Ah yes, I remember it well. As I said to George at the time, you can't win 'em all, old chap.
That was not the argument you put forward in the post to which I responded. You were not asserting that guns supported revolution: quite the contrary.
Jeremy
Jeremy, it never is. That's the nature of the beast.
Funny reading remarks about the Brits and the States-as-were at that time; you could easily make the mistake of believing that the Americans (white) were the natural inhabitants, first-owners of the USA-to-be! Not a mention of the smothered Indian tribes, not a peep of the inflow of all manner of
different European outcast, exploiter, adventurer who was either banished there, went there to seek his fortune. Somehow, there is this mythical land and race of indigenous, supreme whites that was invaded by England at some stage, an England then repelled and sent packing back across the Atlantic. Who, then, were the people who remained post WOI? Or the ones who just moved over to the Bahamas etc. post Civil War?
Like most of history, it assumes a rosy glow of righteousness on all sides, when reality is really never simple and always stained with guilt, remose and a thick coating of lies that tries to make it all palatable.
Why do successive US and UK governments always allude to some "special relationship"? Basically, I think they both feel a bit unsure about it, but know that it perhaps comes down to the common language (which is common not by accident)) and that like it or not, old roots run deep. I suppose it's why parts of Canada and Louisiana still cling to French... it offers the imaginary glamour of something "extraordinary", much as any other special ability might do; in other words, they don't feel themseves to be
only anglophones, but something a grade higher up the pole of life and comparative standing.
"
I think part of the disconnect between Europeans and Americans on this issue is that Europe was ruled so long in the past by monarchs, Czars, and other tyrants. So there's a history of leaving power with the government. That's not so with America. Most Americans wanted their own political power and not be controlled by the English tyrant King Geroge III any more than current Brits want to be controlled by those nosey bureaucratic gnomes in Brussels. Americans who are not brain washed by the Liberal press see their guns as the instrument of their freedom and are not willing to give them up." ....... Alan
Power was given to government precisely
to remove it from the favour and gift of monarch. And by the way, what a broad brush you use to paint monarchy!
Your local problem is that you can't even trust your elected governments because you can all see just how indebted its officers are to different power group interests. The concept of altruistic governance, i.e. for the greater good, no longer exists.
Sadly, that is something that has spread almost everywhere else, too, if not quite in so obvious a manner, and whether the US changes its Constitution or not, the result will still be as the brokers decide it will be, laws or no laws.
In truth, all your much vaunted freedoms are largely illusory for the simple reason so often overlooked: one's freedom, as in total, will always impinge upon that of somebody else with a different agenda. The sensible solution is to limit freedoms to the level that those remaining affect the safety of nobody else. A good place to start would be guns. Of course you can't agree: that would shatter your illusions of total freedom, including that of killing anybody who crosses your path, should the idea alight between your ears some sunny morning as you are on your way to work or even, perhaps, to school.
