#4613 and #4621 are perfect examples of why it's a fool's errand to debate gun rights with liberals.

Gregory whiffed on a few fat ones. He kept pressing the point that if ammunition clips were regulated, isn't it possible that Lanza would have killed fewer people? Wayne kept bringing up Columbine, that it happened during the assault weapons ban as proof that weapons bans don't work. The obvious follow up is "if the perpetrators of Columbine had semi automatic weapons with 31 round clips, isn't it possible they would have killed a lot more?"

Many of us here will probably find Pinker's conclusions unsatisfying, since he advises we don't obsess about things like Newtown and don't get carried away by trying to enact extreme and bizarre solutions.

as i learn more of how last week went down i think the president is being too much the tough guy

The Bill of Rights did not detail the rights of individuals.

Yes it did. But as against the Federal Government.

There were, of course, no suits against the states for violating the Bill of Rights until after the Civil War, because under Barron v. Baltimore the Bill of Rights didn't apply to the states. In fact, no state laws were struck down under the Bill of Rights until 1932.

EDIT: and if I told you why, this post would have to get deleted, too.

I am fascinated by conservatives, they are generally very bizarrely illogical outside of certain narrow fields. When talking about the US, it is always in danger of complete collapse and/or turning into an authoritarian tyranny (liberal hellhole). But when talk of the world comes around the US is great, wonderful and exceptional to the point that no other nation compares.

I don't think there's any reasonable argument against the idea that the US is fundamentally different from every other nation in the world. It's not that nothing anyone else does matters or provides any guidance as to our own best policies, but that everything from our culture's emphasis on the individual, our diversity in matters of race, religion, and politics, our size, our system of government, and even our isolation from the rest of the world make it difficult (not impossible, but different) to compare policy.

But the "you get nothing, I get that for free" quote just struck me as unnecessarily harsh, at odds with the narrative of Obama moving THIS much and the Republicans not at all, and with the potential to reinforce ideas like HW expressed on the right. Why not "That gets you a seat at the table."

Really, its brand confusion. There should be no reason for Tea Party and Republican Party to be interchangeable like it is, but it happened and now they have to deal with it. You certainly don't see this on the left like with the Democratic Party and the Green Party.

He tried conciliatory four years ago. It got him less than nowhere.

NOTE: As an aside I love how the fact that Joe thinks the US is ~15 times larger than Australia means nothing from Australia's history can be used to guide the US. Because every proof of concept, every statistical study has to be much larger than ... oh wait of course it doesn't.

The U.S. has over 15 times more people than Australia, the U.S. is far more diverse than Australia, the U.S. has substantially greater problems with gangs and drugs, the U.S.'s illegitimacy rate is almost double Australia's, the two countries' cultures are different, the geography is different, the weather is different, the population densities are different, etc., etc.

All of that aside, what was the baseline? Was Australia having 20 mass shootings per year which dropped to zero after it passed some new gun laws, or did the country move to reduce guns after a one-off incident that was statistically unlikely in the first place?

--Other countries are more diverse. We're predominantly a white, Christian nation.

Yes, but this is a terrible thing in itself, and an even worse thing for a liberal to state approvingly. Shame on you, too, Mark.

But the "you get nothing, I get that for free" quote just struck me as unnecessarily harsh, at odds with the narrative of Obama moving THIS much and the Republicans not at all, and with the potential to reinforce ideas like HW expressed on the right. Why not "That gets you a seat at the table."

(CNN) – Republican lawmakers said Sunday they believe President Barack Obama wants the country to fall off the fiscal cliff for political purposes.

“I think he sees a political victory at the bottom of the cliff. He gets all this additional tax revenue for new programs. He gets to cut the military, which Democrats have been calling for for years and he gets to blame Republicans for it,” Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming said on “Fox News Sunday.”

His sentiment was shared by Rep. Mick Mulvaney of South Carolina.

“I believed from the very beginning and continue to believe that the president has no interest at all in not going over the cliff,” Mulvaney told CNN chief political correspondent Candy Crowley on “State of the Union.” “He wants to go over the cliff. Everything I've looked at and seen out of the White House.”

how are they going to explain that vote to their constituents?

Indonesia, Singapore, India to name a couple. If we're going by language, its probably Indonesia. This list has them second in spoken most languages behind Papa New Guinea, but Indonesia is a much larger nation.

There should be no reason for Tea Party and Republican Party to be interchangeable like it is, but it happened and now they have to deal with it.

In advance of a new edition of their book American Grace, political scientists David E. Campbell of Notre Dame and Robert D. Putnam of Harvard published in a The New York Times opinion the results of their research into the political attitudes and background of Tea Party supporters. Using a pre-Tea Party poll in 2006 and going back to the same respondents in 2011, they found the supporters to be not "nonpartisan political neophytes" as often described, but largely "overwhelmingly partisan Republicans" who were politically active prior to the Tea Party...

Polls found that... roughly 77% of supporters had voted for Obama's Republican opponent, John McCain in 2008.

Polls found that... roughly 77% of supporters had voted for Obama's Republican opponent, John McCain in 2008.

A good chunk of them are true small-government types, and a good chunk of them are put-God-back-into-the-government types, the two philosophies which basically define the modern GOP. They're Republicans who desperately want to look in the mirror and see themselves as Outsiders, but they're still Republicans.

I was at a dinner yesterday with a bunch of righties from all over the country that in the 90's and such would call themselves Republicans. Almost all of them said they were either independent now or were going to consider themselves independent in the future. The problem with that view is that they are all still going to vote republican come hell or high water. It's a meaningless distinction.

But it was a fact and the fact was put in dispute

He tried conciliatory four years ago. It got him less than nowhere. To expect that he failed to learn the first thing from that experience is to, well, whiff on a fat one.

All the more reason the Republican party didn't need to adopt the Tea Party identification, or allow it to be done. There was little upside to it for Republicans.

But it's a fact anyone decent should wish didn't exist; it certainly shouldn't be used by anyone decent as ammo against anyone who, for whatever reason, uses the language of the Bill of Rights to defend or sustain any freedom, even the type of freedom liberals don't like.

Ted Cruz won a Republican seat in a Republican state by 16%. Marco Rubio's Democratic opponent scooped up a hefty 20% of the vote in a three-way race. So you can chalk up two more hand-wrapped gifts to the GOP, courtesy of the Tea Party.

That they voted for tax cuts and this was the best deal they could get from the White House who are playing partisan politics.

LOL. I doubt anyone can name three countries that even approach the U.S.'s level of racial and ethnic diversity. Brazil is probably the only other country in the discussion.

USA
Non-Hispanic White - 63.7%
Hispanic or Latino - 16.4%
Black - 12.2%
Asian - 4.7%
Native - 0.7%
Other - 9%

Canada
Non-French European - 64%
French-Canadian - 16%
Asian - 9%
Native - 4%
Black - 2.5%

You and your facts. This is *Joe* you're talking to.

Hmm, gee, tough one. Are you claiming the GOP would be worse off with Charlie Crist and David Dewhurst, and Dick Lugar, and John Brunner, and Sue Lowden, and Jane Norton, and Mike Castle? I'll bet a lot of lefties fully endorse your "clogging up the basepaths" philosophy for political victory, though.

But anyway, #4730 didn't really refute anything I said. The biggest chunk of Canada's diversity comes from splitting white Canadians from white French-Canadians, the latter of whom are mostly in one place (Quebec).

Not to the same degree, but the Hispanic population of America is fairly regional isn't it?

In broad strokes I'd say the diversity is roughly comparable. I'm not exactly sure how to measure it, but I'd put the "diversity" of Toronto or Montreal against any American city...and then less diverse in rural areas.

Hmm, gee, tough one. Are you claiming the GOP would be worse off with Charlie Crist and David Dewhurst, and Dick Lugar, and John Brunner, and Sue Lowden, and Jane Norton, and Mike Castle? I'll bet a lot of lefties fully endorse your "clogging up the basepaths" philosophy for political victory, though.


Yeah, just what the GOP needs: More RINOs.

I wonder what John Boehner thinks about having a Democratic Senate, and if it means nothing to him but bragging rights.

But what the heck. It'll only take 6 years to try to climb back up to where you were.

Sure, five of those uninspiringly amarinth red Senate seats are now sky blue... but aren't the two that turned burgundy red just gorgeous?

Perhaps, but the numbers are still the numbers. Canada is ~80 percent non-Hispanic white, while the U.S. is ~66 percent non-Hispanic white and dropping. That's a fairly big difference, before even getting to the issue of scale (i.e., the U.S. has roughly 9 times more people than Canada).

In terms of blacks and Latinos, the numbers are 13 and 16 percent in the U.S. vs. just 3 percent and 1 percent in Canada [2012 U.S. Census vs. 2006 Canada Census].

But anyway, #4730 didn't really refute anything I said. The biggest chunk of Canada's diversity comes from splitting white Canadians from white French-Canadians, the latter of whom are mostly in one place (Quebec).

And as Joe is clearly telling us, there's no diversity but racial diversity. When Joe says the US is distinctly diverse what he means is "ain't nobody else got to deal with them black folk like we do."

French-Canadians represent a different dynamic and raise different issues than Hispanic-Americans.

Joe's an idiot. I'm shocked people continue to treat him like anything other than someone to be punched in the face.

Having a non-filibuster-proof majority of the Senate while a Dem is in the White House would mean little beyond bragging rights for the GOP.

22 minutes later:
It's funny how much you're focused on a few Senate losses while disregarding the 2010 GOP takeover of the House.

Yes... "funny."

The idea that 2010 would have been as successful, or that the gains made in places like Wisconsin and Michigan vis-a-vis unions, would have happened without the Tea Party movement is fairly laughable.

Yes... "laughable."

In Michigan, Rick Snyder ran as a moderate, and won election because of Democratic crossover votes. The Tea Party called him "RINO Rick," and preferred Pete Hoekstra. Then again, compared to the purifying triumph of losing five Senate seats, I guess failing to stop Governor Snyder is a very substantial win to the Tea Party.

Joe's an idiot. I'm shocked people continue to treat him like anything other than someone to be punched in the face.

Dude, you're insane. You have to take guys you think are RINOs on the flank, in order to have numerical superiority. Especially in states like Delaware - someone you feel is a RINO will still vote with the Republicans far more than he or she will with the Democrats. The Democratic party knows this - it'll generally ignore the bleating of the netroot folks and will settle for conservative Democrats in situations where they have little choice.

I'd rather have a pitcher strike out the batter rather than let the ball go into play, but that doesn't mean that I'd rather allow a homer than let the ball go into play.

Specifically costing the GOP its ability to take over the Senate is nothing, but the House takeover was everything.

No break for you. Candidate Snyder refused to sign the Norquist no-tax pledge, endorsed the auto bailout, and ran as a moderate "tough nerd." Democratic votes gave him his margin of victory in an open primary. After being elected, Snyder vetoed a voter ID law, and worked to create insurance exchanges under Obamacare. It was the Tea Party, that powerful engine of Republican victory, that labelled him "RINO Rick." Here's Newsweek on the 2010 Michigan primary result:

A simple "I was wrong" would have sufficed.

Dude, you're insane. You have to take guys you think are RINOs on the flank, in order to have numerical superiority. Especially in states like Delaware - someone you feel is a RINO will still vote with the Republicans far more than he or she will with the Democrats. The Democratic party knows this - it'll generally ignore the bleating of the netroot folks and will settle for conservative Democrats in situations where they have little choice.

Among the 75,000 things you claim to find laughable is that "anti-union gains in Wisconsin and Michigan had nothing to do with conservatives or the Tea Party but, instead, began with "RINOs" and moderate Dems." But that's exactly what happened. No Snyder, no "anti-union gains in Michigan."

Fair enough. I wasn't really following the guns/diversity discussion (and I'm a little fuzzy on the connection there), so I'll allow that I'd be speaking from ignornace to wade into that discussion. I was merely narrowly responding to a very specific claim. I think we're both fairly clear on where the other stands on the topic so I'm happy to leave it at your summation, except to say I don't really see how French Canada being a geographically and culturally cohesive entity makes the nation less diverse. But, as I say, fair enough, in a very narrow sense debating the meaning of national "diversity" isn't particularly useful I guess.

The only point I was trying to make, and I thought it was mostly self-evident, is that even while both countries are diverse, the samples are too different to render a valid 1:1 comparison.

It's not just Canada. Joe believes this to be true for every country in the world, so you can take your academic studies and real-world examples and stuff it.

Diversity is only white people and non-white people. Huh.

Show me some countries with anything resembling America's demographics and America's level of gun ownership and I'll be happy to consider it.

Thereby proving my snark correct.

The current Michigan legislature could not override the veto of a Democratic Governor. But because there is currently no Democratic Governor, that is not a concern for the Michigan legislature. The reason there is currently no Democratic Governor has nothing to do with the Tea Party, and everything to do with an electable conservative who appealed to moderate Dems. You scoffed at this scenario, after it had already happened.

You insist that the GOP is better off with a purified, more Tea Party-like minority in the Senate, but the Senate is accomplishing almost nothing that advances conservative goals. Whereas in Michigan, the Tea Party's wishes were ignored, but because the Tea Party lost and "RINO Rick" won, the unions were ultimately dealt a blow.

You smirked before that I was "still ignoring Wisconsin." I didn't contradict Wisconsin because the Tea Party did support Scott Walker, and played a role in his election. Yes, we do "all know what happened there." Those were the facts -- in Wisconsin. But in Michigan, apparently all of us don't know what happened there, or simply don't want to.

Thereby proving my snark correct.

You cited "academic studies and real-world examples" in #4769, thus implying that studies of countries (allegedly) similar to the U.S. exist. Assuming you weren't just grandstanding, would you care to list a few of them?

Why should I bother? You've summarily dismissed every single example given on the thread, from Australia, from Canada, from the UK and Ireland.... You've made it clear that you're unwilling to accept anything from any of these real-world examples that might apply to the United States. Since you nitpik any difference from any study and use that as a reason for dismissing that study — that's kind of your M.O., grand dismissals — there's no reason to discuss them with you. You're closed to the arguments.

</I guess this is your way of acknowledging there aren't any good comparisons to the U.S. for purposes of studying guns and crime. Otherwise, if Australia, Canada, and Ireland are your best examples, your argument is in big trouble.

See? They're not good enough for you because you don't want to take a look at the details of the studies. You don't want to acknowledge that gun control legislation have impacted gun fatalities elsewhere, and that such legislation might, just might have some similar impact in the United States. There are no perfect comparisons, but the fact that you refuse to allow for any possibility that something that happened in another country might happen here makes the idea of discussing comparisons with you a total waste of time.

At least be man enough to acknowledge that.

First the pro-Asian racism, and now some sexism. Tsk, tsk. Not very liberal of you.

The rampage came on Dec. 14, the same day a heavily armed 20-year-old man killed his mother and then opened fire at a school in Newtown, Conn., killing 20 first graders, 6 adults and then himself. Official Chinese news organizations had much more coverage of the Newtown massacre than of the Henan attack, and there was an outpouring of sympathy for the American tragedy as well as commentary drawing inevitable comparisons. Many Chinese Internet users pondered how many students at the Chenpeng school might have been killed if China had gun control laws as loose as those in the United States.

But now the Chinese video, circulating here on television and the Internet, has refocused attention on the Chenpeng attack, especially on security measures at the school and on local officials’ efforts to squelch coverage. Fury has been building because such rampages have recurred over the last three years, with intruders slashing at schoolchildren with knives and axes, including one who attacked with a hammer and then set himself on fire. Each case set off fear among parents across the country as well as criticism of government officials for not doing enough to protect children; each time, officials guaranteed schools would be secure. The video made blatant the gap between the official promises and reality.

“Did the government not say that no strangers can get into schools?” wrote one Internet user, Xia Ling, on a microblog. “Did the government not say that every school has security guards? Liars! You will eventually all face karma someday.”

They're fairly similar. Just substitute Hispanics with French-Canadians, and a few African-Americans with Asians and Natives.

I don't see the 2A as protecting an individual right in any case. I think it refers to a collective right.

First the pro-Asian racism, and now some sexism. Tsk, tsk. Not very liberal of you.

Just when did being called a liberal become a slur?

but AFAIK (and plz correct me if I'm wrong) no other nation -- aside perhaps a largely symbolic legislative nod to the UDoHR -- has an equivalent to the US Bill of Rights, or even if it does, lacks one with such a highly placed protection of gun ownership among those rights.

I'm glad it exists and note that it is race, gender, and most importantly, class neutral -- that last being the first casualty of many of the existing and proposed judicial and statuary infringements -- infringements, btw, that are reactionary and illiberal by definition, yet are almost always effected by liberals.

But guns cost money, and nothing that costs money is class neutral in practice.

here is act of parliament passed in 1689 entitled "The Bill of Rights" which included (among other things) a clause that declared that "no royal interference in the freedom of the people to have arms for their own defence as suitable to their class and as allowed by law". Which isn't precisely the 2nd ammendment...but at least it mentions guns!

I don't understand how or why any liberal would NOT apply a maximalist interpretation of any right implicitly or explicitly guaranteed by the Bill of Rights.

I'm not sure what a "maximalist" interpretation would include, though. The right to own automatic weapons? The right to falsely shout "Fire!" in a crowded theater? All the rights in the BoR get interpreted to limit them in some way. It's really just a question of how far that goes. I don't think the same limit needs to apply to each right, because I think the consequences differ pretty dramatically: allowing more porn just isn't the same as allowing magazines with 100 rounds.

Saying you couldn't distribute child porn or yell fire in a theater did not suddenly lead to mass arrests for speaking against the government.

Heh. While I agree with your overall point, the case in which the Court used the "shout fire" example was, in fact, one in which people were arrested for speaking against the government. It took quite a while for the Court to fix that.

All of that aside, what was the baseline? Was Australia having 20 mass shootings per year which dropped to zero after it passed some new gun laws, or did the country move to reduce guns after a one-off incident that was statistically unlikely in the first place?

The U.S. has over 15 times more people than Australia, the U.S. is far more diverse than Australia, the U.S. has substantially greater problems with gangs and drugs, the U.S.'s illegitimacy rate is almost double Australia's, the two countries' cultures are different, the geography is different, the weather is different, the population densities are different, etc., etc.