Originally posted by: Mursilis
Originally posted by: Craig234
Originally posted by: Mursilis
Just a quick question for all the people mourning the loss of their Constitutional rights (and I'm not mocking that loss at all - I'm agreeing it's a loss) - where were you when the gov't was busy establishing policies that made some people more equal than others (affirmative action), or when certain members of Congress (usually Democrats) were attempting to erode 2nd Amendment rights? It's great so many people are looking askance at gov't, but a little consistency would be nice.
Bull.
Affirmative action was about *correcting* some small bit of the wrongs done previously which left some people unfairly at a disadvantage from the legacy effects of earlier discrimination.
Your attempt to try to pretend that everyone starts out equally now and there are no lasting effects and that you are oh so wronged is about as classy as complaining that you didn't get any of that money the 9/11 victim families did, who didn't do anything more than you did to earn it. Centuries of slavery followed by a century of racism left a legacy of some people who are not getting the same opportunities as others because their fathers and grandfathers and great-grandfathers didn't get to get an education and move to a better part of town.
I'm not pretending at all that everyone starts out equal, but there's precious little gov't can do to fix the past, and their solutions have harmed as much as helped (gov't played a huge hand in destroying the black family unit), not to mention reeking of unfairness. If you're going to argue that Constitutional guarantees of equality can be bypassed due to special circumstances, don't complain when Bush & Co. argue the same in undermining the 4th.
Not to overuse the word, but you keep posting things like this, so:
Bull. If you knew jack about affirmative action, you would know that it's applied where there is clear evidence of a group now affected by the legacy effects of previous discrimination.
When you say there's little the government can do to right past wrongs, you're partly right in that they can't begin to right 1% of the past wrongs, but you're wrong if you're implying that the things they can do now are not worth bothering with (you seem to be trying to argue it both ways, that it's not much, but that it's a big issue). The steps that can be done in these situations where there's clear evidence of a group so disadvantaged are quite a lot.
You're typically not arguing coherently as you go off on a rant lumping every government program for pretty much everything from race to poverty into one sweeping condemnation about 'destroying the family unit' and such - you're just spewing, not saying anything reasonable. You don't give a crap, I'd say, about the truth, judging by your posts. If you did, you might have done what I have, and did a little research to see, for example, that LBJ's Great Society programs permanently lowered the poverty rate in the US by a third.
But this isn't about all those programs, and you can hardly make a case that affirmative action to slightly correct past discrimination's remaining effect has hurt the 'black family'.
You are also very confused on the meaning of the equal protection clause.
It does not preclude the government from reasonably differentiating among people based on different circumstances. I shouldn't have to explain all this because you shouldn't be posting crap without learning a thing about what you're posting about, but you did, so here we are. The government has to clearly identify a set of circumstances where people now are suffering lingering discrimination effects. An example might be where they are statistically provably underemployed in an area for reasons that can be shown related to past discrimination's effects. Then they can get limited assistance to help to get things to a slightly less uneven situation - and it's shown again and again to work.
I understand the whole resentment about it and the claim it's 'reverse discrimination'; that was my earlier view as well, until I evolved my own view.
If as you suggest someone tried to do the same thing for unjustified reasons - to give advantage to cute blonde girls, say - that's why we have courts that throw it out.
The government can discriminate *for a good reason*. That's why they spend $100,000 to cure a sick person and they don't spend $100,000 on a healthy person. That's why they have a tax credit for blind people that people with sight don't get. That's why they pay soldiers more who are in combat than those who aren't.
The fact that's the case and your 'equal protection' argument is wrong doesn't mean your slippery slope about Bush and his 'exception' has any legitimacy. It doesn't.
As for the 2nd amendment, there's a little phrase in there called 'well-regulated militia' that you are not following the constitution by ignoring.
You can debate the exact meaning of the amendment, but there's enough variance in interpreting it that current gun laws are not comparable to clear violations of rights.
Here's a hint: the people who passed gun control laws don't need Congress to give them immunity. You can take those laws to court if they were unconstitutional.
Luckily, the Supremes are about to issue a ruling on this issue, and most commentators are expecting it to recognize an individual right, so good-bye to your "militia' non-argument.
My 'militia' non-argument as you call it is both a fact - the phrase is in the second amendment and your post only shows how deluded you are in not wanting it to be there - and the way the Supreme Court has always interpreted the amendment in every ruling in the history of our nation.
You may well be right that our current court with four right-wing radicals may again follow the right-wing political agenda and say otherwise, but that doesn't change my argument.
It would simply mean that the court has said what it's said. The history of our nation to this point doesn't change, and the words are still there in the amendment.
I'm not even saying they can't find some 'individual right', but rather that your implication that all gun control laws are somehow in violation of the 2nd amendment is wrong.
You're the one who is arguing based on the amendment you want rather than the actual words in the constitution, and against the Supreme Court's ruling to date.
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