Christ...There was me thinking about going on holiday to US next year.....

The ups and downs of Palace have left me older than my years

What always amazes me is how gun owners, and thus very often republicans, always go on about the Constitution and the 2nd Amendemnt i.e. the right to bear arms. But that amendment actually blabs on about to do that to form a militia.

Now I don't actually see too many gun owners rushing to form a militia, local or otherwise, to keep anyone at bay. It has just turned into a stereo-typical American excess of getting everything you can for yourself, in this case as much ammunition and as many guns as you want.

Let's face it, if the "winning" reaction to the murdering of 20 small kids & some of their teachers (Sandy Hook, Newtown) is "more guns" it won't change anything except perhaps the state of the country's moral decline, which will just slide into one of complete despair.

Edited by Dweeb (07 Jan 2016 8.46am)

Taking the bungy jump since 1964. Never to see John Jackson in a shirt again

Sorry to see Lee Hills go, did we ever see Alex Marrow? We did January 2013

The number of people who own guns has been steadily dropping for years; the number of guns owned has been rising - and spikes every time there's a hint at an effort for gun control. Nationwide support for universal background checks tops 90% - there is no sane reason why something as doable as that doesn't get done. But...

The NRA is now nothing but a lobbyist for the gun manufacturing industry. Over the years, they have pushed back regulations because, simply, there has been no one pushing the other way. That's why you now have patently crazy s*** like open carry and stand-your-ground.

It's a well-oiled machine, and it kicks into high gear following each new shocking gun crime. They have their patented talking points that they use to drown out proponents of gun control and they run out the clock on our attention span; until the next time when they start all over again.

Things seem more fraught right now, because they are. This is because gun control appears to be gaining some real traction, and the old bulls*** has lost is potency. If the sane part of the country - and this includes people like my father-in-law who has a number of guns (mostly for hunting) - continue to warm to gun control, then the crazies are going to get worse.

This laughable militia stand-off in Oregon is just the beginning. I say laughable, because they're a bunch of deluded rubes who think the Gub'mint (i.e. the Kenyan Mooslin in the White House) is coming for their freedom (i.e. guns and illegal grazing habits); they've set themselves up for an occupation to last years, they say, while equipping themselves with enough guns and ammo for a small war and enough food and clothing for a week.

But what happens when they get desperate; hungry, tired and cold? Will they take the humiliation of just surrendering? Will they try and bust out? Will their friends try and resupply them?

This has the potential to get very, very bad. And if some or all of these guys end up dead, then the rest of their ilk will have martyrs to their cause.

The real fight against gun control is yet to come: trying to enforce gun regulations on heavily armed people who don't want it.

Edited by Ray in Houston (07 Jan 2016 3.18pm)

We don't do possession; we do defense and attack. Everything else is just wa**ing with a football.