Arms-bearing Americans are rarely wrong

[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Arms-bearing Americans are rarely wrong

Posted: 2/14/2006 12:37:10 AM EDT

<Article deleted>

Although this British newspaper article was very supportive and admiring of the American attitude to the RKBA, it's democratic principles and the pleasures of hunting, I've deleted it as people feel the need to post abusive comments about it purely because it was written by a British writer...

Posted: 2/14/2006 12:43:27 AM EDT

[#1]

I've lived in Texas all my life, near the big city and out in the hill country, and have yet to see a single sign with a bullet hole in it.

Posted: 2/14/2006 12:44:15 AM EDT

[#2]

haha No one is going to argue with a man that has a gun!

Posted: 2/14/2006 12:51:05 AM EDT

[#3]

They should be very careful what they print over there. People could get the wrong idea that ALL Brits think this way... but then, that's what they WANT us to think, isn't it? It's a form of manipulation, as if their liberal press should influence the way WE think.

Posted: 2/14/2006 1:16:50 AM EDT

[#4]

Dear GB,

Kiss my ass!

Posted: 2/14/2006 1:24:02 AM EDT

[#5]

He almost gets it but not quite.

Posted: 2/14/2006 1:27:42 AM EDT

[#6]

Quoted:
They should be very careful what they print over there. People could get the wrong idea that ALL Brits think this way... but then, that's what they WANT us to think, isn't it? It's a form of manipulation, as if their liberal press should influence the way WE think.

Yep, you got it; reverse psychology.

Posted: 2/14/2006 1:54:42 AM EDT

[#7]

Quoted:
Quoted:
They should be very careful what they print over there. People could get the wrong idea that ALL Brits think this way... but then, that's what they WANT us to think, isn't it? It's a form of manipulation, as if their liberal press should influence the way WE think.

Yep, you got it; reverse psychology.

+1

I don't want to be Brit.
Max

Posted: 2/14/2006 2:25:17 AM EDT

[#8]

And WHY we should give a shit about what the British think?

I know, steadfast Allies and all that, but sometimes they just need to shut up and mind thier own fucking business.

Posted: 2/14/2006 2:37:31 AM EDT

[#9]

At least he got the title right, and he got the main point right - Just having a gun doesn't implicate a person, but breaking the rules or etiquette does. Did I misspell etiquette?

ETA - hey vito, I read it!

Posted: 2/14/2006 2:48:08 AM EDT

[#10]

Quoted:
I've lived in Texas all my life, near the big city and out in the hill country, and have yet to see a single sign with a bullet hole in it.

You have got to be shitting me........, and do us all a favor down here and post a picture of your daily driven vehicle, so we can recognize ya coming down the road. For you obviously don't see anything when your behind the wheel and I for one would prefer to get outta your way.

There was a shooting a few weeks ago at a road intersection and I counted 8 rounds in the stop-sign as the camera scanned the crime scene, right here in SW Houston.

Mike

Posted: 2/14/2006 2:48:24 AM EDT

[#11]

Quoted:
I've lived in Texas all my life, near the big city and out in the hill country, and have yet to see a single sign with a bullet hole in it.

Maybe your DOT is just quicker about replacing the damaged signs than they are around here.I see it all the time.

Posted: 2/14/2006 2:51:51 AM EDT

[#12]

I don't even live in Texas, and I've seen plenty of Texas road signs shot full of holes.

We have that here in Pa too.

Posted: 2/14/2006 2:54:03 AM EDT

[#13]

I live in the same area, and I don't see signs with bullet holes in them. There are a lot of paint ball marks on the PETA signs.

Posted: 2/14/2006 2:56:34 AM EDT

[#14]

Arms-bearing Americans are rarely wrong
By Stephen Robinson
(Filed: 14/02/2006)

If you have never gone hunting in Texas, you may find it odd that the man shot in the face by Vice-President Dick Cheney at the weekend was adjudged to be the guilty party.

Katharine Armstrong, the hostess of the hunting weekend, was clear in her own mind that Harry Whittington, a 78-year-old lawyer now resting comfortably in his hospital bed, was the author of his own misfortune.

On Saturday evening, Harry broke free from a group of friends to retrieve a downed quail, and then - according to Ms Armstrong - strode back without observing the proper southern protocol of noisily announcing himself to the rest of the group.

When another quail was flushed, Mr Cheney, "an excellent, conscientious shot", according to Ms Armstrong, swung to his right, fired, and Harry "got peppered pretty good".

According to the Corpus Christi Caller-Times, Harry is doing fine in hospital, though we do not have his reaction in his own words.

British readers will cluck with disapproval at this breezy exoneration of a former US Defence Secretary for his responsibility in such an ugly outbreak of friendly fire.

The sort of person on this side of the Atlantic who deplores America's "gun culture" will almost certainly despise Mr Cheney's politics, and wish to see him carted off by a Texas sheriff and charged with reckless endangerment. But as one who, during seven years of living in America, occasionally went duck shooting - or huntin', as I learnt to call it - I confess that I loudly cheer the Vice-President's speedy exculpation.

In Britain, the man with the gun is always at fault. Our culture and our law enforcement agencies deplore gun ownership; rural police forces persecute owners, treating them as freaks.

Viscount Whitelaw, a blameless and splendid man, never recovered from a simple error on the moor when his shotgun accidentally discharged, winging a beater and spraying an old friend in the bottom.

It could have happened to anyone, but poor old Willie was forced to give up the sport he loved, such was the tabloids' glee at his misfortune.

Our world-beating Olympic shooters must practise abroad because of the post-Dunblane handgun ban - a ban ignored by gangsters on the streets of our larger cities, whose criminal antics have driven an exponential rise in gun crime since the legislation was passed.

This could never happen in America, where gun ownership is not just constitutionally protected, but is part of a great levelling exercise. In many of the southern states, the first day of the hunting season is a school holiday, so that fathers can take their sons out with rifle, shotgun, and paramilitary fatigues.

Hunting is an affirmation of the frontier spirit of the nation. More, it is a celebration of democratic participation - not, as is the case over here, an exclusive club for social climbers in plus fours.

Pretty much every road sign in Texas, Arkansas and Virginia is peppered with holes, testimony to the relentless zeal of southern men honing their marksmanship skills in the close season.

When I moved to America, I acquired my first and only gun - a pump-action 12-bore, which I kept under the sofa in my Washington home and which I would bring out to appal namby-pamby visitors from England.

It was a beauty. As the man in the gun shop told me, it had an extra large stock so that - in theory - it could double as a paddle as I made my way across the bayou in pursuit of duck or goose.

The first time I was taken duck hunting, my hosts and I chanced on half a dozen ducks paddling genially across a lake. Before I could begin to consider the implications, my comrades had unleashed a volley of covering fire, turning the lake into a cauldron of shot and feather.

When I questioned the protocol of shooting birds that were not actually flying, I was kindly put in my place. They all taste the same, I was informed, especially if you have drunk enough bourbon while feathering them.

In America, you do all the gruesome stuff involving feathers and innards yourself, and you would never even think of handing over the menial work to a gamekeeper or beater.

Americans are amazed to hear of the weird layers of etiquette imposed on the act of shooting your supper in this country. When George Bush Snr, a handy quail hunter in his home terrain of Texas, found himself at one of the stiffer sorts of driven shoots in Europe a few years ago, he fluffed every shot.

He told his hosts that he was thrown because European game birds are driven towards the guns, while Texas quail are shot flying away.

But my guess is that the protocol got to him. Mr Bush was thinking supper, yet knew his hosts were worrying about the angle at which he carried his gun, or the cut of his tweeds, or whether he swung his barrel too much to the left or right, or that he might be regarded - horror of horrors! - as greedy.

No wonder Mr Bush couldn't perform at his best, and no doubt he would have been much happier shooting in Texas, where everything is more relaxed and you don't fear the cold stare of disapproval for having the temerity to pick up a shotgun.

And where it is always wise to remember, to adapt the preferred slogan of America's all-powerful National Rifle Association, that guns do not kill people; vice-presidents do.

neener

Posted: 2/14/2006 3:12:14 AM EDT

[#15]

I thought it was a good article, nice to see a sane man still lives in Britian.

Posted: 2/14/2006 3:33:52 AM EDT

[#16]

Keep in mind folks, the Brits aren't marching in droves denouncing American gun ownership. In fact, many are a bit defiant of the Libtards over there, note the recent fox hunt issues. The Brits Libtard media attempts to poison the minds of other people, even across the pond. I've met one or two Brits that thought guns were appaling but far more that found guns facinating. And they do still build some of the finest sporting shotguns and big game rifles made.

Point I'm making is don't generalize when you're hurling your insults. It's not any more right to do so than it would be for them to call this website a paramilitary den of insurrection.

Thanks Andy for sharing the views of folks on the other side.

Posted: 2/14/2006 3:42:59 AM EDT

[#17]

Vito, the article was well written.
Thanks for the post.

Posted: 2/14/2006 3:52:45 AM EDT

[#18]

Not sure why anyone would have a problem with that article.
And growing up in Nevada (and now in Alaska) I have a hard time finding a sign that hasn't been zeroed.

Posted: 2/14/2006 3:55:17 AM EDT

[#19]

Quoted:
Keep in mind folks, the Brits aren't marching in droves denouncing American gun ownership. In fact, many are a bit defiant of the Libtards over there, note the recent fox hunt issues. The Brits Libtard media attempts to poison the minds of other people, even across the pond. I've met one or two Brits that thought guns were appaling but far more that found guns facinating. And they do still build some of the finest sporting shotguns and big game rifles made.

Point I'm making is don't generalize when you're hurling your insults. It's not any more right to do so than it would be for them to call this website a paramilitary den of insurrection.

Thanks Andy for sharing the views of folks on the other side.

That was pretty much the point I was trying to make in my reply. Remember that it's just an ARTICLE, not a press statement. And, yes, he does make some good points, but his tone gives him away. They have theirs, just as we have ours (libtards, that is).

BTW, my wife is British. She LOVES her Dissipator, and is a Team Member here.
Cheers...

Posted: 2/14/2006 4:27:08 AM EDT

[#20]

Quoted:
<Article deleted>

Although this British newspaper article was very supportive and admiring of the American attitude to the RKBA, it's democratic principles and the pleasures of hunting, I've deleted it as people feel the need to post abusive comments about it purely because it was wriiten by a British writer...

Thanks for the article (I read the cut & paste version). I didn't see anything wrong with it - generally positive overall.

And the thing about the signs is true in rural Minnesota - I don't think I've been to a WMA, state forest, or country road where I didn't see a sign with at least a few dings from a .22 or shotgun pellet....sometimes something much bigger. I do know of people who think nothing of plinking the stop sign at the section corner, or who "verify their sights" prior to hunting by shooting at the WMA signs. Is it everyone doing it? No, of course not, and I would add that in my experience it is "hunters" and not "gun lovers". But it is certainly someone with a gun which makes us all look bad.

Posted: 2/14/2006 4:28:08 AM EDT

[#21]

Quoted:
Quoted:
Keep in mind folks, the Brits aren't marching in droves denouncing American gun ownership. In fact, many are a bit defiant of the Libtards over there, note the recent fox hunt issues. The Brits Libtard media attempts to poison the minds of other people, even across the pond. I've met one or two Brits that thought guns were appaling but far more that found guns facinating. And they do still build some of the finest sporting shotguns and big game rifles made.

Point I'm making is don't generalize when you're hurling your insults. It's not any more right to do so than it would be for them to call this website a paramilitary den of insurrection.

Thanks Andy for sharing the views of folks on the other side.

That was pretty much the point I was trying to make in my reply. Remember that it's just an ARTICLE, not a press statement. And, yes, he does make some good points, but his tone gives him away. They have theirs, just as we have ours (libtards, that is).

BTW, my wife is British. She LOVES her Dissipator, and is a Team Member here.
Cheers...

So run this pass me again, he’s a libtard because;

He wrote the lead OpEd article in one of Britains most respected and right wing newspapers...

He wishes all the best for Vice President Cheney...

He criticizes gun grabbers who blame ‘guns’....

He criticizes those that obstruct and hinder gun ownership in the UK...

He critisizes the media for hounding a senior British politician who had a similar shooting accident...

He praises the Constitutional protection of firearms ownership in the USA...

He praises the way that schools make the first day of the hunting season a holiday so fathers can take their sons hunting with them...

He praises the way hunting is seen as a celebration of the frontier spirit and democracy...

As soon as he moved to the US he bought himself a pump action shotgun - and kept it to hand in his home....

He praises the down to earth attitude to hunting in the USA...

And he praises the way that possession of a shotgun in Texas is a good thing unlike over here...

Yep, he’s clearly an anti gun ‘libtard’...

Posted: 2/14/2006 4:29:27 AM EDT

[#22]

Quoted:
I've lived in Texas all my life, near the big city and out in the hill country, and have yet to see a single sign with a bullet hole in it.

Plenty around here. I got a pic of one down near Homestead thats a cheeze grater.

Posted: 2/14/2006 4:35:21 AM EDT

[#23]

Quoted:
<Article deleted>

Although this British newspaper article was very supportive and admiring of the American attitude to the RKBA, it's democratic principles and the pleasures of hunting, I've deleted it as people feel the need to post abusive comments about it purely because it was wriiten by a British writer...

Luckily someone quoted it so I could read it. Appears those who felt need to insult didn't read it through first. It was spot-on writing, no matter who authored it.

Posted: 2/14/2006 4:38:00 AM EDT

[#24]

I thought it was a decent article. Hopefully it might help the Brits out.

Posted: 2/14/2006 4:58:35 AM EDT

[#25]

Vito... I re-read the article (thanks to Mauser), and I suppose I failed to see the subtle sarcasm in the statement:

"And where it is always wise to remember, to adapt the preferred slogan of America's all-powerful National Rifle Association, that guns do not kill people; vice-presidents do."

My "tone" statement was influenced by that closing statement. I see it now... I admit that I misread it, or misinterpreted it!

HOWEVER, my original point remains. I was trying to say NOT to class all Brits as anti-gun libtards, as the article stated:

The sort of person on this side of the Atlantic who deplores America's "gun culture" will almost certainly despise Mr Cheney's politics, and wish to see him carted off by a Texas sheriff and charged with reckless endangerment.

and

In Britain, the man with the gun is always at fault. Our culture and our law enforcement agencies deplore gun ownership; rural police forces persecute owners, treating them as freaks.

and

When I moved to America, I acquired my first and only gun - a pump-action 12-bore, which I kept under the sofa in my Washington home and which I would bring out to appal namby-pamby visitors from England.

What I was trying to say was that not ALL Brits are like the above-highlighted examples. But you aren't a Brit, are you? You're "over the water," right? Plenty of gun-toting thugs where you are, right?

Sorry to be unclear. Good article, too, I might add. And, yes, I took it wrong the first time I read it.

I guess that makes me one of those rare cases where an armed American is wrong.

Posted: 2/14/2006 5:18:20 AM EDT

[#26]

Damn...some of you will argue and criticize anything...

I personally thought it was a well written article. Hell, I'd be happy to see that exact same thing written by an American and published in my own local news paper.

Props to him.

Posted: 2/14/2006 8:54:24 PM EDT

[#27]

If the Stephen Robinson article that Mauser posted is the same one that Vito posted-and-deleted, I don't see where you guys think it's a postive article in the slightest. The writer's tone makes it seem obvious to me that he is being snide and anti-gun, not to mention anti-hunting. Blowing away ducks on the water, shooting up signs, and blaming the lawyer for getting in the way of the shot pattern? None of these are a part of responsible hunting or shooting, at least as far as I was ever taught. And I haven't heard anyone claim that the lawyer (Whittington) was "at fault" for being shot -- every article I've seen has made it quite clear that while it would have been nice for him to announce his return, Cheney was clearly at fault for firing without being certain no one was downrange.

So the guy claims he bought a shotgun and took it out to scare his British visitors -- big deal, plenty of anti's own a gun or two. A Microsoft exec who was pushing for I-676 (a Brady Bunch wet dream handgun licensing initiative in WA) wrote a long op-ed about how he'd illegally purchased a handgun for home defense but how registration and mandatory training would be great. Then there was that Million Mom March idiot who shot and paralyzed a kid whom she thought had attacked her son -- oops, turned out she shot the wrong kid.

Posted: 2/14/2006 9:14:00 PM EDT

[#28]

Quoted:
Vito, the article was well written.
Thanks for the post.

+1
Some slight issues with it, but still, a good article.
The guy gets it.

Posted: 2/14/2006 9:59:06 PM EDT

[#29]

That was a very good article. The author's tongue-in-cheek comment at the end is not sarcasm, folks, just a little joke.

Clearly, the author knows how things really are, and does a good job explaning that to folks who otherwise wouldn't get a balanced view.

-Troy

Posted: 2/14/2006 10:02:56 PM EDT

[#30]

Quoted:
I've lived in Texas all my life, near the big city and out in the hill country, and have yet to see a single sign with a bullet hole in it.

You're joking right? Might think about getting an eye exam

. I grew up in TX and signs with bullet holes in them were VERY common. Dad always commented on how stupid it was because many of them obviously had no backstop for miles...

Thought it was a good article myself...

Posted: 2/14/2006 11:04:56 PM EDT

[#31]

Some of you guys amaze me.... even when someone steps up and supports gun ownership you shit on them just 'because'...

I suppose you will want to shit on the Telegraph for todays OpEd piece too?

No more complacency: kill this gun culture
(Filed: 15/02/2006)

The shooting in Nottingham of a probationary woman police officer, Rachael Bown, reinforces the impression of a loss of control by the authorities over illegal handguns.

Her wounding comes just three months after the murder of another policewoman, Sharon Beshenivsky, during a robbery in Bradford.

The irony of the epidemic of gun crime in Britain is that it comes at a time when those who legally hold firearms are more policed and regulated than ever before.

The heavy-handed approach many police forces take towards licensed owners contrasts with the increasing, and lethal, incidence of unlicensed ones.

Before the shooting of police officers becomes any more habitual than it already is, the Government needs urgently to consider what might best be done to tackle the problem at source.

Many of the illegal weapons in this country come from eastern Europe. Tough airport security means they enter the country through seaports or the Channel Tunnel, smuggled in via the boots of cars, the backs of vans and hidden in lorries.

Customs officers have boasted various triumphs in preventing the illegal importation of alcohol for re-sale. They have clearly been less successful with guns, and might like to reconsider their search procedures.

There seems to be a basic failure of intelligence on the part of the police about the black market in these guns. That needs to be rectified, whether by good, old-fashioned policing, or by officers going undercover in inner-city areas where the trade is rife. Above all, though, the punishment for possessing an illegal firearm - irrespective of whether it is used - needs to be severe.

The offence carries a maximum sentence of 10 years. It is rarely applied. That must change if society is to be protected.

The police have finite resources. It might be as well if officers spent less time checking up on licensed gun owners and channelled resources instead into catching unlicensed ones.

Every time an officer is shot the argument starts up about whether police should be armed. There is a respectable case to be made for this, but not yet a convincing one. Paradoxically, arming the police might make them more rather than less vulnerable.

An armed criminal confronted by an armed police officer is more likely to kill, before he is killed.

The de Menezes shooting last July, like that seven years ago of a man armed only with a table leg, shows that even highly trained officers can make awful mistakes.

Arming the police must be the very last resort. Stiffer punishments, ending official complacency about the rise in gun crime, and using all means to take the gun out of society must be tried thoroughly first.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2006/02/15/dl1501.xml&sSheet=/opinion/2006/02/15/ixopinion.html

Posted: 2/14/2006 11:07:29 PM EDT

[#32]

Quoted:
I've lived in Texas all my life, near the big city and out in the hill country, and have yet to see a single sign with a bullet hole in it.

that is one thing that bother me more than anything else. hunters complain about land being posted, i cant blame landowners for not wanting these assmonkeys on their land.

Posted: 2/14/2006 11:21:05 PM EDT

[#33]

Good post Vito, I don't care what anyone says about the British. While most of the rest of the world is complaining about out war on terror, the British are over there with us.

[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Arms-bearing Americans are rarely wrong

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