Federal ban on assault weapons ended yesterday.

[KaBar2]

I think that many conservatives and ultra-conservatives strongly suspected what the government was doing in the '60s, '70s and '80s, but nobody could prove it absolutely. Mostly it was circumstantial evidence. But their attempt to force Randy Weaver into becoming an informer for the ATF, and their campaign against the Branch Davidians were both seen, by the right, as the "test case" to see what would happen if the ATF just rolled into one of these compounds with all guns blazing. They picked the Branch Davidians not because they were the most dangerous (they weren't--there were many groups far more dangerous than the Davidians) but because the ATF thought they were politically vulnerable. Their religious ideas were wacky and unpopular, they were isolated way out in the country, David Koresh was engaging in a bunch of wierd-ass polygamous sexual shit with his female followers, and had "married" several underage girls. Mind you, the fact that NONE of this fell under the jurisdiction of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms slowed them down one bit.

The ATF suspected that the Davidians were manufacturing full-auto machineguns out of AR-15's and MAK-90's. They had no proof, but a UPS driver who delivered some empty cast-iron grenade casings (like you can buy at any gun show for $5) made a big complaint to the ATF that he thought something was up. I believe that his real bitch was that Koresh was fucking underage girls, but he couldn't get anybody to act on his complaint. In Texas, that would have been handled by the local Sheriff's office and Child Protective Services. CPS had been out there several times and could find no evidence of abuse. Koresh and several of his followers had surrendered peaceably to the local Sheriff and one deputy some years before on a murder charge stemming from a fight between different factions of Davidians. They did not give the Sheriff one bit of trouble, they all went as quietly as lambs, but the Sheriff had a VALID, SIGNED WARRANT.

 

The ATF did not want a peaceful arrest. They wanted a big ass shoot out on the TV evening news, so they rolled up there shooting with news cameras rolling. This tape is a substantial part of the movie "WACO: The Rules of Engagement."

 

The Davidians shot back, as is their right. They had a right to defend themselves in Texas, even against law enforcement, if the cops are breaking the law and trying to kill them. The ATF was armed with 9mm pistols and 9mm HK MP5's. The Davidians were shooting back with AR-15's, MAK-90's and other "full battle rifles." The ATF RAN OUT OF AMMUNITION, and had to retreat with their hands in the air, begging the Davidians to not shoot them, dragging their wounded and dead agents with them.

 

This situation is EXACTLY why people should have the right to keep and bear arms, and why we have the right to own service rifles. The ATF was DEAD WRONG.

 

When it was all over, the FBI recovered numerous burned remains of assault rifles, supposedly the evidence of the alleged "illegal machine guns" that the Davidians were allegedly building. They had all of the rifles x-rayed using a government contractor, so they could prove that they were right. THEY NEVER RELEASED THE RESULTS OF THE X-RAYS. And why? Because the Branch Davidians WERE INNOCENT. They had NOT been building illegal machine guns. And even if they had been, it would not have required a war to arrest them. The local Sheriff could have gone down there with a search warrant any day of the week and taken the entire group into custody any time he needed to do so.

 

This situation pissed off just about everybody I know. They were fucking furious, especially about the deaths of the children. David Koresh was an asshole, and his followers were idiots, but nothing that they did deserved what the Government did to them. And if they could do it to Koresh and the Branch Davidians, the sonsofbitches can do it to you or me.

Sure, he should have surrendered. But the FBI attacked them on Day 51 because the Davidians refusing to surrender made the FBI look like a bunch of dumb asses. They did it because they were arrogant. They did it because of pride, as you will see, if you go watch "WACO: the Rules of Engagement." And they came very close to touching off a serious-ass civil war.

[Poop Man Bob]

Originally posted by seeking

please, i asked you to do this before, but you never replied. explain how your rifles are going to be used to fend off our government. paint a scenario where your 'freedom loving' brothers and sisters effectively stand up to the man with your rifles (assault or otherwise). it is not going to happen, ever.

 

Kabar, I've asked you the same question previously, and you never provided a response.

 

You're incapable of answering this question.

[KaBar2]

Okay

 

I concede the point. I'm incapable of answering the question to your satisfaction. Sorry.

[bodice_ripper]

I'd definitely think of myself as a liberal, and I'm totally pro people's right to bear arms.

 

 

 

I've every fucking right to defend myself against right wing loonies :rolleyes:

[Nekro]

Re: Seeking

 

Originally posted by KaBar2

The whole schtick of the right wing is that BOTH MAJOR POLITICAL PARTIES are part of the SAME ESTABLISHMENT CONSPIRACY, which has it's roots in the banking houses of Europe (especially the Rothschild Bank) and, here in the U.S., in the establishment of the PRIVATELY-OWNED Federal Reserve System and the illegal and unconstitutional passing of the Income Tax in 1913.

Oh, OK. So the Jews are behind this; the jews are the ones who want to come in and take all your rights away.

The current state of affairs was not what the Founding Fathers intended. For one, Senators were NEVER supposed to have been elected by the public at large. They were supposed to be elected BY THE STATE LEGISLATURE, which gave the State legislatures a great degree of control over the Federal government. Once this was changed, it effectively freed the Senators from State obligation, and allowed them to start thinking that the "little people" have no say over what the Senators do and do not do. Instead of our representatives in Congress, they think of themselves as our masters. WRONG.

The founding fathers intended the indirect election of senators to be a check and balance to prevent the people from gaining too much power. They wanted to create a house of lords to counter the house of commons. If anything, the direct election of senators has increased their obligations to the states they represent, as they actually have to answer to the people now.

[seeking]

thank god we have kabar to give a long winded explanation about some shit that no one fucking cares about, since he can not answer the questions that we do.

 

it's not that you cant answer them to our 'satisfaction', you can't answer them AT ALL. you're fantastic at giving trumped up glorified revisionist essays on the past, but you fail completely when it comes to putting your paranoid dellusions to the test of reality. you dont even try because you know damn well that you cant do it to anyones satisfaction, not even your own. you cant even pretend. id love to hear you try, just once, to even humor us. dozens of times you've been asked this question, and every time, you blow it off. you've got a million words from history to recite, but none that are your own. or even your contemporaries. no one is expecting you to have all the answers, but you have NO answers. you have tired rhetoric and distorted facts.

[villain]

Guerilla warfare is very effective even against a better equipped enemy. We lost in Vietnam. We are losing in Iraq. In fact we have lost every major, sustained campaign since and including the Korean war. Conventional armies are not as effective in guerilla warfare, as I've said time and time again. That is why the major strategems rely on having the support of the people of the host country you are occupying. When I see mobs of people exalting dead insurgents and Iraqi children playfully chasing after insurgents rushing into combat, I already know that we have lost this war. I hope people understand that the only reason we are taking less casualties than in vietnam is because of our body armor. We have more injuries to extremities and less KIAs. 11,000 wounded in 1 year is no joke. That is about 10% of troop strength in Iraq. 1 in 10 odds of getting fucked up in Iraq is not good.

 

The Waco thing is very strange. I don't know a whole lot about it but I don't really understand why the ATF wouldn't just wait it out. It's not like they were killing hostages in there. I think there was less protest among the left on this issue because it is convoluted. Kabar brought up many points that I wasn't aware of that give me an idea as to why right wing militias were incensed about this. However I do not understand as well why they aren't up in arms about what Bush has been doing to our rights. Perhaps there is an undercurrent of racism here? Perhaps it is viewed that these laws Bush enacted target arab men?

 

The ultraconservatives, religious right, and neoconservatives are different. Neocons like Bush are in power because they have more financial and political clout. Bush throws out lines like his procrastination on the assault weapons ban and that keeps him more closely allied to his base than Kerry. Even though they don't completely agree with everything.

 

Ugh. Well I agree that there are snakes of all stripes in government, but I hope Kabar and his militiamen will see that Bush is far more corrupt than Kerry.

[Jimmy Jump]

Heres how you deal with assault weapons..

"We don't need gun control. You know what we need? Bullet control. I think all bullets should cost $5,000. 'Cuz if a bullet cost $5,000, there would be no more innocent bystanders.

"Every time somebody gets shot, it'd be like, 'Dang, he must've done something. They put $50,000 worth of bullets in his head.' And people would think before they kill somebody: 'Man, I would blow your head off if I could afford it. I'm gonna get me a job, start saving, and you're a dead man.' " (Chris Rock)..

[seeking]

Originally posted by villain

Guerilla warfare is very effective even against a better equipped enemy. We lost in Vietnam. We are losing in Iraq.

 

we 'lost' in vietnam, but we also killed or wounded an estimated 3,000,000 vietnamese. there are not 3,000,000 americans willing to die for ANYTHING. also, there would not be a 'gurilla war' that involved our government and us citizens. there might be 'stand offs' like waco, but there will never be an outright war, like in columbia, iraq or vietnam. it simply wont happen. our govt would not allow it. in order to have a 'gurilla war' you need the support of laymen, whichh the militia men would never have. people are too easily occupied and appeased by their tv's and cars. they are much more likely to view militia men as 'crazed rednecks' than freedom loving men and women.

 

but again, thats all reality, and it has no place in this discussion.

 

seeks/militias are for guys who are too cool for majic cards and D&D.

[villain]

Originally posted by seeking

we 'lost' in vietnam, but we also killed or wounded an estimated 3,000,000 vietnamese. there are not 3,000,000 americans willing to die for ANYTHING. also, there would not be a 'gurilla war' that involved our government and us citizens. there might be 'stand offs' like waco, but there will never be an outright war, like in columbia, iraq or vietnam. it simply wont happen. our govt would not allow it. in order to have a 'gurilla war' you need the support of laymen, whichh the militia men would never have. people are too easily occupied and appeased by their tv's and cars. they are much more likely to view militia men as 'crazed rednecks' than freedom loving men and women.

 

but again, thats all reality, and it has no place in this discussion.

 

seeks/militias are for guys who are too cool for majic cards and D&D.

 

Yeah carpet bombing has never been an effective counter-insurgency tactic. In the end both sides are fucked up and noone really wins. Even our precision bombing is heinous to me. The press will say "US warplanes targeted a house believed to be harboring terrorists. 10 insurgents were killed as well as 4 civilians." Then Rumsfeld or somebody will say something like "Well at least you know we were targeting insurgents." Wrong answer. As if this justifies it. As if to say they would target civilians if they wanted to. As if to say they don't really care but only do it cause the press is watching.

 

I don't remember saying anything about the viability of revolution in the united states. But imagine for a minute if there was revolution here. Would US warplanes be targeting houses where they believed insurgent activity was happening? Wouldn't the innocent survivors be more convinced of the corruption of the government and it's lack of concern for it's people?

 

But about the viability of revolution in the US, I agree with you. Most people here are too wrapped up in themselves. There would have to be a serious disruption in our way of life for the average person to even begin to consider things along these lines. Didn't the Romans say that give the people bread and circus and they will be yours? Well something like that. Give people a means of survival, why would they jeapordize that? Since our lives are not in jeapordy we need entertainment to keep us occupied. And there you have it... a cacoon of comfort. Ensconced in the shroud of our fantastical illusions.

However that's not to say that a small cell would not be able to shatter the illusion. Especially in this age of interdependency. As masses, we are weak, pliable, and docile. As individuals, we are more powerful than ever. If we realize this. Let's just hope that our channels are open within the system, so that no individual feels marginalized to the point of some irrational resolution to a seemingly insoluable problem (For the individual not heard amongst the droning of the masses. Drowned out and forgotten. The problem not being addressed in social, governmental channels, is internalized by the individual(s) where it smolders and festers until the individual is no longer able to bear it and it comes bursting out onto those who repressed (or ignored) it.).

 

I hope that makes sense. I tend to get a little abstract and poetic sometimes.

[porque]

Originally posted by villain

As masses, we are weak, pliable, and docile. As individuals, we are more powerful than ever.

 

...you apparently haven't met many of the same individuals as i have...

[KaBar2]

Nekro

 

I never said anything about the problem being created by Jews, so please don't put words in my mouth. The undeniable fact that the Rothschild family created an international banking cartel that seeks to dominate world finance and to influence governments is not some figment of my imagination. Of the men present at the secret 1911 meeting on Jeykll Island, GA that set the stage for both the Federal Reserve System and the Federal income tax, two were related to the Rothschilds by either blood or marriage, and several had business dealings with them that pretty much precluded any independent action. If you study the "Robber Barons" in high school in any depth, you will eventually realize you are studying about the agents of the Rothschild Bank in London.

 

There is definately some revisionist history afoot, but it's not anything I'm inventing. It's the glossing over of the influence of the Rockefellers, the Mellons, the Du Ponts, the Warburgs and so on and so forth. These people, these families, constitute a dynasty, and a sort of economic aristocracy. You cannot look at their individual accomplishments without looking at with whom they intermarried, with whom they do business and whom are their economic "rivals," both here in the U.S. and abroad, especially in Europe.

 

Rothschild sent either sons or sons-in-law to the European capitals and, later, to the U.S., to establish banking houses. They loaned vast sums of money to BOTH SIDES of several wars, including WWI and WWII, guaranteeing that they would make a profit. The central, overall goal was to eventually create a Central Bank in every world power which owed both money and loyalty to the Rothschild Bank. In the U.S., the Federal Reserve System is that bank, and it is NOT owned by the Federal government. Organizations like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund are essentially extensions of those creations.

 

Lenin was sent to Russia from Germany courtesy of these people. I have no doubt that Hitler, or the people that supported Hitler, were probably entwined with them as well, but I never tried to study that. Their classic political/economic ploy was to play "both ends against the middle." They would loan money to France and encourage the French to begin military build-up, which alarmed Germany, and then loaned money to Germany to so that the Germans could begin military build-up to counter the French.

 

These people go to great lengths to hide their true intentions, their true identities (they work through agents and intermediaries) and the true beneficiaries of their actions. Trying to figure out the puzzle of interlocking corporations, etc. is more work than most people (including myself) are willing to do. There are people who are more-or-less obsessed with it, and who have spent a lifetime, essentially, tracking down relationships, marriages, business deals, secret arrangements and so on. To me, it constitutes a genuine conspiracy, albeit, a very long-lived one, but if you start investigating the Rothschilds and all their descendants, agents, employees and minons you are going to be surprised and the degree to which they influence MODERN LIFE.

 

Read "The Creature from Jeykll Island," for starters. It will challenge your comfortable world view.

They are a lot better at covering their tracks than they once were, but nevertheless, the relationship very probably still exists today.

[KaBar2]

BODICE RIPPER

 

YES, you do. Roll your eyes if you want, but that is EXACTLY what I'm talking about. You most certainly DO have the right to keep and bear arms to protect yourself, not only from right-wing loonies, but from ANYBODY from whom you need to defend yourself.

 

I'm glad you understand my point, even if you are being sarcastic.

[porque]

...kabar...do you think the waco incident would have been any better if it happened now, under this administration?...because i certainly don't...

[Nekro]

So fucking what, corporations and moneyed interests have always had way too much influence in government. Neopotism has always existed. What you're saying is that the Jews are responsible for all the world's wars and genocides. Sorry pal, that shit was discredited ages ago.

[seeking]

yet another fantastic reiteration of someone elses legwork, and yet another post by kabar that completely avoids the fucking topic. this is seriously becoming comical. do you actually think your proving anything by reciting a bunch of irrelivent 'facts' about topics that no one but you is discussing? how much control jews weild over the worlds financial institutes, has absolutely ZEROOOO to do with how you will react to a government attack on your 'freedom loving men and women'. i mean, certainly while buying thousands of rounds of ammo, building bomb shelters and storing enough food and water to last for 6 months, certainly in the middle of all of that, one of you visionaries must have jotted down a plan of action as well. some sort of 'duck and cover' for the 21st century. quit with the lollygagging kabar, fill us in. inquiring minds want to know.

[WhiteOx]

kabar2 i've always wondered whether you wrote grafftiti or did at one stage?

[dosoner]

time to start up and outifit my local milita with sniper rifles. does this mean that we can setup a perimiter around lake tahoe and take out the tourists as they make the drive in?

[bodice_ripper]

Re: KAbAR

 

Originally posted by KaBar2

YES, you do. Roll your eyes if you want, but that is EXACTLY what I'm talking about. You most certainly DO have the right to keep and bear arms to protect yourself, not only from right-wing loonies, but from ANYBODY from whom you need to defend yourself.

 

I'm glad you understand my point, even if you are being sarcastic.

 

 

no no. you missed the point. I wasn't being even a bit sarcastic. I do have a right to defend myself from right wing loonies. the rolling eyes were to indicate the sort of right wing loonie I meant (ie you).

 

the secondary point being made was that I'm one of those boogy-man liberals you're talking about. Only I don't want your guns. so perhaps you SHOULD be more concerned about the Patriot Act.....

[random]

not that this hasn't been covered before but...seems kinda appropriate

 

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial...zzling_america/

 

A puzzling America

By Roland Merullo | September 20, 2004

 

FOR A LONG time now I've been pondering the reasons why conservatives decide to be conservative and liberals to be liberal. Part of the motivation for this pondering is rooted in the fact that I'm a left-leaning independent with a number of conservative friends. Some of these right-wing friends are close relatives, people I love dearly, people who still forward me nasty Internet jokes about Hillary and Bill with a certain kind of triumphant glee.

 

It is a source of continual surprise to me that these friends and I can look at the same person -- George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, John Kerry, Bill Clinton, Jesse Jackson -- and form diametrically opposed opinions.

 

My pondering along these lines always carries me back to the 1996 presidential campaign, during which I wrote a 20-part series for the op-ed pages of the Philadelphia Inquirer. The series started with the New Hampshire primary and ended on Election Day in Washington, D.C. For two installments, I drove from Bob Dole's birthplace (Russell, Kansas) to Bill Clinton's (Hope, Ark.) via Ross Perot's (Texarkana, Texas). I traveled back roads through small towns, stopping occasionally to ask people what word first came to mind when they heard the name "Clinton," "Dole," or "Perot."

 

Not surprisingly, the responses to "Dole" were more positive in Kansas than in Democratic eastern Oklahoma, and Clinton was better liked in Hope than in Russell. What did surprise me, though, were the kinds of things conservatives said about Clinton and the obvious hatred with which they said them: "Monster." "Nonhuman." "Worm." "Antichrist." "Devil."

 

That was the Bible Belt, where one might be more likely to hear the term "Antichrist," but the general pattern of vitriol held true in other parts of the country. I began to form the impression then that the conservative mindset springs from what, for lack of a better term, might best be described as an Old Testament world view: Life is harsh, God is angry, enemies ought to be treated without mercy. An eye for an eye. There is good and there is evil, and the distinction between them is as clear as the line between sin and righteousness. These days, the words of Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, or George W. Bush only reinforce that impression.

 

Most liberals, on the other hand, appreciate life's gray areas, which is perhaps why left-wing radio has never been very entertaining. The strength of this embrace of ambiguity is that liberals see the world in all its complexity. The weakness is that evil, real evil, can sometimes become so abstract and multifaceted that it is not quite real.

 

Life, liberals believe, is meant to be pleasurable, God is forgiving if He exists at all, and it's important to think about others' feelings and motivations as well as your own. You might not like the idea of abortion, but it is important to allow people who believe differently to make their own choice.

 

What liberals consider open-mindedness can seem wishy-washy when held up against the certainty of a right-wing opponent. At the same time, the right-wing opponent's views can appear simplistic. In this year's presidential campaign, the two sides have been trying to spin things accordingly: Kerry too thoughtful, Bush not thoughtful enough.

 

Strains from earlier campaigns can be heard here, too. The elder Bush's Willie Horton ads had a racial undercurrent, of course, but they were also intended to point up the idea that Dukakis, like all liberals, was soft on crime, weak on defense, living in a dream world in which the evil ones could be furloughed, rehabilitated, or ignored.

 

The two Americas, conservative and liberal, worship two very different gods. It's as if the fibers that make up the human psyche are spun around opposite psychological poles. But what is the essence and origin of that fundamental difference? Why is gay marriage anathema to one group and an obvious human right to the other? Why does almost exactly half the country beam with pride when George W. speaks, and the other half cringe? Why did my liberal friends talk about the Abu Ghraib scandal while my conservative friends were focusing on mutilation of hostages in Fallujah? Why do the delegates to the Republican convention have neater haircuts and less interesting clothes?

 

I ponder these questions when I drive past the home of one of my neighbors, a man with very strong opinions. I don't know the man, but I know about his opinions because he paints them on slabs of wood and nails the slabs up on tree trunks in his front yard. He is in favor of Supporting Our Troops. And vehemently opposed to a new addition that was built onto the 100-year-old public library, at least judging by one of his more interesting signs: "LIBRARY OFFICIALS EATING STEAK WITH OUR TAX DOLLARS."

 

Coming from a certain direction I drive by this man's yard, and a few times I've seen him sitting out there in a lawn chair, glaring at passersby as if to say: "What are you looking at? You want to start something?" He doesn't have a rifle across his knees, but I almost remember him that way. Perhaps I'm being unfair, but then again, a sign tacked onto one tree reads: "KILL THY ENEMY."

 

And then, sometimes on the same drive, I'll pull up at a traffic light beside a smiling, shaggy-headed soul at the wheel of a foreign-made car festooned with bumper stickers like: "Magic Happens." "Free Leonard Peltier." "I Brake for Animals." "War is Not the Answer."

 

At their essence, conservatives are on guard, bristling, armed with a righteous anger, prone to mockery of their enemies, sure of themselves, unwilling to criticize America, especially by comparing it to anyplace else. The attacks of Sept. 11 only confirmed their world view: We are constantly at risk.

 

Liberals are mannered, sensitive, armed with intellectual cynicism, self-critical, eager to learn from other cultures, wanting there to be no pain in the world. The attacks made them sad and angry, too, but their reflex was more pensive than vengeful.

 

And so we lurch toward what promises to be another close election, two Americas enduring a war that seems designed to highlight our differences. Two Americas, standing side by side, and -- for reasons that remain a mystery -- viewing the same landscape through very different filters.

[KaBar2]

Dosoner

 

Too late, there is already an extensive survivalist organization in the Lake Tahoe area, and they are quite wealthy and well equipped, but they are not very open to recruiting from the outside, LOL. Like I've said before, the rich folks often have their own little private armies of security people, especially the really rich ones. They fully intend to survive and let the great unwashed masses starve, you can be sure. Since I consider myself to be one of those masses, I don't see any reason why I shouldn't do a little preparing to survive myself.

 

Does anybody here remember when the musician John Denver's 25,000 gallon underground diesel storage tank started leaking and polluting the groundwater in Colorado? He is only one example, but he had several very well developed, and very well concealed survival shelters, similar to a bomb shelter. It sort of made sense at the time--the U.S. and the USSR were at daggers drawn back then, and SAC headquarters is in Colorado, which made Colorado a primary nuclear target. Probably still is. Denver was probably hoping to survive any nuclear attack on SAC. I don't know exactly where his property was, but depending on location, it might have worked. The environmentalist movement got very upset when they found out Denver's diesel fuel was trickling into Colorado's ground water, and I can't blame them. I think he eventually had to transfer the fuel and have the tank dug up.

[KaBar2]

White Ox

 

I have actually only used a firearm once to defend against criminals. I had a neighbor down the block who had a dispute with a contractor who did some work on her house. A friend of mine lived across the street. He was watching when two guys drove up to her house, broke a window, and went inside. So he came down and got me. He was pretty stoned on weed, and asked me to get my shotgun and go find out what these guys were doing. So, we went down there with my shotgun, and surprised them in the act of stealing a double stainless steel sink and a new garbage disposal (stupid, but true---they committed felony burglary over less than $300 worth of construction bullshit.) I never actually pointed the shotgun at them, I just said, "You guys are under arrest, and we are calling the cops. Sit down right there." They did. When the cops arrived, they tried to make out like they had every right to be there and said I threw down on them, which was not true. The cops arrested them both, because my friend saw them break the window. The D.A. gave them immunity from prosecution for testimony against their boss. The boss got convicted.

 

My wife has used her pistol three separate times since 1989 to defend herself against people who were trying to either rob her or abduct her. So far, she hasn't had to shoot anybody, because as soon as they realized she was armed, they ran like the sorry fucking cowards they were. She was more than willing to shoot them, though.

 

My late ex-wife was murdered by her landlady's ex-convict son in 1989. We had been divorced a long time (13 years) but it was still devastating. He stabbed her to death with one of her own kitchen knives, after attacking her from ambush. He got into her garage apartment with a spare key, and was hiding in her closet. She came home from work, and was undressing. When she opened the closet door, he jumped out and attacked her. She fought him (she had defensive cuts all on her arms and hands) but when she turned to run, he stabbed her five times from the back with a butcher knife. He raped her as she bled to death in her hallway. I doubt that having a gun would have helped her any, because he surprised her totally and his attack was extremely aggressive and violent, but I think if she had had time to arm herself with a pistol, she definately would have defended herself. She was an extremely liberal, left-wing Democrat, a life-long feminist, a union organizer for the SEIU and a leader in the local Congress of Labor Union Women. She lived in a poor, minority neighborhood because she felt comfortable and safe there. Apparently she was wrong about it.

 

When she and I were anarchists and members of the IWW, we owned several guns and practiced shooting pretty frequently. She was a good shot with both the M-1 carbine and the revolver I bought her. I wish she had had it that day.

 

Owning a gun is not going to save one from every situation, obviously. But there are situations where it might make the difference. Perhaps her attacker had a bad childhood, maybe he was mentally ill, maybe he was high on drugs, I don't know, and I don't care. She was a good, decent person who tried her whole life to help people, and he was a sorry-ass predator, rapist career criminal and murderer, who targeted and attacked women. I sincerely wish she had killed him, instead.

 

After her funeral, I applied for and received my Federal Firearms License (gun dealer's license.) I made it my personal crusade to provide .38 caliber pistols at a rock-bottom, wholesale price to every woman who would accept one. I trained numerous women in how to shoot. I did that for several years until the government raised the price of an FFL from $30 to $90 and then to $300. When they began to demand that FFL holders install security bars, burglar alarm systems and all that, I said "Okay, enough is enough." I was tired of them coming around to inspect my records all the time, too. So I turned in my license and got out of the business. I still know several FFL holders, though. If I wanted to buy a gun from a wholesale house, I can still do so, through a couple of friends who still have an FFL.

 

Maybe I'm a bad guy in the eyes of some of the people on this board. But I can't see it. I've never harmed anyone, with a firearm or without. All I've ever done is try to protect myself, my family and my friends. I've done so legally. I was (still am) very careful not to violate the law--with the exception of trainhopping once in a while.

 

I see a world that is definately not a safe place to be unarmed. If you can't see that, well, all I can say is "good luck." I wish you well, truthfully.