[quote]new2training wrote:
Mikey,
What would you have done in that situation?
Would you have fired on the National Guard?
[/quote]
I have a chihuaha. I don’t want to see him under a BATF boot later today. I will plead the fifth on that question. I know where I stand. And while I do have a vested interest on where others stand, I have no grounds making that decision for anyone. I just think that it is better to have that answer figured out for yourself before your door is kicked open.
mike
[quote]hedo wrote:
That being said. I spend 10 weeks in NO after Katrina. I never saw anyone shoot at a helicopter or heard of it happening other then in the media. I always travelled armed and so did all members of our crew. Not open carry but we were all armed. We worked in all of the parishes. I was also set up near a National Guard camp. They had free access to our coffee and food trailer. We got ice and water from them. They knew we were armed and we were never asked about it. My crew was also multi-racial as were the guard crews so it wasn’t just good old boys getting along.
I don’t doubt any of the stuff on the youtube clip happened I just don’t think it was widespread.
I wouldn’t shoot it out with our troops. It’s the last thing anyone needed. We carried our weapons for protection and if we engaged somone it would be to evade and move to cover and help. We weren’t a military force. We were there to help the city and the people.[/quote]
The guard absolutely should have been armed to protect themselves, but anyone violating the Constitution becomes a domestic enemy. They do deserve to have been shot at. That isn’t to say that I either do or don’t have the balls to have shot at them.
I’m not going to go so far as to claim those officers giving the orders should have been tried for treason, but they absolutely should have been given at best, general discharges after being charged with conduct unbecoming an officer. Yet nothing happened to any of them. This only emboldens the feds the next time.
Btw, thanks for stepping up over there. Situations like Katrina are exactly what the Guard was designed for.
mike
I badly wanted to respond to some threads here, but I had to build myself a new computer. (bastard now works, took me a week!)
@Zap, seems to be the only sensible thing to do, BUT: Not everyone has the nerve to lie straight into the face of armed men who storm your house and wave guns in your living room, while your kids are nearby.
@Mike & Varqanir:
You guys make it look way too simple.
I stand by my words- There won’t be a successful american resistance, cause they lack organization, manpower and required mental toughness as well as the readiness to make sacrifices.
Consider some points here:
[quote]
No, YOU can’t fight the beast. You seem to lack the stomach for it. So do you just go along with the beast and wait for someone else to save you? Let me temper this. I’m not trying to be insulting. What is your opinion of the “boss” jews during the Holocaust? The ones that saved their asses by allying with the Nazis? Were they right not to fight?
And when do you know that you’ve got the beast? So far as I see it, liberty is always in a state of flux. [/quote]
I’m gonna ignore this ad hominem nonsense, especially since I’m someone with a great sense of justice who had countless problems with unjust authority exactly because I won’t stand unrighteousness.
There will be no massive organized crackdown by the government against the American people. Who will do it? American volunteer soldiers? I don’t think so.
The federal government does have its share of jackbooted thugs it can use in a localized area and some well meaning troops may be duped for a short while in a very bad situation such as in New Orleans but I cannot see a massive firearms confiscation happening.
I have a much greater fear of a slow erosion of our right to keep and bear arms. I do not see any sort of uprising against the government with firearms but I do foresee the use of firearms against thugs in times of trouble.
Schwarz, you make compelling arguments, as always, but this thread really isn’t about ragtag groups of American guerrilla fighters slugging it out against the government’s armed forces. That may one day happen, but that’s not really what we’re talking about here.
I’m well aware of your stance on civilian ownership of firearms, but I daresay that it is irrelevant in this case.
The people of the United States, whether you like it or not, are legally entitled to own firearms. Their right to do so is protected by the Constitution not only of the United States, but also of the State of Louisiana (Sec. 11: The right of each citizen to keep and bear arms shall not be abridged.) Both constitutions also guarantee that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, except by due process of law.
The confiscation of personal arms following Hurricane Katrina was therefore an egregious violation of the constitutional rights of these citizens.
My purpose in starting this thread is not, as it was in the Liberty Control thread, to debate the morality or the utility of an armed populace, but rather to elicit discussion as to what a legally armed populace should do in the face of illegal confiscations such as depicted in the video.
With the benefit of hindsight, one could say that the Jews may have been better off in 1938 had they used their weapons against the officials who had come to collect them. Some may have been killed so doing, but to my way of thinking, it is better to get shot while resisting tyranny than to die a slave behind barbed wire.
These people had no way of knowing, of course, that meekly turning in their arms would make it easier for the government to round them up and exterminate them a few years later.
Given what we know about the disarmaments in Germany, the Soviet Union, and China, and the pogroms and genocides that followed, I think any armed citizen should cast an extremely jaundiced eye on any attempt by a government official to deprive them of their arms.
I’m not saying that the US government will ever attempt to perpetrate genocide on its own people, nor would I ever advocate shooting it out with federal agents if they were to come knocking at the door.
However, as Mike said, one would do well to think about these things, just in case.
[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
There will be no massive organized crackdown by the government against the American people. Who will do it? American volunteer soldiers? I don’t think so.
[/quote]
UN troops, maybe.
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
Zap Branigan wrote:
There will be no massive organized crackdown by the government against the American people. Who will do it? American volunteer soldiers? I don’t think so.
UN troops, maybe.[/quote]
In black helicopters.
[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
Varqanir wrote:
Zap Branigan wrote:
There will be no massive organized crackdown by the government against the American people. Who will do it? American volunteer soldiers? I don’t think so.
UN troops, maybe.
In black helicopters.[/quote]
With Raytheon Pain Ray guns.
OK then, so I did overshoot here. Sorry.
And while I’m against arming Europe, I pointed out at the end of some gun control thread (maybe just in a PM) that I’m not really against this “furry-arms” amendment of yours. Because- For one, America isn’t Europe and second, your market is probably sated as far as weapon availability.
Arguing here has an effect sometimes and can convince people, you know!
The pain guns and tasers creep me out.
If the state wants to enforce something, it should be done the old fashioned way. You either shoot people and take full responsibility or you don’t. It’s like the waterboarding thing, it’s not something a just nation should do.
[quote]Schwarzfahrer wrote:
No, YOU can’t fight the beast. You seem to lack the stomach for it. So do you just go along with the beast and wait for someone else to save you? Let me temper this. I’m not trying to be insulting. What is your opinion of the “boss” jews during the Holocaust? The ones that saved their asses by allying with the Nazis? Were they right not to fight?
And when do you know that you’ve got the beast? So far as I see it, liberty is always in a state of flux.
I’m gonna ignore this ad hominem nonsense, especially since I’m someone with a great sense of justice who had countless problems with unjust authority exactly because I won’t stand unrighteousness.
[/quote]
I wrote this long rebuttal to your post, but the site froze and didn’t post it, so I’ll skip the seditious academic portion of it and clarify my last statement. Sorry for the attack Schwarz. I didn’t mean to come across like that and I’ve been given no reason to question your character. I get pretty heated re:guns, which is funny because I’m not a gun nut.
What I was trying to say was, do you feel that just because you don’t think we can resist the .gov, that others should be disarmed and not given the opportunity to at least try?
mike
Um the constitution was written a long time ago when people needed weapons to overthrow the british, defend themselves from wild animals and possibly to fight with Native Americans. Today, the gun culture of the US is a cancer responsible for countless deaths. Nagin got this one right. While some law abiding folks lost their guns this move no doubt saved lives. There were a lot of scum on the loose after Katrina. Just look at the Superdome rapes, etc.
[quote]deanosumo wrote:
Um the constitution was written a long time ago when people needed weapons to overthrow the british, defend themselves from wild animals and possibly to fight with Native Americans. [/quote]
The conditions are the same. Only the names have changed. The right to defend oneself did not vanish after the eighteenth century.
No, the misuse of guns by certain individuals is responsible for those deaths. Indicting the so-called “gun culture” for the actions of some individuals is as pointless as blaming all black people for the LA riots, all Muslims for the September 11 attacks, or for that matter, the American “car culture” for the deaths caused by drunk drivers.
If you can show me any evidence that any of the guns confiscated were in the possession of criminals who might have used them to facilitate rape or murder, I might just give this statement some credence. More likely, the vast majority of guns confiscated were legally owned by people who were not criminals, and who probably (as they were unable to defend themselves) became rape or murder victims themselves.
Regardless of your personal position on the morality of personal firearms, what Nagin did was, from a constitutional standpoint, wrong, wrong, wrong.
Honestly, I hear you. But can’t you at least take into account the sheer magnitude of scumbag ness that took place in the wake of Katrina? I mean, sure, there was police abuse of power in certain instances - but seriously, the abuse of the second amendment constituted an absolute STATE OF EMERGENCY. In such cases Constitutionality of certain policies need not be checked.
Fuck those dirty motherfuckers who were looting and robbing everyone in sight. The police were dead right in their handling of the situation.
[quote]cormac wrote:
Honestly, I hear you. But can’t you at least take into account the sheer magnitude of scumbag ness that took place in the wake of Katrina? I mean, sure, there was police abuse of power in certain instances - but seriously, the abuse of the second amendment constituted an absolute STATE OF EMERGENCY. In such cases Constitutionality of certain policies need not be checked.
Fuck those dirty motherfuckers who were looting and robbing everyone in sight. The police were dead right in their handling of the situation.[/quote]
sigh Your native sons Sam and John Adams would not be pleased with you right now cormac. I would have expected as much from the Kiwi, but not from you. You have a proud heritage to uphold.
Our rights are not given to us by the Constitution. The Bill of Rights merely lists the rights we have by nature of being human. It is never okay for them to be violated without due cause. Would you allow the police to jail citizens who peacefully assembled to speak out against FEMA’s handling of the situation? There is no difference between the two.
I’m also curious as to exactly who abused to second amendment? Was it criminals who by way of due process weren’t allowed to have guns in the first place or peaceful citizens who abused their rights (by which you seem to mean privileges).
Besides, if our rights are so flimsy so as to not be able to withstand a silly flood, then we were a rather pathetic people in the first place.
mike
Hm. As a result of your far greater thoughtfulness and apparent lack of intoxication I’m going to have to suspend further comment until tomorrow, preferably sometime after 2pm.
[quote]deanosumo wrote:
Um the constitution was written a long time ago when people needed weapons to overthrow the british, defend themselves from wild animals and possibly to fight with Native Americans. Today, the gun culture of the US is a cancer responsible for countless deaths. Nagin got this one right. While some law abiding folks lost their guns this move no doubt saved lives. There were a lot of scum on the loose after Katrina. Just look at the Superdome rapes, etc. [/quote]
How many of the rape victims were armed?
[quote]orion wrote:
How many of the rape victims were armed?
[/quote]
I think it’s safe to surmise that none of them were.
It’s easy to victimize an unarmed person. Impossible to victimize an armed one.
If one is to learn anything from history, it should be this.
[quote]Mikeyali wrote: […]
What I was trying to say was, do you feel that just because you don’t think we can resist the .gov, that others should be disarmed and not given the opportunity to at least try?
mike[/quote]
No, I believe you are entitled to fight for your gun rights you hold so dear. While I also believe it would be extremely unwise and ineffective to engage the youtube muggers in a gunfight, I would find it perfectly legitimate.
Speaking of state sponsored efforts to reduce gun violence by reducing guns…
mike