What the fuque, Jon?

The tell here is the phrase "you lefties":  because it's a generalization, it sets up the following phrase about vitriol as invalid, in an attempt to invalidate the emotional truth of what people are feeling.  Jon's initial comment is fake reasonableness.   When he says "perfectly nice" in re: Tucker Carlson, most of us instinctively know that he's talking out of his ass, because Carlson is in fact the farthest thing from "perfectly nice".  Carlson might not have the vehemence of some other right-wing assholes (not-so-Breitbart), but he's something even worse than most of those; a wannabe,  much like Michelle Malkin is an Ann Coulter wannabe.  Further, Carlson is the douche-iest of all wannabes....with his ham-handed stylistic cues (the bow tie, the limp hairlock) he signifies Richie Rich, the Berries-and-Cream Starburst guy, and a soupcon of antiEstablishment hippie longhair.  The cross-purpose-dressing is supposed to let us know that there's an intellectual heavyweight under all that pampered neotony.  But Jon Stewart pulled the curtain back for us on that- all Carlson could do, when Stewart handed him his ass on live TV, was grin stupidly.  

Laura McLean Also too, Andrew Breitbart, Tucker Carlson, and Tom Vilsack are dicks. Horrble, shameful, tiny dicks.

July 20 at 7:53pm · Comment · 

• You and 4 others like this.
• • 

    Jon Frugoli Tucker Carlson?...Why?...He strikes me as a perfectly nice person, and a respectful and moderate debater. Why the hate?

    July 20 at 8:00pm · 
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    Jon Frugoli Who's Tom Valsack?....never heard of him.

    July 20 at 8:02pm · 
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    Laura McLean Well, in fairness, Tucker's more of a douche.

    July 20 at 8:35pm · 
  • 

    Richard Beres he's a mothertucker!

    July 20 at 9:16pm · 
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    Jon Frugoli What did he say that's got you all so upset?

    July 20 at 9:20pm · 
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    Ob Askin http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2010/7/15/884657/-Tucker-Carlson-vs.-Keith-Olbermann:-Master-Of-Your-Domain
    
    Not nice, not respectful, not moderate.
    Just as much bile as others like Beck, just doesn't drool.

    July 20 at 10:08pm · 
  • 

    Jon Frugoli 

    Gee, you lefties can dish out the vitriol like nobody's business, but you can't handle even the slightest speck criticism - or even a joke - without crying like babies.
    
    So Tucker Carlson owns KeithOlbermann.com?...I think that's pretty damn...See More

    July 20 at 10:20pm · 
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    Jess Winfield 

    I don't see any lefties crying like babies in this debate. But heeere's a rightie crying like baby when he realizes he's been wrong about gay marriage.
    
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Te5xIGu6FiQ
    
    Just proves that "crying like a baby" is a val...See More

    July 21 at 2:02am ·  ·  1 person
  • 

    Laura McLean 

    I was referring to the gleeful slandering and firing of a woman who not only had done nothing wrong, but whose life's work has been to move beyond racial bounderies and aid poor farmers.
    
    Breitbart apparently loves to call innocent people of ...See More

    July 21 at 8:25am ·  ·  1 person
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    Rand Stoller John just has a man crush on Carson. Live and let live.

    July 22 at 1:28am · 

Lemme lay it out for you- if your revolution doesn't hurt or kill anyone, then you haven't committed any crimes.  If your revolution is bloody, then obeying the law is the last thing on your mind.  Either way, there's no need for a "Right to Revolution", and little chance that The Founders had one in mind when crafting the 2nd amendment.

Not that it matters what The Founders had in mind.  Great recent opinion by Justice Stevens on why "strict constructivism" is a sham, y'all have probably read it.  Nonetheless, I think we can infer that what they were talking about was maintaining the legality of a way of life (huntin', collectin'), and maintaining readiness for national defense (vs. Redcoats).  Preserving a right to delegitimize The State probably wasn't on the table, especially since they had just gone to so much trouble to create It...and since they had already included so many paths for legitimate dissent.

So why do we need this brand-new right, regardless of its provenance?  I mean, revolution is something that people do, without referent to the Constitution or code or anything else...when The People have had enough, they tend to rise up and overthrow, and they usually don't stop to consult the local law library.  The only thing that comes to mind is, its a way for the desperate contrarians among us to justify their paranoia about the gummint takin' away their guns.  Don't let this happen to you!  If you're a proud American gun-nut, console yourself with the fact that a lot of legislation has been passed regarding guns, and our glorious 2nd is still here.  If you're a shrinking American violet when it comes to guns, take comfort in the fact that despite our glorious 2nd amendment, we still have the legal ability to make some places gun-free.  In either case, don't be fooled- those who yammer about a "right of revolution" are making stuff up.  These yammerers (!) are of a type- they fashion themselves "shit-disturbers", and will attach themselves to a number of causes that are diametrically opposed.  All arguments made in bad faith; a hallmark of your typical Randian/Objectivist.

And it's no accident that Objectivism rears its ugly head here.  Only those who subscribe to something as shockingly immoral as Ayn Rand's "philosophy" would feel the need to gin up a "right of revolution".

my first, and last, dailykos diary

So, I've been banned- I admit it, I broke the rules.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/7/12/183119/227

here's a little tete-a-tete

So, Kaili is running her mouth over at DailyKos, and here are two or three of my cents:

 I really wanted to let this one go. (4+ / 0-)

Recommended by:

AaronInSanDiego, dsb, Futuristic Dreamer, Its the Supreme Court Stupid

I even started writing a comment, got up, walked away, and got pulled back because there was just too much idiocy in this post to let stand without objecting.

First, you have a really facile interpretation of the Constitution if you think the plural term "the people" is always going to convey an individual right, or that liberals shouldn't vociferously defend collective rights.  Not only is it facile, but it's illogical. Look at the example you picked: the right of assembly.  When one person assembles,there is no assembly, there's just one person exercising his or her right to express a view, which is freedom of speech.  For the right of assembly to be an individual right means that you've compressed it into the right of speech--in other words, you've actually taken away one distinct, collective right and folded it into another one.  That turns the right of assembly into a dead-letter, and that's simply foolish.

Second, restrictive gun laws aren't inherently anti-Second Amendment.  The 2nd is a narrow right, protecting very limited ranges of conduct, and not everything that touches on gun ownership, possession, sales, or transportation is a constitutional issue.  The RKBA folks were nice enough to let me borrow their platform a few months ago to elaborate this point--feel free to read it.

Third, and this is the most important in my book, THERE IS NO RIGHT OF REVOLUTIONin the Constitution (unless you read it into the guarantee of the Ninth Amendment).  There's a grant to Congress of the unchecked authority to punish treason, which pretty well flies in the face of the idea that the document enshrines our right to commit it.  The 2nd may facilitate treason (I'm sure it made life easier for many in the Confederacy, for example), but to say that it's a right is asinine. And from a logical perspective, have you considered that at the point when a group is waging war on the United States it is no longer bound by the Constitution?  If we wanted to raise an army to challenge the US military (which is fucking suicidal--the Iraqi insurgency fought a small proportion of our troops away from our homeland, which bears about as much resemblance to a home-grown revolution as a large turd does to the Sistine Chapel), why the bloody hell would we give two shits about the 2nd Amendment, if we're in a position where we don't recognize the authority of the state?

Your premises don't hold, your argument requires a type of constitutional textualism that's anathema to actual liberal goals, and your entire argument ignores the real harm that befalls our society because of unchecked weapons proliferation.

[And because this is somehow obligatory for me to note: I'm willing to bet that I'm one of the very few people on this goddamn thread who spent any part of today firing a weapon at a shooting range. For those in or near western Maryland, the Savage River State Forest's outdoor range is quite nice, though it does tend to get crowded on holidays.]

"Speaking for me only." -Armando

by JR on Sun Jul 04, 2010 at 04:07:03 PM PDT

[ Reply to This ]

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   Hear, Hear! (0 / 0)

  I know Kaili pretty well- her recently deceased ex-husband was my best friend of 32 years.  He shot himself a couple of months ago, just after Kaili served him with divorce papers.  One thing I know about Kaili is that she desperately wants to be taken for an intellectual- thus her attraction to ideas that are guaranteed to be provocative (pro-gun, pro-Ayn Rand, etc.).  Thanks, JR, for explicating and exposing her simplistic analysis of the 2nd amendment.  I'm a former Marine, I've been in combat, I've used guns and actually (legally!) SHOT PEOPLE- and I think gun restrictions  should be made a lot tighter.  It makes me physically ill when I think of all the young people in this country that have been killed by guns, chief among them my best friend Scott.  I think this overwhelming amount of violence is definitely facilitated by the fast and loose attitude we have with guns.  I don't know if the laws about gun possession should be changed- I'm not a lawyer and never will be- but I do think that we should close whatever loopholes exist that allow most gun crimes to be anonymous.  This, to me, is the core of the problem: there are so many guns available, and so cheaply, and with so few legal means to track their provenance, that prosecuting crimes becomes impossible.  I don't think most of us are worried about "gun nuts", because with rare exceptions they aren't committing crimes.  Gun nuts are having accidents, but it's gang violence that kills the poor, and the innocent bystanders who are in the wrong place at the wrong time.  I think that arming ourselves with guns to combat gang violence is the wrong approach- as a Liberal, I support social solutions to social problems, so I would rather see programs that lift gang members out of poverty.  I also think that arming ourselves against theoretical or possible tyranny, rather than actual tyranny, is completely nuts: thanks for making the point that revolution is not a right- it may be necessary from time to time, but the State is under no obligation to legitimize its own dissolution. Kaili's desire to voice new and original ideas has run up against her insufficient parsing of the real world, so she ends up as a de facto teabagger....too bad.