 per 100,000 of population, whereas the U.S. has a rate of 4.2 per 100,000, or, 2.6 times greater than the rate in Canada. That difference is certainy reflective of our different attitudes towards guns.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional
_homicide_rate#By_country
But that still doesn't make me want to be a Canadian.
We are two very different peoples, despite our common border and (almost) common language.
The United States separated violently from Great Britain in 1783.
As nearly as I can tell, Canada only began the process of peaceful separation from Great Britain in 1867, and didn't fully complete the process until 1931
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Canada
This is an additional 148 years that Canada was under the influence of the mother country.
Just as the U.K has since evolved very differently from the U.S. with respect to private ownership of firearms, so has Canada under the U.K.'s leadership.
While there are some things that I admire about Canada, such as its single-payer health care system, there are things about Canada that I don't like, do believe are oppressive and don't think we should emulate.
In addition to Canada's gun laws, I call to your attention Canada's draconian "hate speech" laws and its star-chamber-like Human Rights Commission, before whom--as nearly as I can tell--almost anyone can be dragged for saying things that the Commission might deem offensive to someone. A defendant can be forced to compensate a plaintiff for "hurt feelings."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech_laws_in_Canada
Sorry, but to me, such laws and such a Commission are indeed oppressive, and the fact that not only does Canada's central government have such statutes, but so does virtually every province, indicates to me that Canadians have a fundamentally different perception of individual liberty than do citizens of the United States.
It's called the Bill of Rights, with the First Amendment leading the charge and the Second close on its heels.
I won't attempt to change your opinions about private ownership of firearms, but I do think that it's fair of me to call to your attention the difference between Canada's and the United States' histories, which have some bearing on the way in which our valuation of liberties such as free speech and gun ownership have evolved.
In the end, I prefer life here, south of the border, with all its attendant risks.
I am a retired probation officer who carried a firearm for part of my career. My father was a WWII vet, expert marksman (read sniper) and a lifelong NRA member. He taught NRA gun handling classes and had a significant gun collection. My brother is a police officer. My family were avid hunters, although I did not like hunting and preferred target or trap. I learned my attitudes about guns from my father. He was was very careful with firearms, both use and storage. Although he never spoke of it, he had taken many other peoples' lives during the war. I felt he had a strong position to speak on the gun ownership and use.
I have very strong feelings about firearm regulation. I'm sure there are more folks out there who are responsible than not. The fact remains that harm caused by a gun is almost always serious. People don't have to be criminals or nuts to cause harm. I have seen lots of people who are emboldened by a firearm who use poor judgement, including law enforcement personnel. Open carry, in public venues is unnecessary. You don't hunt in a crowd of people. Likewise large clip weapons and semi-automatic weapons are not for hunting. We can sure debate the "protection" argument based on individual circumstances, most of which I find unconvincing.
When I weigh the liberty interest of the permissive use of guns, it comes up short against the interests of the rest of us. I am confident that both my father felt the same and I know my brother does.
@Diane: You put it very succinctly: "When I weigh the liberty interest of the permissive use of guns, it comes up short against the interests of the rest of us."
The United States has more than 2 1/2 times the number of all gun deaths (homicides, suicides and accidental firearm deaths) as Canada. All those precious lives wasted.
Study after study has confirmed that the number of gun deaths correlates directly to the widespread availability of firearms. For what? Does owning or carrying a gun make you any safer? That has never, ever been proven: the opposite has been shown. Countries with widespread gun ownership and availability (the US, Somalia) are much less safe. It's not just a matter of different traditions and culture (Canada too had a "wild west" that lasted longer than that of the US, and the only effective tie to Britain after 1867 was in foreign policy, not domestic policing). No, the only real benefit of widespread gun ownership is the increased opportunity for widespread macho posturing, mostly (but not exclusively) by men.
@ Zee: Glad you brought it up. Understand your point about the disproportionate effect of a pay at the pump carbon tax on lower income people but believe there is an easy and equitable solution. The carbon tax should be set at a high level--whatever that most effective and beneficial tariff turns out to be--but could be offset by a paired federal income tax deduction based on income. You are right; a carbon tax by itself would be regressive, but there is no reason other than lack of political will--or the Right's desire to impose a regressive flat tax on everyone, which would disproportionately benefit the wealthy--not to create a progressive counterbalance in the federal tax code.
Of course, we'd have to be serious about both climate issues and equity and there's a ton of oil industry lobbying money between here and there.
@Diane and @Calyban--
As I said, I'm not going to try to change your views on gun ownership. You have your perspective, and I--and 80,000,000 other Americans--have ours. For the moment, the law is with us, though I know that could change in a flash. Though for my part, I hope it's not in my lifetime.
As I have tried to express in this forum before, I think you might find me more "flexible" on the topic of "gun control" than you expect, though I'm not going to try to beat that dead horse again.
@Ken Winkes--
Agreed!