Tuesday, May 27, 2014
Pummeled on the Catholic Blogosphere
I'm about to get skinned over at CAEI. Mark posted a hit piece on "Joe the Plumber" who echoed critics of our response to 9/11 by saying that dead kids don't trump his rights. Of course that was an oft repeated mantra following 9/11, and in honesty, there's something to be said about it. Losing freedom and doing anything in the wake of a tragedy, no matter how horrible, is never acceptable. Now, of course, it looks like the prudent approach, at least in terms of gun control. Anyway, it isn't going to be pleasant. Here I go!
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We taking bets on your banishment? ;)
ReplyDeleteJust mention to them "feelz before realz" and how great it is so many Catholics are allowing their feelings to trump all other concerns (legal, moral, historical, whatever).
Or maybe ask if the next time a scandal is hung around Catholic necks, if that then makes it ok for religious freedom to be restricted.
After all, if you make "how many die" to be your sole guiding factor, then as soon as someone says "Catholicism (or any other disliked group) killed # of people/kids!" then you're stuck. Because any effort to argue or address the charge will be taken as "insensitive" or "ignoring the issue" or any other argument they use over there.
"By your own standards, you will be judged" -some smart guy I'm sure ;)
Whew. That's getting rough. Get over there and help me! post those point there! :)
ReplyDeleteI would but I'm banned over there, remember? (for... well I think making these points the last time Shea touched on them)
ReplyDeleteDarn that Joe The Plumber, opposing smart guns!
ReplyDeleteI just posted there, for all the good it will do. I think it's a waste of time though, to think that Mark or any of his liberal readers are still reachable by reason at this point. He's blinded by wrath, and only grace will pull him back from the edge, imo.
ReplyDeleteSmart guns are the silliest idea I've ever heard of. I mean sure it would probably help for an emergency from someone just grabbing your gun away and using it on you right then, but to prevent someone from just taking it back to their hang out and removing the smart chip technology? Yeah that ain't gonna happen. You may as well propose smart see-saws.
ReplyDeleteThe whole "smart gun" thing, as a supposed "solution" to our yearly gun death count to any noticeable degree (if any degree at all), is indeed absurd.
ReplyDeleteBut it's something that Mark has latched onto, because 1) he's already decided ahead of time based on mere personal prejudice that the NRA and anyone else who lacks his own deep-seated fear and loathing of guns is evil and wants people to die, but 2) he needs to come up with some actual reason he can give for calling them evil other than his own inchoate prejudice, without admitting that he wants gun control (even though, mysteriously, he flips his lid at anyone arguing against gun control, and links approvingly to those arguing for it).
And so, since the NRA and most pro-2nd Amendment types are mostly ambivalent about smart guns, he's latched onto "opposition to smart guns" as their mortal sin. It's ridiculous, but his only alternative is to say they're evil for opposing gun control, which would force him to admit that he's in favor of gun control, which would then in turn force him to defend the notion that gun control reduces the murder rate and the notion that there is no natural or Constitutional right to bear arms.
Also, as I've pointed out to him before, the NRA supports smart gun vaults, which already exist and already achieve Mark's stated goal of making sure that nobody other than the authorized user has access to their guns. And they do a better job of it than smart guns, are more secure and reliable, more restrictive to the owner because they make use of biometrics, more affordable, are capable of securing multiple guns, and don't require crippling the gun itself and posing the risk that it won't fire when you need to defend your life with it.
But, of course, that cuts no ice there, because the whole "smart gun" thing is just Mark's bullshit red-herring rationalization for hating gun rights supporters, and not his real reason.
Actually, I've just thought of a rather devious strategy to employ. We should start advocating that the government provide, free of charge, a biometric smart vault to any American citizen that requests one. If anyone from the Markan cohort objects to the idea, we demand to know why they're completely indifferent to 30,000 deaths a year and can't bear any change to "the status quo," and why they think "only the rich should be able to afford gun safety," and insinuate that their souls are in mortal danger of hellfire for it.
ReplyDeleteAnd if they try to counter that a free biometric smart safe in every willing gun owner's home wouldn't diminish the gun death rate, then they reveal their conceit that the mere availability of smart guns would do so to be a complete sham.
It's something Thomas Sowell has said often and a wisdom that I think Shea is going to be very slow to realize (kicking and screaming if he has to).
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/5KHdhrNhh88
That there are no solutions, only trade offs. That we may have to deal with a bit of evil.
I don't know if he'll ever come to that realization or not. The concept of Original Sin is something he should've already been familiar with long ago. Seems like he's moving away from it, and the number of people willing to try and calmly explain it to him while he throws temper tantrums is shrinking. Then again, maybe some time in the liberal echo chamber will cause him to get disillusioned.
ReplyDelete