Saturday, December 31, 2011

Dennis Henigan on American Exceptionalism

In his article in the Huffington Post, Dennis Henigan recounted several of the holiday shooting stories we've all been talking about. His conclusion was quite interesting.


On some level it seems that we ought not to have to confront such horror during the season of peace. But not even the most joyous time of the year can immunize us against the reality of gun tragedies. The deadly drumbeat of gun violence just goes on and on, an American tragedy of a kind and dimension unknown to other Western nations. Among all the Western, high-income nations of the world, 80 percent of gun deaths occur in the U.S., a particularly unwelcome instance of American exceptionalism.

What's your opinion? Don't you think the gun-rights crowd is a bit blinded by its bias? How could they cling to that thin reed of "guns do more good than harm," while the United States is drowning in gun violence? It baffles the mind.

Please leave a comment.

10 comments:

  1. People who don't like freedom are baffled. People who must make choices for others are baffled. But those who understand the core principle of this country know that Americans will only follow the path of freedom.

    In case you don't see anything specific in that statement, allow me clarify. The majority of Americans for decades now have supported gun rights. That trend will continue and get stronger, despite what the Brady Bunch wants.

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  2. Greg Camp said...

    People who don't like freedom are baffled. People who must make choices for others are baffled. But those who understand the core principle of this country know that Americans will only follow the path of freedom.

    The Declaration of Independence refers to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.

    LIFE is the first of the desideratum, of the goals of this country becoming a separate sovereign nation.

    That means to be free from being killed, as tens of thousands of our own residents are killed inside this country, and even higher numbers outside this country are killed by OUR weapons.

    Your use of the words path of freedom is an obscenity. There is nothing in the meaning as you use it that has anything to do with fundamental freedom.

    All it means is you want to have as many guns as possible, regardless of how many other people lose their lives, or are injured, including the higher probability of that being you yourself and others in your home.

    What you advocate is a violent bloody obscenity, NOT FREEDOM.

    In case you don't see anything specific in that statement, allow me clarify. The majority of Americans for decades now have supported gun rights. That trend will continue and get stronger, despite what the Brady Bunch wants.

    That just shows how effective single issue voters and a whole ugly lot of bloody money has bought and corrupted the political process.

    You won't see unlimited unregulated gun laws indefinitely. It is just a matter of time. You have a lot of violence and blood and death and ruined lives on your conscience until that sanity takes hold here.

    Freedom is always a balance; what you are demanding is violent imbalance.

    The world wide trends always win, like the abolition of slavery, like civil rights and women's rights. This will be just one more. You are on the losing side of history, you just have too poor and failed a knowledge of history to recognize it.

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  3. Greg, it is not freedom to lose your a family member because of some senseless violence.

    Greg, you never fail to show that you are a complete and total moron.

    Not to mention, you spout shit which you don't back up.

    If anything, your continued babbling only makes me want to see gun control actually instituted in the United States.

    I would add in that Dog Gone is correct, the world wide trend does tend to win--and that trend is for gun control.

    The people who want gun control are frustrated by people like you who want to spout bullshit that the high incident of gun violence is the cost of freedom and that the Second Amendment means something other than that there should be a citizen's militia rather than a standing army.

    Unfortunately, reality is against you, Greg.

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  4. You do have freedom from being killed. The law punishes and deters the act. But you don't have a guarantee of not being killed, whether by a man with a gun, or a pipe, or a knife, or in a random car accident.

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  5. MAgunowner said...

    You do have freedom from being killed. The law punishes and deters the act. But you don't have a guarantee of not being killed, whether by a man with a gun, or a pipe, or a knife, or in a random car accident.

    Yes. I DO have a right to be free and safe, and to have laws not only that punish that but that make me as safe as possible, as safe as OTHER CIVILIZED COUNTRIES from people with guns.

    And if that means you have restricted gun rights, then that is not only acceptable, it is highly desirable.

    You have NO RIGHT to guns if it results in far far greater numbers of people DYING from them, from them getting into the hands of dangerous, emotionally unstable people.

    That was never the intent of the 2nd Amendment, and it is not what we should do.

    The constitution is address providing for the common good - that would be this. It is about providing the common defense - that can as reasonably include our common defense from dangerous people within our borders as outside them.

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  6. Keep dreaming about gun control in America. You had your day with the Assault Weapons Ban, and you screwed up. That law awoke Americans who hadn't been paying attention. The trend is now with us.

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  7. Life, as in, life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, means your life is your property. You are your own property, and as such, you have the right to defend your property against aggression. Now, if you prefer not to defend your property, that is your prerogative.
    Murders, killings, rapes, assaults are going to happen. That's life, get used to it. There are also laws to punish those who do these things. I suppose to make every woman free from rape we could castrate every male child at birth. That would certainly end that problem, wouldn't it.
    It's very simple to understand, if Abel would have had a weapon, Cain would have been punished for his attempt to be the first murderer.

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  8. "It's very simple to understand, if Abel would have had a weapon, Cain would have been punished for his attempt to be the first murderer."

    Bible stories to support the gunzloonz burnin' stoopit, that figures.

    So, you've read the incident report about the Cain on Abel violence. Cain didn't just walk up to Abel and bop him or stick him without so much as a "Hi, how'r'ya?"?

    Inane shit aninnymouse spouts helps me understand the gunzloonz' reliance on the "scholarship" of Liars for the NRA like John Lott.

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  9. Greg, you can say the majority favor gun rights and cherry pick some stat to support it. I can say the majority support reasonable restrictions and do the same.

    The problem is our definitions of "gun rights" and "reasonable restrictions" differ.

    You say: "You had your day with the Assault Weapons Ban, and you screwed up."

    What really happened is we didn't screw up, Bush happened. What the hell are you referring to by "you screwed up?"

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  10. Mikeb302000,

    You should have gone for the whole wheel of cheese while you had the chance. That Assault Weapons Ban woke up many gun owners who weren't worried about banning this or restricting that, so long as it didn't affect them. Now they know differently, as do we all.

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