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Wish I had written this!
fitzx2
Member Posts: 39 ✭✭
http://www.lneilsmith.org/
Why Did it Have to be ... Guns?
by L. Neil Smith lneil@lneilsmith.org
Over the past 30 years, I've been paid to write almost two million words, every one of which, sooner or later, came back to the issue of guns and gun-ownership. Naturally, I've thought about the issue a lot, and it has always determined the way I vote.
People accuse me of being a single-issue writer, a single- issue thinker, and a single- issue voter, but it isn't true. What I've chosen, in a world where there's never enough time and energy, is to focus on the one political issue which most clearly and unmistakably demonstrates what any politician-or political philosophy-is made of, right down to the creamy liquid center.
Make no mistake: all politicians-even those ostensibly on the side of guns and gun ownership-hate the issue and anyone, like me, who insists on bringing it up. They hate it because it's an X-ray machine. It's a Vulcan mind-meld. It's the ultimate test to which any politician-or political philosophy-can be put.
If a politician isn't perfectly comfortable with the idea of his average constituent, any man, woman, or responsible child, walking into a hardware store and paying cash-for any rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything-without producing ID or signing one scrap of paper, he isn't your friend no matter what he tells you.
If he isn't genuinely enthusiastic about his average constituent stuffing that weapon into a purse or pocket or tucking it under a coat and walking home without asking anybody's permission, he's a four-flusher, no matter what he claims.
What his attitude-toward your ownership and use of weapons-conveys is his real attitude about you. And if he doesn't trust you, then why in the name of John Moses Browning should you trust him?
If he doesn't want you to have the means of defending your life, do you want him in a position to control it?
If he makes excuses about obeying a law he's sworn to uphold and defend-the highest law of the land, the Bill of Rights-do you want to entrust him with anything?
If he ignores you, sneers at you, complains about you, or defames you, if he calls you names only he thinks are evil-like "Constitutionalist"-when you insist that he account for himself, hasn't he betrayed his oath, isn't he unfit to hold office, and doesn't he really belong in jail?
Sure, these are all leading questions. They're the questions that led me to the issue of guns and gun ownership as the clearest and most unmistakable demonstration of what any given politician-or political philosophy-is really made of.
He may lecture you about the dangerous weirdos out there who shouldn't have a gun-but what does that have to do with you? Why in the name of John Moses Browning should you be made to suffer for the misdeeds of others? Didn't you lay aside the infantile notion of group punishment when you left public school-or the military? Isn't it an essentially European notion, anyway-Prussian, maybe-and certainly not what America was supposed to be all about?
And if there are dangerous weirdos out there, does it make sense to deprive you of the means of protecting yourself from them? Forget about those other people, those dangerous weirdos, this is about you, and it has been, all along.
Try it yourself: if a politician won't trust you, why should you trust him? If he's a man-and you're not-what does his lack of trust tell you about his real attitude toward women? If "he" happens to be a woman, what makes her so perverse that she's eager to render her fellow women helpless on the mean and seedy streets her policies helped create? Should you believe her when she says she wants to help you by imposing some infantile group health care program on you at the point of the kind of gun she doesn't want you to have?
On the other hand-or the other party-should you believe anything politicians say who claim they stand for freedom, but drag their feet and make excuses about repealing limits on your right to own and carry weapons? What does this tell you about their real motives for ignoring voters and ramming through one infantile group trade agreement after another with other countries?
Makes voting simpler, doesn't it? You don't have to study every issue-health care, international trade-all you have to do is use this X-ray machine, this Vulcan mind-meld, to get beyond their empty words and find out how politicians really feel. About you. And that, of course, is why they hate it.
And that's why I'm accused of being a single-issue writer, thinker, and voter
But it isn't true, is it?
Why Did it Have to be ... Guns?
by L. Neil Smith lneil@lneilsmith.org
Over the past 30 years, I've been paid to write almost two million words, every one of which, sooner or later, came back to the issue of guns and gun-ownership. Naturally, I've thought about the issue a lot, and it has always determined the way I vote.
People accuse me of being a single-issue writer, a single- issue thinker, and a single- issue voter, but it isn't true. What I've chosen, in a world where there's never enough time and energy, is to focus on the one political issue which most clearly and unmistakably demonstrates what any politician-or political philosophy-is made of, right down to the creamy liquid center.
Make no mistake: all politicians-even those ostensibly on the side of guns and gun ownership-hate the issue and anyone, like me, who insists on bringing it up. They hate it because it's an X-ray machine. It's a Vulcan mind-meld. It's the ultimate test to which any politician-or political philosophy-can be put.
If a politician isn't perfectly comfortable with the idea of his average constituent, any man, woman, or responsible child, walking into a hardware store and paying cash-for any rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything-without producing ID or signing one scrap of paper, he isn't your friend no matter what he tells you.
If he isn't genuinely enthusiastic about his average constituent stuffing that weapon into a purse or pocket or tucking it under a coat and walking home without asking anybody's permission, he's a four-flusher, no matter what he claims.
What his attitude-toward your ownership and use of weapons-conveys is his real attitude about you. And if he doesn't trust you, then why in the name of John Moses Browning should you trust him?
If he doesn't want you to have the means of defending your life, do you want him in a position to control it?
If he makes excuses about obeying a law he's sworn to uphold and defend-the highest law of the land, the Bill of Rights-do you want to entrust him with anything?
If he ignores you, sneers at you, complains about you, or defames you, if he calls you names only he thinks are evil-like "Constitutionalist"-when you insist that he account for himself, hasn't he betrayed his oath, isn't he unfit to hold office, and doesn't he really belong in jail?
Sure, these are all leading questions. They're the questions that led me to the issue of guns and gun ownership as the clearest and most unmistakable demonstration of what any given politician-or political philosophy-is really made of.
He may lecture you about the dangerous weirdos out there who shouldn't have a gun-but what does that have to do with you? Why in the name of John Moses Browning should you be made to suffer for the misdeeds of others? Didn't you lay aside the infantile notion of group punishment when you left public school-or the military? Isn't it an essentially European notion, anyway-Prussian, maybe-and certainly not what America was supposed to be all about?
And if there are dangerous weirdos out there, does it make sense to deprive you of the means of protecting yourself from them? Forget about those other people, those dangerous weirdos, this is about you, and it has been, all along.
Try it yourself: if a politician won't trust you, why should you trust him? If he's a man-and you're not-what does his lack of trust tell you about his real attitude toward women? If "he" happens to be a woman, what makes her so perverse that she's eager to render her fellow women helpless on the mean and seedy streets her policies helped create? Should you believe her when she says she wants to help you by imposing some infantile group health care program on you at the point of the kind of gun she doesn't want you to have?
On the other hand-or the other party-should you believe anything politicians say who claim they stand for freedom, but drag their feet and make excuses about repealing limits on your right to own and carry weapons? What does this tell you about their real motives for ignoring voters and ramming through one infantile group trade agreement after another with other countries?
Makes voting simpler, doesn't it? You don't have to study every issue-health care, international trade-all you have to do is use this X-ray machine, this Vulcan mind-meld, to get beyond their empty words and find out how politicians really feel. About you. And that, of course, is why they hate it.
And that's why I'm accused of being a single-issue writer, thinker, and voter
But it isn't true, is it?
Comments
I personally decided some number of years ago that the ideal way to determine a persons sanity was to query them on the Second Amendment....specifically, WHERE they stood on it.
Those that defended government control of firearms are Socialists, brain-washed...or simply idiots.
The brain-washed CAN be educated..but it is a LONG, difficult task....
The others are beyond redemption.
Ditto,
Ditto, and Ditto.
Very well put. I'm sending the link out to everyone on my contact list.
And that enemy is people using the idea that gun ownership should be outlawed, or severly restricted, among civilians. But of course let the government and police have any and all the firearms they think they need.
Guns are powerful and potentially dangerous instrutments. Therefore the right to possess and use them are potentially dangerous. But so are other "instruments" that are presently considered untouchable freedoms as well as rights granted in the US and state constitutions.
Such rights as the right to assemble with other citizens. Heck, those citizens might assemble and storm the "castle" and throw out the political slugs.
The right to free speech. Citizens might misuse that right to forment an overthrow of our inempt government.
Freedom to travel. Citizens might travel around and cause problems.
Freedom to express your opinions. Citizens might reveal to other citizens how corrupt our government is.
My point is that there are other freedoms that we have that, after the liberals are through destroying our gun rights, some of them will for sure start thinking about how many of our other rights seem "dangerous" to them.
Too dangerous for us common citizens to possess.
The very INSTANT guns are banned..is the moment those other rights you mention become government property..and we the 'citizens' become REAL slaves...instead of the nearly slaves we are right now.
I wish I had written this....
I found this today. It reflects what I have been saying for the last two years. No holds barred.
A brief history of our future. Well worth the time it takes to read.
A WAKEUP CALL.
http://www.dansimmons.com/news/message/2006_04.htm