Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Unintended Consequences

recommended by Orygunner.


From Wikipedia:

Unintended Consequences is a novel by author John Ross, first published in 1996 by Accurate Press. The story chronicles the history of the gun culture, gun rights and gun control in the United States from the early 1900s through the late 1990s. Although clearly a work of fiction, the story is heavily laced with historical information, including real-life historical figures who play minor supporting roles. The novel also features unusually detailed and intricate facts, figures and explanations of many firearms-related topics. The cover has a picture of Lady Justice being assaulted by an ATF agent.

The novel is currently out of print. However, the entire novel is available to be read online at http://www.scribd.com/doc/11793519/Unintended-Consequences.

The story hinges upon the enactment and subsequent unintended consequences of several important pieces of U.S. gun control legislation and regulation: the National Firearms Act of 1934, the Gun Control Act of 1968, the Firearm Owners Protection Act of 1986, the Assault Weapons Importation Ban enacted by Presidential executive order in 1989 and the Federal Assault Weapons Ban of 1994.

Its thesis, as discussed in the Author's Note - A Warning and Disclaimer in the beginning of the book, is that enough bullying by what is widely perceived as a hostile occupation government will inevitably end in revolt if the occupied area is large enough and has a culture that is significantly different from the occupying state, and that this revolt will be undefeatable if the rebels use very low-tech "leaderless resistance."

17 comments:

  1. You did say "work of fiction".

    I seem to remember that some folks once said that having those "black bucks" and the heaten chinee runnin' loose in our country would destroy murKKKa. Slavery and indentured servitude seemed like such good ideas, once upon a time.

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  2. @Democommie and Laci:

    What does any of that have to do with the book Unintended Consequences?

    Have you even read it? It has nothing to do with "right wing" vs. the government.

    ...Orygunner...

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  3. As are a lot of works of "fiction", this book is laced with historical facts and dates. The historical events included in the book actually happened...they're not made up.

    You'd be surprised at how long an insurrection against the Federal Government would last. Not counting our military, we happen to have the world's largest standing army. Think about it.

    And I've read it three times and it's a very good book, even if you don't like guns.

    Mike

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  4. The bible, also a work of fiction, has lots of "historical" facts larded into its oh-so positive message of love and peace.

    I truly fail to understand how people don't get that I'm NOT anti-gun, but am definitely anti-asshole with a gun.

    When the feds start rounding up the guns I'll start worrying about it. I think that I read a few minutes ago that the Social Security fund is now expected to go negative in 2037, that actually concerns me--primarily because a lot of the same idiots who feel only the 2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is in danger or worth preserving are doing all they can to make sure that Social Security won't be here for the people who are currently in their peak earning years. Thank you, Party of God and Teabaggers.

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  5. Orygunner, If it's not a story of the "right wing" against the federal government, what is it?

    Are you objecting to gun rights extremists being lumped into that overused term "right wing?"

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  6. @Mikeb: First of all, how do you define "extremist"? Are you judging others beliefs against your own? Comparing the beliefs of some against the majority or the mainstream?

    I consider myself to be a Constitutional libertarian, which I believe takes the best elements of freedom and liberty from both the Conservative and Liberal sides of our supposed political spectrum.

    Both the "Right" AND the "Left" support gun control to some degree (obviously the left generally supports it more). I don't see how valuing our freedom, not wanting to continue failed policies (gun control) and respecting the rights of individuals is a left or right issue at all.

    ...Orygunner...

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  7. Gun Control is a failed policy. Why, yes, it certainly is. It's been enshrined in U.S. and international law for oh, lemme see, um, oh, that's right, it hasn't been. Here's a thought experiment. When you've got something like a couple of billion handguns and various other "small arms" floating around on the earth's crust AND the tectonics of international smuggling and arms dealers with moral compasses that comes in a box of Cracker Jack moving them around, how tough do you think it's gonna be for the BAD guys to get their hands on guns? When you add in the dishonest, greedy P.O.S. gun dealers in this country who tout their love for the 2nd Amendment (while what they reall love is M-O-N-E-Y) you might realize that "gun control" has never existed at anything like an effective level.

    It's kinda the opposite of Social Security. Oddly enough, many of the same morons who hate SS loves 'em their gunz!

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  8. @democommie: By George, I think you've got it!

    Well, at least the part about why gun control doesn't work. As long as there are guns in the world, and as long as there are criminals free to walk the streets, it will never be possible to keep the two apart.

    Since it's impossible to remove guns, how about we try to reduce the number of criminals in our corner of the world? Find the causes of violent crime, how to avoid making MORE criminals, and put the truly dangerous ones behind bars as long as they remain dangerous?

    ...Orygunner...

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  9. This book should be required reading for our elected officials.

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  10. Orygunner said, "Since it's impossible to remove guns,..."

    Not so fast there pardner. No one is saying we can remove ALL guns, but I personally believe we could remove a large percentage of the ones in criminal hands, not overnight, but with proper laws properly enforced, it could be done.

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  11. MikeB - with the laws you envision, you would criminalize the possession but you would not eliminate the possession. The fact is criminals break the law and adding new laws just means they will break more laws. It will not stop them from obtaining a gun. The police don't get involved until after the law has been broken which is usually after the criminal has actually used his illegal gun in a crime - which by the way is already against the law.

    If passing laws prevented crime, why do we have so much crime?

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  12. Orygunner:

    You want to remove criminals. Okay. Let's start with this one. Anyone who sells a firearm without determining that the buyer is in fact the end user (and is not a straw) is subject to arrest for facilitating crime. Upon being found guilty they are put to death, publicly, in as gruesome and graphic a manner as possible. Same thing for anyone who kills someone with a gun when that someone was not actually trying to kill them.

    Does that sound ridiculous to you? Gosh! I'm just spitballing here, but if you think that we need some really drastic changes (removing criminals from American society, in toto, being one of them) why not just choke off the pipeline and the testosterone fuelled rageaholics?

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  13. Mikeb said:
    "I personally believe we could remove a large percentage of the ones in criminal hands, not overnight, but with proper laws properly enforced, it could be done."

    Gun control has been implemented in most countries in the world to try and remove guns from the hands of criminals. Surely, at least ONE of these countries must have tried these proper laws, and had them properly enforced? Do you have ANY examples? Any at all?

    ...Orygunner...

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  14. You want examples, how about this? We're the country that went to the moon in less than a decade, to mention just one of the many accomplishments associated with the greatest country in the world.

    Are you saying we couldn't organize a proper database and make unaccounted guns scarce. I don't buy it.

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  15. mikeb - our going to the moon is your example of a country that successfully reduced criminal's possession of guns?

    I think you have a reading comprehension problem.

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  16. OK, Jim, if you want to play hard to get, I'll answer you straight.

    here's a country and here's a whole continent.

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