Alan: American conservatives are frightened people, so entrenched in bunkered individualism that their ensuing derangement makes them magnify threat while discrediting civil society's demonstrated ability to diminish risk and make life better.
In effect, American conservatives are determined to remain fearful, and to this end they contribute to the socio-political degradation that confirms their worst suspicions.
They listen to the worst angels of their nature, and -- by God! -- those angels speak to them.
They listen to the worst angels of their nature, and -- by God! -- those angels speak to them.
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"Conservatives Scare More Easily Than Liberals"
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Cain killed Abel with a rock.
Have a Great Day … Pray for Rain. Pray for peace in America.
Dear Fred,
Of course it's a heart problem!
But to say it's a heart problem -- while refusing to recognize that it is also a gun problem -- enables The Ideal to "get away with murder."
Not to advocate reasonable gun control contributes to The Carnage.
Ironically, The Second Amendment reveals the solution. Subordinate gun ownership to the establishment of "well-regulated militias." (This is what the Swiss do. http://www.npr.org/2013/03/19/174758723/facing-switzerland-gun-culture)
To be clear, The United States has a gun problem. But whereas the "heart problem" will always be with us, the gun problem needn't be.
Here is how gun control actually works:
"Australian Gun Control After Port Arthur Massacre: 35 Dead"
Read more about the Port Arthur Massacre and Australian gun control at:
"Gun Cartoons and Gun Violence Bibliography"
How does one "pray for peace in America" without working for well-regulated gun control?
I'm reminded of George Carlin's splendid quip:
I'm reminded of George Carlin's splendid quip:
Pax tecum
Alan
PS Second Amendment evangelism's fierce opposition to "gun regulation" reminds me of conservative resistance to legislation that first mandated seat belt use. In that political battle, conservatives actually argued that seat belts would trap people inside crashed cars, thus preventing them from "being thrown clear of the car." (In no more than 10 years, America will look back on "global warming denial" and see nothing but negativity whose only purpose was to validate negativity. There will always be two parties: The Party of Hope. And The Party of Nope.)
Many truth-challenged conservatives make it their business to create whimsical pastiches of bogus assertions and ersatz "principles" to support the status quo, even when the status quo is manifestly responsible for unnecessary injury and death.
TED Talk: "The Danger of Science Denial," by Michael Specter
"The terrible thing about our time is precisely the ease with which theories can be put into practice. The more perfect, the more idealistic the theories, the more dreadful is their realization. We are at last beginning to rediscover what perhaps men knew better in very ancient times, in primitive times before utopias were thought of: that liberty is bound up with imperfection, and that limitations, imperfections, errors are not only unavoidable but also salutary. The best is not the ideal. Where what is theoretically best is imposed on everyone as the norm, then there is no longer any room even to be good. The best, imposed as a norm, becomes evil.”
"Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander,” by Trappist monk, Father Thomas Merton
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More Merton Quotes
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