U.S. Politics

[rhubroma]

You are right.

BTW, in your opinion, why the huge reduction in gun violence in the US?

Exacty! In my opinion (however huge that conquest might be) that's because of a tentative move toward civility. Nothing less.

 

[aphronesis]

The first thing we need to do is be honest and assess what is causing the breakdown in the family unit particularly with inner city black families.

Having a government program replace the role of the father or gangs serving the role as daddies to young black males has proven to be a bad recipe.

Oh, please. Act like you can try a little harder than that to work though causality and socioeconomics. You sit around 19 days out of 20 with harangues for the liberals that govt. is not solution to every problem.

The flip side of that (go hard if you're going to go) is that you can't blame govt. for all of society's woes. Funny that.

Back to your other post. People's comments on a third rate huffpo article constitute dissident anti-americanism that might pose a challenge to the status quo and the reigning order. Let alone accredited media that gooner might be in touch with?

yeah right. in what way does that challenge what i said in the original post?

and no, i'm not going to read the comments: there are reasons I live the places that i do.

 

[Scott SoCal]

Oh, please. Act like you can try a little harder than that to work though causality and socioeconomics. You sit around 19 days out of 20 with harangues for the liberals that govt. is not solution to every problem.

The flip side of that (go hard if you're going to go) is that you can't blame govt. for all of society's woes. Funny that.

Back to your other post. People's comments on a third rate huffpo article constitute dissident anti-americanism that might pose a challenge to the status quo and the reigning order. Let alone accredited media that gooner might be in touch with?

yeah right. in what way does that challenge what i said in the original post?

and no, i'm not going to read the comments: there are reasons I live the places that i do.

Oh, please. Act like you can try a little harder than that to work though causality and socioeconomics. You sit around 19 days out of 20 with harangues for the liberals that govt. is not solution to every problem.

And I'm right, 19 out of 20 days. What's driving black out of wedlock birth rates? What is substituting the role of black fathers.... particularly inner city black fathers?

The flip side of that (go hard if you're going to go) is that you can't blame govt. for all of society's woes. Funny that.

Not saying govt is to blame for all society's woes.

Back to your other post. People's comments on a third rate huffpo article constitute dissident anti-americanism that might pose a challenge to the status quo and the reigning order. Let alone accredited media that gooner might be in touch with?

Can't vouch for what he reads, can you? The anti-Americanism is fairly well established among some. A (willful?) misunderstanding of what American Exceptionalism actually means seems rife in that group.

 

[ChewbaccaD]

I'm going to just state that there's probably as many liberals who have never hear of Alexis de Tocqueville as conservatives. Excluding academia, of course.

I am going to state that liberals aren't the ones promoting an idea based in a comment by Alexis de Tocqueville, so there isn't an equivalence there. If they're going to spout the bullsh!t idea without knowing the context or author, they deserve nothing but derision.

 

[Scott SoCal]

I am going to state that liberals aren't the ones promoting an idea based in a comment by Alexis de Tocqueville, so there isn't an equivalence there. If they're going to spout the bullsh!t idea without knowing the context or author, they deserve nothing but derision.

There's more to the idea of American Exceptionalism than what de Tocgueville writes, don't you think?

That when America was founded, the government was to serve the people, not a king, not aristocracy. "Among a democratic people, where there is no hereditary wealth, every man works to earn a living ... Labor is held in honor; the prejudice is not against but in its favor."

Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Inalienable rights. Rights not given by any man to another. Foundational principles.

It has nothing to do with Americans being better than anyone.

 

[JRTinMA]

I repeat. We had cuts in mental health in recent years over here in Ireland. There was uproar over them. Now why isn't there anything like the level of gun violence we see in America?

Ireland, really? Your mental health problem seems to manifest itself in violence against women and the fact that almost 1 in 20 children are molested. But this is a US thread.

 

[gooner]

Ireland, really? Your mental health problem seems to manifest itself in violence against women and the fact that almost 1 in 20 children are molested. But this is a US thread.

Yes, it's a US thread and my question in the end was specifically on gun violence/mental health cuts in America after first giving an example of what impact mental health cuts had here in Ireland. You still haven't answered why there is nowhere near the gun violence over here on the back of our own mental health cuts.

A bit of a hint, it might have something to do with guns nowhere near as easily accessible as in the US.

 

[JRTinMA]

Yes, it's a US thread and my question in the end was specifically on gun violence/mental health cuts in America after first giving an example of what impact mental health cuts had here in Ireland. You still haven't answered why there is nowhere near the gun violence over here on the back of our own mental health cuts.

A bit of a hint, it might have something to do with guns nowhere near as easily accessible as in the US.

What part of you can't compare the two do you not understand? We are not Ireland. We are not Norway either who has a larger per capita gun ownership than the US and WAY less gun violence.

 

[gooner]

Actually, UK stats are not very good for your argument.

Guns do not make a nation safer, say US doctors who have compared the rate of firearms-related deaths in countries where many people own guns with the death rate in countries where gun ownership is rare.

Their findings, published Wednesday in the prestigious American Journal of Medicine, debunk the historic belief among many people in the United States that guns make a country safer, they say. On the contrary, the US, with the most guns per head in the world, has the highest rate of deaths from firearms, while Japan, which has the lowest rate of gun ownership, has the least.

They examined data from 27 developed countries, using gun ownership figures from the Small Arms Survey and deaths from the World Health Organisation, the National Center for Health Statistics and others. They also looked at crime rates compiled by the United Nations for an indication of the safety of each country.

More guns meant more deaths, they found. "The gun ownership rate was a strong and independent predictor of firearm-related death," says Bangalore. "Private gun ownership was highest in the US. Japan, on the other end, had an extremely low gun ownership rate. Similarly, South Africa (9.4 per 100,000) and the US (10.2 per 100,000) had extremely high firearm-related deaths, whereas the United Kingdom (0.25 per 100,000) had an extremely low rate of firearm-related deaths.

"There was a significant correlation between guns per head per country and the rate of firearm-related deaths with Japan being on one end of the spectrum and the US being on the other. This argues against the notion of more guns translating into less crime. South Africa was the only outlier in that the observed firearms-related death rate was several times higher than expected from gun ownership."

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/18/gun-ownership-gun-deaths-study

 

[Amsterhammer]

Like so many on the US right when trying to use comparative stats to put the UK in a worse light, Scott has confused the relevant stats for firearm related deaths quoted by Gooner above, with UK stats for numerous other crimes, including violent, but unarmed crime, which are indeed the worst in Europe in a number of categories. But, that's not what the discussion is about. The discussion is about guns. Nor are the the UK's poor crime figures directly attributable to the banning of guns, as I regularly see the pro gun right attempt to argue on the webz.

 

[Scott SoCal]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/18/gun-ownership-gun-deaths-study

And yet another intellectually dishonest argument.

Remove the suicides then re-calculate. Or don't, I don't care. Go back a couple hundred pages and read this thread. This has already been discussed.

You will not change my opinion on this issue nor will I change yours.

I say we spare ourselves all the pseudo psychobabble and insults. Move on to a different topic we can argue about because I'm done with this one.

 

[Scott SoCal]

Like so many on the US right when trying to use comparative stats to put the UK in a worse light, Scott has confused the relevant stats for firearm related deaths quoted by Gooner above, with UK stats for numerous other crimes, including violent, but unarmed crime, which are indeed the worst in Europe in a number of categories. But, that's not what the discussion is about. The discussion is about guns. Nor are the the UK's poor crime figures directly attributable to the banning of guns, as I regularly see the pro gun right attempt to argue on the webz.

To YOU the discussion is guns. If you want to discuss inanimate objects that "kill people" then we should also talk about cars, swimming pools and bathtubs. Wash buckets even.

Shall I march out those stats again?

 

[gooner]

To YOU the discussion is guns. If you want to discuss inanimate objects that "kill people" then we should also talk about cars, swimming pools and bathtubs. Wash buckets even.

Shall I march out those stats again?

Like Dana Loesch said we should talk about spoons as well.

I'm out.

 

[Amsterhammer]

To YOU the discussion is guns. If you want to discuss inanimate objects that "kill people" then we should also talk about cars, swimming pools and bathtubs. Wash buckets even.

Shall I march out those stats again?

Yes, it is about guns. How about if the mentally unstable, who don't get the treatment they require because they are no kind of priority for politicians, don't have such easy access to guns? How many mass killings with cars, swimming pools, or bathtubs do you think we would see? All kinds of inanimate objects have caused death, I'm sure, but hardly the kind of regular massacres we only see with guns.

I can hardly believe that I took the time to respond to that stupidity. That was unworthy of you.

Here's a little stat to shine another light on why guns are different to bathtubs.

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/01/20/more-americans-have-died-from-domestic-gunfire-than-all-wars-in-u-s-history-is-that-true/

 

[ChewbaccaD]

There's more to the idea of American Exceptionalism than what de Tocgueville writes, don't you think?

That when America was founded, the government was to serve the people, not a king, not aristocracy. "Among a democratic people, where there is no hereditary wealth, every man works to earn a living ... Labor is held in honor; the prejudice is not against but in its favor."

Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Inalienable rights. Rights not given by any man to another. Foundational principles.

It has nothing to do with Americans being better than anyone.

No, it doesn't. But it is sold that way by conservatives to idiots who don't know any better. Read my first quote on the subject. I stand by it 100%. And the term itself is derived from de Tocqueville regardless.

And if you don't think the term is used by people who don't understand it in any way other than to insinuate a superior state, you aren't listening. That is EXACTLY how it is used.

EDIT: And let me state clearly that we are not exceptional any longer if we truly ever were. Believe it or not, there are actually a lot people and governments that are from different geographical locations, that we can learn a lot from. The longer we treat the rest of the world like they are children who haven't grown up enough to do things right, the dumber we will continue to become. And that is precisely how American conservatives treat other countries and people foreign to our land.

 

[Scott SoCal]

No, it doesn't. But it is sold that way by conservatives to idiots who don't know any better. Read my first quote on the subject. I stand by it 100%. And the term itself is derived from de Tocqueville regardless.

And if you don't think the term is used by people who don't understand it in any way other than to insinuate a superior state, you aren't listening. That is EXACTLY how it is used.

EDIT: And let me state clearly that we are not exceptional any longer if we truly ever were. Believe it or not, there are actually a lot people and governments that are from different geographical locations, that we can learn a lot from. The longer we treat the rest of the world like they are children who haven't grown up enough to do things right, the dumber we will continue to become. And that is precisely how American conservatives treat other countries and people foreign to our land.

And why? Over the generations we no longer adhere to our founding principals. A government that serves the people doesn't really exist anymore and may never really have. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. See our govt today.

But to the extent that it existed at all... The US economy is a 16 trillion dollar economy. That wasn't all luck. Much of that was exactly what Tocqueville observed.

 

[aphronesis]

And I'm right, 19 out of 20 days. What's driving black out of wedlock birth rates? What is substituting the role of black fathers.... particularly inner city black fathers?



Not saying govt is to blame for all society's woes.



Can't vouch for what he reads, can you? The anti-Americanism is fairly well established among some. A (willful?) misunderstanding of what American Exceptionalism actually means seems rife in that group.

You may be right, but with the exception of maybe one, no one here is arguing against you on that score.

Um, lack of societal infrastructure: let's say lack of positive masculine incentives and possibilities, not your substitution of govt/ for.

Vouch for what he reads? He reads tripe, so what? That affects surface noise, not actuality

Exceptionalism means many things and can't be pinned to your Edenic gloss either. Sorry.

 

[rhubroma]

And why? Over the generations we no longer adhere to our founding principals. A government that serves the people doesn't really exist anymore and may never really have. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. See our govt today.

But to the extent that it existed at all... The US economy is a 16 trillion dollar economy. That wasn't all luck. Much of that was exactly what Tocqueville observed.

Well, luck, no, but through war, pilfering, mendacity, baseness and every sort of financial sorcery.

Scott it's really quite simple: once with the help of France the American colonialists were able to detach themselves from the British monarchy, and after they had stolen enough territory from the natives, they were able to put into effect a highly unoriginal system based on European enlightenment principles that was impossible in that moment in the Old World.

Then, with practically unlimited natural resources, an immense territory to expand (again by pilfering the natives), exploit and develop, the nascent US state soon became an industrial power - by the heritage of Europe's industrial technology developing since the XVIII century. The influx of cheap labor from the European immigrants, or black slaves kept overhead costs down. The Founding Father's? A masonic cove of slave owning opportunists. No more.

In none of that, therefore, is there anything intrinsically exceptional. Americans only had to get off their arses and not be idle, whereas often what was happening was appalling. The forging of an internal empire, for instance, has witnessed the massacre of Wounded Knee, robber barons (other than being subjects to a monarchy) like J.P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller and Jay Gould to name only the ones who most readily come to mind, the crimes against the George Pullman strikers, the propagandistic vilification of Eugene "Dictator" Debs, "Open Door" politics, etc.

Whereas the building of a US empire abroad entailed the Hispanic-American war that caused the brutal suppression of Antonio Maceo and the Cuban revolution, the heinous anti-Cuban media propaganda of the New York magnate William Randolph Hearst, the invasion of Cuba, war profits of the "benevolent liberators,” etc. Having defeated the Spanish once, next we invaded the Philippines and our hoodwinking the Philippine revolutionary, Emilio Aguinaldo, led to the slaughter under the orders of US general Elwell S. Ottis at Santa Mesa, which US General Arthur Macarther admitted was part of a precise plan to unleash a war against the revolutionaries.

By the presidential election of 1900 people were wondering was the US a republic or empire? At the time according to Indiana Senator, Albert J. Beveriddge: "The US will never renounce from our people's mission, which God has given us to defend civilization throughout the world. The Philippines have provided us with a base at the gateway of Asia." Then came further opportunity to expand the US empire, on a proxy basis, into Europe itself in the First World War.

Back home labor was getting tired of being exploited, for which, under State backed policing, repression was necessary, which in fact led to the Ludlow massacre, Sacco and Vanzetti, acts of State sponsored hygiene at places like Camp Funston and the growing class consciousness.

With US global hegemony firmly established after the WWII, the Cold War era set in as did McCarthyism. Imperialist warfare continued in Korea and then with Vietnam under the theory of the so called Domino Effect, which caused the infamous massacre of My Lai, repression of anti-war protestors by the FBI, Daniel Ellsberg and the "Secret Pentagon Archives," etc. Back home, given that blacks were sick and tired of segregation and marginalization from the so-called American Dream, the civil rights movement took flight.

In the meantime the usual rotten barrel was stirring up havoc in the Middle East under Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush I, Clinton, Bush II: Betchel, GM, ExxonMobil, Halliburton, GE. The countless killed by US repression of the Sandinista revolutionaries through Iran Contras, in support of fascist counter-revolutionaries, re-launched the US Empire; while in Afghanistan arming the Taliban and Osama bin Laden was necessary to defeat the communist enemy. New imperialist war began in earnest no sooner had the Soviet state imploded and communism was defeated with the first Gulf War.

Then came the support of puppet and criminal dictators in Africa, South America and the ally Middle Eastern regimes to support the corporatocracy, the unwavering support of Israel before the Palestinian tragedy, the neocon "The New American Century," the second Iraq War and the financial crisis caused by the insatiable greed of capitalism.

Where is the exeptionalism in all this? Perhaps our conspicuous consumption?

 

[hrotha]

And why? Over the generations we no longer adhere to our founding principals.

What do you mean, "why"? Because, like, the whole of the Western world now shares these values you mentioned yourself:

Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Inalienable rights. Rights not given by any man to another. Foundational principles.

It has nothing to do with Americans being better than anyone.

 

[patricknd]

To YOU the discussion is guns. If you want to discuss inanimate objects that "kill people" then we should also talk about cars, swimming pools and bathtubs. Wash buckets even.

Shall I march out those stats again?

don't forget those pesky alcohol related deaths

 

[mikeNphilly]

Woohoo...this is awesome!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=iH2_ixNQxls#t=291

 

[aphronesis]

To YOU the discussion is guns. If you want to discuss inanimate objects that "kill people" then we should also talk about cars, swimming pools and bathtubs. Wash buckets even.

Shall I march out those stats again?

Please do, but factor in human agency while you're at it. (Which would encapsulate the whole mental health canard as well.)

Then we might get somewhere.

 

[Scott SoCal]

Please do, but factor in human agency while you're at it. (Which would encapsulate the whole mental health canard as well.)

Then we might get somewhere.

Hmmm. I don't know how to respond....

My whole point is factoring in human agency. It is not possible to be more clear. The tip off was to point out the gun as an inanimate object.

 

[Scott SoCal]

don't forget those pesky alcohol related deaths

We can't talk about alcohol. Or cars. Everybody drinks. Everybody drives. That cars and alcohol kill people is totally irrelevant.

 

[Scott SoCal]

What do you mean, "why"? Because, like, the whole of the Western world now shares these values you mentioned yourself:

Sure. At the time these values were adopted, it was the exception. It was exceptional. It was American.