# Someone pls explain why Democrats don't want ICE contacted if illegal aliens attempt to buy guns



## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

https://www.floridadaily.com/democr...-ice-when-illegal-immigrants-try-to-buy-guns/

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/de...gal-immigrants-fail-firearm-background-checks


The news articles are rather focused on the illegal alien issue, but actually the amendment was not just to contact ICE when an illegal alien attempted to buy a gun, but to contact law enforcement when _any_ background check was rejected. 

Attempting to purchase a gun when you're prohibited by law or by submitting a false 4473 form to a federally licensed firearms dealer (FFL) is a crime, so law enforcement should be alerted, right? Well, Democrats in the House Judiciary Committee voted to kill that amendment to their "Bipartisan Background Checks Act." 

Do they really want their gun control legislation to result in catching criminals, or do they just want control over everyone else? 

Also, why hasn't CNN, CBS, NBC, ABC, etc reported this story? It _is_ newsworthy, isn't it???


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## RaptorDMG (Feb 20, 2019)

I agree that police should be notified when someone tries to buy a gun when they're not allowed although I still don't get why Americans need to have guns in the first place


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## Lacius (Feb 20, 2019)

Why would Democrats approve a poison pill measure that does nothing to reduce gun violence?

This is a nonstory that only exists to rile up one's right-wing uncle.


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

Lacius said:


> Why would Democrats approve a poison pill measure that does nothing to reduce gun violence?
> 
> This is a nonstory that only exists to rile up one's right-wing uncle.




Law enforcement notification in the event of a crime is a poison pill? Poison to which party?

Also, does nothing to reduce gun violence? Why wouldn't incarcerating people who make illegal attempts to buy guns reduce gun violence?


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## RaptorDMG (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> Law enforcement notification in the event of a crime is a poison pill? Poison to which party?
> 
> Also, does nothing to reduce gun violence? Why wouldn't incarcerating people who make illegal attempts to buy guns reduce gun violence?


If they know they can't legally get a gun they'd likely turn to illegal means instead


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

RaptorDMG said:


> If they know they can't legally get a gun they'd likely turn to illegal means instead



It's already a crime for a convicted felon, domestic violence offenders, addicts, and persons adjudicated mentally ill to attempt to purchase or to possess firearms or ammunition. Likewise if a person lies about any of these things while attempting to purchase. Problem is, when the background check fails, they can just walk out of the shop. There's no means of enforcement in the current law.


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## Lacius (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> Law enforcement notification in the event of a crime is a poison pill? Poison to which party?
> 
> Also, does nothing to reduce gun violence? Why wouldn't incarcerating people who make illegal attempts to buy guns reduce gun violence?


ICE and deportations don't have anything to do with keeping guns out of the hands of people who shouldn't have them. It's not complicated.

It's an anti-immigrant measure, not an anti-gun violence measure.


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## RaptorDMG (Feb 20, 2019)

Lacius said:


> ICE and deportations don't have anything to do with keeping guns out of the hands of people who shouldn't have them. It's not complicated.
> 
> It's an anti-immigrant measure, not an anti-gun violence measure.


If they are an illegal immigrant and are found out by law enforcement they should be sent back otherwise what's the point in having a legal process to become a citizen in the first place


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## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> It's already a crime for a convicted felon, domestic violence offenders, addicts, and persons adjudicated mentally ill to attempt to purchase or to possess firearms or ammunition. Likewise if a person lies about any of these things while attempting to purchase. Problem is, when the background check fails, they can just walk out of the shop. There's no means of enforcement in the current law.


They try to buy a gun. They volunteer for background check. They get denied based on background check. They don't buy gun. Where had the law been broken? Why do we need to augment authoritarian powers like noncrime reporting?


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## Lacius (Feb 20, 2019)

RaptorDMG said:


> If they are an illegal immigrant and are found out by law enforcement they should be sent back otherwise what's the point in having a legal process to become a citizen in the first place


We barely have a legal immigration system, and don't act like Trump wants it to exist either.

Also, regardless of how one feels about it, it's controversial and a poison pill. Nobody should act indignant about this.


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

Lacius said:


> ICE and deportations don't have anything to do with keeping guns out of the hands of people who shouldn't have them. It's not complicated.



No, it's not complicated. They're committing a felony. So deport them. If they're legal residents/citizens, prosecute them.

Unfortunately, this particular crime is committed over 100,000 times a year with few consequences.



https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...-during-background-checks-charged/1213216002/




IncredulousP said:


> They try to buy a gun. They volunteer for background check. They get denied based on background check. They don't buy gun. Where had the law been broken? Why do we need to augment authoritarian powers like noncrime reporting?



Attempting to purchase a gun when you're a 'prohibited person' by providing false info is a crime. Legal residents can purchase firearms, but illegal/undocumented cannot.


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## blahblah (Feb 20, 2019)

Take this right wing dreck to another site.


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## Lacius (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> No, it's not complicated. They're committing a felony. So deport them. If they're legal residents/citizens, prosecute them.
> 
> Unfortunately, this particular crime is committed over 100,000 times a year with few consequences.
> 
> ...


I love that whenever we have a conversation, you refuse to acknowledged or concede the points I make. This measure doesn't affect gun safety, regardless of how you feel about immigration. See above where I also tell you not to act indignant. It's controversial, which alone makes it a poison pill.

In addition, this can arguably include people who simply fail a background check, and a person shouldn't be deported for that, IMO.


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## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

And yet most Mass shooters are white legal residents.


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

Lacius said:


> I love that whenever we have a conversation, you refuse to acknowledged or concede the points I make. This measure doesn't affect gun safety, regardless of how you feel about immigration. See above where I also tell you not to act indignant. It's controversial, which alone makes it a poison pill.




The immigration angle is the media's spin on this. The amendment is to require FFL's to notify law enforcement when the crime occurs. Doesn't matter whether it's a citizen, legal resident, or illegal. If they're prohibited and they attempt to purchase, it's a crime. It occurs over 100,000 times a year, little is done about it. You think prosecuting those people - people who lie in a attempt to buy a gun, knowing they're not allowed - would have no effect on gun crime?? Then why bother with a 'Background Check" law in the first place?


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## Lacius (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> The immigration angle is the media's spin on this. The amendment is to require FFL's to notify law enforcement when the crime occurs. Doesn't matter whether it's a citizen, legal resident, or illegal. If they're prohibited and they attempt to purchase, it's a crime. It occurs over 100,000 times a year, little is done about it. You think prosecuting those people - people who lie in a attempt to buy a gun, knowing they're not allowed - would have no effect on gun crime?? Then why bother with a 'Background Check" law in the first place?


Immigration is the reason for the amendment. Don't be disingenuous.


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

Tigran said:


> And yet most Mass shooters are white legal residents.




You're pretty well off-topic, but the demographics of 'mass shooters' isn't that different from the population distribution*, i.e. about 70% of the USA population is caucasian, so it follows that the majority of 'mass shooters' would also be caucasian. Almost all murderers in Japan are Japanese. "Mass shooters" account for a very small percentage of gun deaths, anyway. Want to talk about the demographics for gun crime generally? Make a thread.


https://www.statista.com/statistics/476456/mass-shootings-in-the-us-by-shooter-s-race/


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## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

I think it fits perfectly well in this thread, your opinion that it doesn't is actually not relevant. If a mod thinks it does not belong, THEN it is relevant, or if other people ignore my opinion then it's irrelevant. But your opinion matters not.


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

blahblah said:


> Take this right wing dreck to another site.



Nice argument.



Lacius said:


> Immigration is the reason for the amendment. Don't be disingenuous.



I don't have any information that says that, and neither do you. It's just your assumption. But even if so, so what? It isn't going to specifically target illegals, the majority of times this offense is committed it's a convicted felon or person with a domestic violence conviction who lies by saying their record is clean.


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## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

RaptorDMG said:


> I agree that police should be notified when someone tries to buy a gun when they're not allowed although I still don't get why Americans need to have guns in the first place


We have guns to protect ourselves from criminals and a tyrannical government.


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## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> We have guns to protect ourselves from criminals and a tyrannical government.



Then why hasn't someone used it on the police, ice and Trump yet?


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## Lacius (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> You're pretty well off-topic, but the demographics of 'mass shooters' isn't that different from the population distribution*, i.e. about 70% of the USA population is caucasian, so it follows that the majority of 'mass shooters' would also be caucasian. Almost all murderers in Japan are Japanese. "Mass shooters" account for a very small percentage of gun deaths, anyway. Want to talk about the demographics for gun crime generally? Make a thread.
> 
> 
> https://www.statista.com/statistics/476456/mass-shootings-in-the-us-by-shooter-s-race/


It should be noted that legal residents are more likely to commit violent crime than illegal residents.



Hanafuda said:


> Nice argument.
> 
> 
> 
> I don't have any information that says that, and neither do you. It's just your assumption. But even if so, so what? It isn't going to specifically target illegals, the majority of times this offense is committed it's a convicted felon or person with a domestic violence conviction who lies by saying their record is clean.


The amendment specifically lists ICE, even though it didn't have to. ICE = immigration.

Edit: You can also look at how this is being reported, if you're not convinced this amendment is about immigration.


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## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

Tigran said:


> Then why hasn't someone used it on the police, ice and Trump yet?


In what way should someone use a gun against them?


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

Lacius said:


> The amendment specifically lists ICE, even though it didn't have to. ICE = immigration.




So, ICE shouldn't be notified when an illegal/undocumented person commits a crime? Ok.


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## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

You figure it out. You said it was for Tyrannical government.


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## Lacius (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> So, ICE shouldn't be notified when an illegal/undocumented person commits a crime? Ok.


I'd go a step further and say ICE should be abolished, but I'm glad we agree.


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## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

lol 
youre still asking about why democrats do the things they do?
you should know better


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## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

Tigran said:


> You figure it out. You said it was for Tyrannical government.


The militia will act when they feel it is appropriate.


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## RaptorDMG (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> We have guns to protect ourselves from criminals and a tyrannical government.


Well if guns were illegal it would be harder to obtain them for criminals and they would be in lower numbers and the arguement about fighting the government is pointless as it relies 100% with the military being on your side afterall 100k people with guns vs 100's tanks, airforce etc would likely be a one sided fight


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

Tigran said:


> Then why hasn't someone used it on the police, ice and Trump yet?



There's an old saying, "When you just can't take the tyranny anymore and run out your front door, rifle in hand and ready for the revolution ... if none of your neighbors are there and also ready for war, go back inside."


So when that guy shot a bunch of cops dead in Dallas a few years ago (a black mass shooter, btw @Tigran) ... that was premature.


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## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> The militia will act when they feel it is appropriate.



except, the militia, which at the moment is part of the older generation, and they aren't aware of the psyops that go on and the bio manipulation that is happening.

we should of moved decades ago...


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## erikas (Feb 20, 2019)

There is no worse law, than a law that stops you from protecting yourself.


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## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> who lies by saying their record is clean.


This is the illegal part. Let me get this straight, you are advocating that ALL failed background checks be reported, falsified or not? Or just ones where the applicant lied (which is a crime)? As I understand, it's not illegal to simply fail a background check, so why report it if the applicant was completely truthful?


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## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

RaptorDMG said:


> Well if guns were illegal it would be harder to obtain them for criminals and they would be in lower numbers and the arguement about fighting the government is pointless as it relies 100% with the military being on your side afterall 100k people with guns vs 100's tanks, airforce etc would likely be a one sided fight


No. People who obey the law should be able to use their guns as a way to protect themselves from those who don't. If guns were banned it wouldn't stop criminals from using them. The United States defeated Britain and we had a huge disadvantage.


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## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

I didn't claim Blacks never mass shoot. I never claimed blacks, or undocumented aliens didn't commit crimes. But false equivalence is getting very old.

I also find it funny that people are whining about this, when most gun advocates don't even want universal background checks to begin with.


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## Clydefrosch (Feb 20, 2019)

Why do you guys always have to bring your political bs into my videogame forums?

And why do you guys always insist that the anti-migrant parties law proposals aren't at all in pursuit of their anti-migrant agenda?


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## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> No. People who obey the law should be able to use their guns as a way to protect themselves from those who don't. If guns were banned it wouldn't stop criminals from using them. The United States defeated Britain and we had a huge disadvantage.



I'd also like to remind you that the Boston Tea party was nothing in reality but a cowardice act of terrorism.


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## Clydefrosch (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> No. People who obey the law should be able to use their guns as a way to protect themselves from those who don't. If guns were banned it wouldn't stop criminals from using them. The United States defeated Britain and we had a huge disadvantage.


and one huge advantage. you didn't need to ship your way into the fucking landmass first.


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> This is the illegal part. Let me get this straight, you are advocating that ALL failed background checks be reported, falsified or not? Or just ones where the applicant lied (which is a crime)? As I understand, it's not illegal to simply fail a background check, so why report it if the applicant was completely truthful?



Have you ever purchased a firearm from an FFL and completed the 4473? You cannot attempt to make the purchase without turning in a completed 4473. You cannot complete the 4473 without representing that you are legally eligible and not prohibited from purchasing. The background check is not run until you complete the form and all your answers say you are good to buy.


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## mstephens1984 (Feb 20, 2019)

The response of a 4473 background check only says pass or denied. There is now way to know now will there ever be for the employee running the check to see what particular issue, and I say issue because it can be an issue and nothing more. Further more, a valid state Id is required to run the 4473, of which the state government of that area felt it was worth issuing to the said individuals. The firearms store employee has no way to know if a crime has been committed, nor any onus to report on an event that is not considered a crime.


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## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

no, i dont care what you say, we are not taking away or banning guns.
i dont care if u say, well so this person dies, and that one dies, ok, take away the nations guns!! and if you dont, you support murder and nazis and rapists and johnson and johnson ... AND....AND..... 

it doesnt matter.
look people.

if you take away guns from law-abiding citizens, criminals can still acquire guns.
i remember buying guns in a walmart parking lot.
ak47 mini draco
glock 22, 29, 17
FAL 308 battle rifle...

you will never get rid of guns. 
just because a tard shoots a tard, or non tard,
doesnt mean it should be harder for me to defend myself, or completely take away the ability to defend myself,
because that bad guy is still going to have a gun, while me, my wife, and my kids have nothing but a flyswatter or a rolled up newspaper.
you liberals are the dumbest, lowest, dumbest people on this earth.

infraction incoming....


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## RaptorDMG (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> No. People who obey the law should be able to use their guns as a way to protect themselves from those who don't. If guns were banned it wouldn't stop criminals from using them. The United States defeated Britain and we had a huge disadvantage.


It wouldn't stop them from being used but they would be much less common among criminals and your point about the US vs Britain highlights the fact that war has changed since then, in the past it was about the numbers of troops you could bring to bear whereas now it is more about which side is better prepared


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## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

Tigran said:


> I'd also like to remind you that the Boston Tea party was nothing in reality but a cowardice act of terrorism.


You have a right to your own opinion.



Clydefrosch said:


> and one huge advantage. you didn't need to ship your way into the fucking landmass first.


U mad?


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## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> You have a right to your own opinion.



That's not opinion. If some undocumented immigrants did something like today... you'd be screaming it's terrorism. Besides, one could argue that the original colonists didn't come legally.


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## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> no, i dont care what you say, we are not taking away or banning guns.
> i dont care if u say, well so this person dies, and that one dies, ok, take away the nations guns!! and if you dont, you support murder and nazis and rapists and johnson and johnson ... AND....AND.....
> 
> it doesnt matter.
> ...


This post is a giant oof of irony.


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## Clydefrosch (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> No. People who obey the law should be able to use their guns as a way to protect themselves from those who don't. If guns were banned it wouldn't stop criminals from using them. The United States defeated Britain and we had a huge disadvantage.


long term, of course it would.
criminals get rid of their guns after use or lose them once caught, they're a literal finite ressource once you stop giving them out like tic tacs.
an they're already quite pricy on the black market. at some point, the majority of criminals wouldn't be able to afford them anymore either.

also, if you own a gun in case of say armed robbery or even the very uncommon home invasion, you are very likely not getting out of this alive, they don't make you safer. so that argument is crap.

taking guns from idiots that need a blankie to feel safe at night also instantly removes the no.1 source for soon to be illegal guns on the market.


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## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

RaptorDMG said:


> It wouldn't stop them from being used but they would be much less common among criminals and your point about the US vs Britain highlights the fact that war has changed since then, in the past it was about the numbers of troops you could bring to bear whereas now it is more about which side is better prepared


It doesn't matter. We have our guns to protect and hunt for ourselves and there is nothing wrong with that and it doesn't matter if you are disadvantaged or not because you're doing it for your freedom.



Tigran said:


> That's not opinion. If some undocumented immigrants did something like today... you'd be screaming it's terrorism. Besides, one could argue that the original colonists didn't come legally.


I would say that about anybody and not just immigrants. We came here and either bought land or fought for it.


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## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> We came here and either bought land or fought for it.



Ahh yes.. Bio-terrorism.. Such a great way to fight for our land....


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

mstephens1984 said:


> The response of a 4473 background check only says pass or denied. There is now way to know now will there ever be for the employee running the check to see what particular issue, and I say issue because it can be an issue and nothing more. Further more, a valid state Id is required to run the 4473, of which the state government of that area felt it was worth issuing to the said individuals. The firearms store employee has no way to know if a crime has been committed, nor any onus to report on an event that is not considered a crime.




But as I said before, the background check doesn't run unless the buyer has made all the necessary representations on the 4473 that he/she is eligible/legal to buy. But you're correct that the FFL wouldn't know, as the system runs now, why the background check failed. Lacius asserted earlier that the amendment that was voted down was targeting illegal immigration specifically, but the FFL wouldn't know why he was referring the failed check to law enforcement, only that he was legally obliged to. There is no law right now that requires FFL's to make that referral, so in most states it doesn't happen. If you read the USAToday link I posted above, Pennsylvania is one state where failed checks do get referred. In 2017 the FFL's in Pennsylvania made 1,900 referral ... 470 resulted in convictions. That's some pretty strong numbers to show this would not be frivolous or unwarranted.


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## Clydefrosch (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> You have a right to your own opinion.
> 
> 
> U mad?


I'm not a brit?
I'm just saying america 'freeing itself from little uks rule' wasn't exactly... hard, if you take into account literally any circumstances.


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## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

Clydefrosch said:


> long term, of course it would.
> criminals get rid of their guns after use or lose them once caught, they're a literal finite ressource once you stop giving them out like tic tacs.
> an they're already quite pricy on the black market. at some point, the majority of criminals wouldn't be able to afford them anymore either.
> 
> ...


What a crock of shit and it protects people all the time. Say that next time when someone breaks into your home and you wish you had something to protect yourself with.



Tigran said:


> Ahh yes.. Bio-terrorism.. Such a great way to fight for our land....


All people fought for land at one point or another. Such is life.


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## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

Clydefrosch said:


> I'm not a brit?
> I'm just saying america 'freeing itself from little uks rule' wasn't exactly... hard, if you take into account literally any circumstances.


Well, from what I understand, US had no chance in hell without the French backing them, and the US never even held up it's end of the bargain for the assistance.


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## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> What a crock of shit and it protects people all the time. Say that next time when someone breaks into your home and you wish you had something to protect yourself with.
> 
> 
> All people fought for land at one point or another. Such is life.



And yet.. Just going by your posts here in this thread... seems to indicate you'd have no problem with the government just -taking- people's land they supposedly fought for.


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> Well, from what I understand, US had no chance in hell without the French backing them, and the US never even held up it's end of the bargain for the assistance.




We made up for that in 1944.


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## RaptorDMG (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> What a crock of shit and it protects people all the time. Say that next time when someone breaks into your home and you wish you had something to protect yourself with.
> 
> 
> All people fought for land at one point or another. Such is life.


If someone breaks into my home I have a knife and baseball bat to defend myself. Guns don't work to well in close quarters.


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## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> We made up for that in 1944.


Ha, we were hardly the ones solely responsible. Don't forget the Canadians and the British. And the loads of illegal immigrants as well.
Additionally, US only entered because Japan bombed Hawaii and Germany declared war on US. US didn't give half a shit about France unless it was buying US merch.


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## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

Tigran said:


> And yet.. Just going by your posts here in this thread... seems to indicate you'd have no problem with the government just -taking- people's land they supposedly fought for.


I have a huge problem with a tyrannical government taking other peoples land.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------



RaptorDMG said:


> If someone breaks into my home I have a knife and baseball bat to defend myself. Guns don't work to well in close quarters.


Really? I thought shotguns were pretty good at that...


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## RaptorDMG (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> I have a huge problem with a tyrannical government taking other peoples land.
> 
> --------------------- MERGED ---------------------------
> 
> ...


Shotguns are also generally quite long and hard to manouvre in a narror hallway and if I can use the layout of the house to my advantage I could get a hit in and potentially disarm or incapacitate my opponent


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## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

RaptorDMG said:


> Shotguns are also generally quite long and hard to manouvre in a narror hallway and if I can use the layout of the house to my advantage I could get a hit in and potentially disarm or incapacitate my opponent


You can use that example with a lot of things and a gun is a lot more effective at stopping someone. The last thing I'm saying about this is that I have a right to use my guns to defend my family, friends, and innocent people from criminals or a tyrannical government. If you or others don't think so... I disagree with your view but I respect it. A free people shall never give their right away to defend themselves from people whom wish to harm us.


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## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> This post is a giant oof of irony.



Where? im not a criminal, but i still buy guns from private parties, just incase the tards do pull through and a gun buyback is set in place. 
ill be up there in the attic with ann frank.

look.
most of these people here spouting liberal views are younger adults that have no real grasp of reality or the world.
they are scared. they watch tv too much.
'they see a shooting on tv, and then all the sad music, and the shootings keep happening, then the hive mind gets together and crys out to have the guns taken away.
you people are kids.
im sorry, but guns arent the issue, theyve been around for over a thousand years, and wont go away.
it is the people that are the problem.
and theres always going to be those people in the cesspool.
look, if i wanted to, 
if guns were banned, 
go around and stab 20 people in a club.
trust me, i move fast.
or i could use another weapon, or i could use my bare hands.
thats the point!!
all liberals want is more control and more control and less rights for us,
its sad to say, but they attain this through shady means.
example.
create 10 mass shootings and prey on the publics garnered/farmed reaction to get the support they need to enact a ban or takeback
they do this with other things as well,
not just guns and mass shootings.

quit watching cnn and fox people.
use your common sense.
everyone was fine in the wild west... lol


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## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> Ha, we were hardly the ones solely responsible. Don't forget the Canadians and the British. And the loads of illegal immigrants as well.
> Additionally, US only entered because Japan bombed Hawaii and Germany declared war on US. US didn't give half a shit about France unless it was buying US merch.



Wow I strongly disagree there. We were giving so much military equipment to the Brits and Russians to fight the Nazis it boggles the mind*. We were definitely getting into the war and definitely getting into the Euro theater, Roosevelt just needed an event.

*We gave Russia almost 400,000 large trucks! Plus 14,000 airplanes, 44,000 jeeps, 8,000 tractors, 13,000 tanks, etc. And I don't have numbers like that for the amount of material given to the British, but I do know it was three times as much as we gave to Russia.


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## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> You can use that example with a lot of things and a gun is a lot more effective at stopping someone. The last thing I'm saying about this is that I have a right to use my guns to defend my family, friends, and innocent people from criminals or a tyrannical government. If you or others don't think so... I disagree with your view but I respect it. A free people shall never give their right away to defend themselves from people whom wish to harm us.


If a non-lethal weapon was invented that was just as effective at protection, would you still advocate for gun ownership?


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## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> I have a huge problem with a tyrannical government taking other peoples land.



yet we took our land by deception, murder, lies.
hmm


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## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> Wow I strongly disagree there. We were giving so much military equipment to the Brits and Russians to fight the Nazis it boggles the mind*. We were definitely getting into the war and definitely getting into the Euro theater, Roosevelt just needed an event.
> 
> *We gave Russia almost 400,000 large trucks! Plus 14,000 airplanes, 44,000 jeeps, 8,000 tractors, 13,000 tanks, etc. And I don't have numbers like that for the amount of material given to the British, but I do know it was three times as much as we gave to Russia.


You say give, but I think you mean sold.


----------



## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> If a non-lethal weapon was invented that was just as effective at protection, would you still advocate for gun ownership?


Of course. People still have a right to use their guns to hunt and defend themselves if need be.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

Tigran said:


> And yet.. Just going by your posts here in this thread... seems to indicate you'd have no problem with the government just -taking- people's land they supposedly fought for.



im totally anti-government.
i dont pick and choose.
this is my life damn it.
and no one will control me, but i also dont go around raping and killing and stealing. so idk.
id say that i play life like call of duty blackout, or pubg, i wait till everyone kills themselves, then go out and reap the benefits


----------



## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> Of course. People still have a right to use their guns to hunt and defend themselves if need be.


Ok. If a weapon was invented that harnessed nuclear technology that could kill thousands in an instant and fits in the palm of your hands, should people be allowed to own them, for protection or hunting?


----------



## invaderyoyo (Feb 20, 2019)

RaptorDMG said:


> If they are an illegal immigrant and are found out by law enforcement they should be sent back otherwise what's the point in having a legal process to become a citizen in the first place


Just wanna say that there actually is no legal process to become a US Citizen. At least, not if you're poor and have no immediate family members who are citizens.


----------



## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

Also being in the country undocumented isn't exactly illegal. It's a civil issue. 

The only way for it to be illegal was if they did not come in through port of entry, which is were MOST immigrants DO come in.


----------



## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> Ok. If a weapon was invented that harnessed nuclear technology that could kill thousands in an instant and fits in the palm of your hands, should people be allowed to own them, for protection or hunting?


Haha they aren't even similar to each other but I don't think anybody should have something that could kill thousands in a second.


----------



## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> You say give, but I think you mean sold.




Yeah, stuff England wanted to keep was sold to them after the war at 10% value, with 50 years to pay.

For most countries the US provided aid, the agreement was not for money repayment but for a commitment to future alliance. Also Britain gave the US access to some major tech breakthroughs including radar in appreciation for the shit-ton of gear.




IncredulousP said:


> Ok. If a weapon was invented that harnessed nuclear technology that could kill thousands in an instant and fits in the palm of your hands, should people be allowed to own them, for protection or hunting?



That's pretty much a moot argument. The Supreme Court case of US v. Miller back in 1939 set the precedent that the 2nd Amendment covers only up to the weapon and ammo load of soldiers in the field, i.e. nothing above squad level, and I don't think that will ever be overturned. Unless and until the US Army issues your imaginary weapon to every infantryman, the 2nd amendment doesn't cover it.

And yes, ironically, despite all the pro-gun control arguments we hear about the AR-15 rifle, that 'nobody needs a weapon of war like that!!' --- even though the AR-15 isn't equivalent to the military M16 and M4 rifles it resembles --- there is a US Supreme Court case that says weapons of war like that are exactly what the 2nd Amendment covers.


----------



## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> Haha they aren't even similar to each other but I don't think anybody should have something that could kill thousands in a second.


Of course, they aren't similar. But you agree that, somewhere, a line has to be drawn that limits one's rights. Ultimately, nobody is truly "free", otherwise it would just be anarchy and chaos. Arguing for the ability to purchase and own something purely on the argument that it would infringe on rights isn't an infallible argument. Why is the line drawn after owning a weapon that can kill dozens of people near instantly but before owning a weapon that can kill thousands of people near instantly?


----------



## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> Of course, they aren't similar. But you agree that, somewhere, a line has to be drawn that limits one's rights. Ultimately, nobody is truly "free", otherwise it would just be anarchy and chaos. Arguing for the ability to purchase and own something purely on the argument that it would infringe on rights isn't an infallible argument. Why is the line drawn after owning a weapon that can kill dozens of people near instantly but before owning a weapon that can kill thousands of people near instantly?


Of course.
In this country we are free to buy guns by law to protect ourselves from people who wish to harm us or to hunt. We don't buy them for the purpose of harming innocent people and using what you have listed would surely do that.


----------



## D34DL1N3R (Feb 20, 2019)

Gotta love a rightie asking why something or another happened with Dems, then linking to Fox News as a source. Lmao.


----------



## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> Of course.
> In this country we are free to buy guns by law to protect ourselves from people who wish to harm us or to hunt. We don't buy them for the purpose of harming innocent people and using what you have listed would surely do that.


Ok, but what if I only used my handheld nuclear weapons for protection and never harmed innocents? Why am I not allowed to own it?


----------



## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> Ok, but what if I only used my handheld nuclear weapons for protection and never harmed innocents? Why am I not allowed to own it?


Because by law you cannot own a nuclear weapon and because of harmful effects it causes such as thermal burns from infrared heat radiation, radiation poisoning, etc.


----------



## granville (Feb 20, 2019)

I always laugh whenever some tough guy says their guns are for "fighting tyrannical governments". I'm originally from Tennessee and now live in Florida, so i'm very familiar with this sort of redneck drivel even from family members.

Go try marching up to Washington and pointing your little pea shooters at a government official. See what happens to you.

This isn't the 1800s, it's the 2000s. The notion of anyone being able to revolt against the government anymore is laughable. The government would wipe your ass off the face of the earth in an instance. Even if you miraculously managed to recruit millions of idiots and countless amounts of guns.


----------



## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

granville said:


> I always laugh whenever some tough guy says their guns are for "fighting tyrannical governments". I'm originally from Tennessee and now live in Florida, so i'm very familiar with this sort of redneck drivel even from family members.
> 
> Go try marching up to Washington and pointing your little pea shooters at a government official. See what happens to you.
> 
> This isn't the 1800s, it's the 2000s. The notion of anyone being able to revolt against the government anymore is laughable. The government would wipe your ass off the face of the earth in an instance. Even if you miraculously managed to recruit millions of idiots and countless amounts of guns.


I never claimed to be a tough guy when I am actually not tough at all.

I wouldn't point my gun at anyone unless they were physically trying to harm me or others.

Better to try then to not try at all.


----------



## Kioku_Dreams (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> If a non-lethal weapon was invented that was just as effective at protection, would you still advocate for gun ownership?


It wouldn't be as effective it were non-lethal in some cases... So... Yeah... It never ceases to amaze me that some of you think the gun is the issue.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------



granville said:


> I always laugh whenever some tough guy says their guns are for "fighting tyrannical governments". I'm originally from Tennessee and now live in Florida, so i'm very familiar with this sort of redneck drivel even from family members.
> 
> Go try marching up to Washington and pointing your little pea shooters at a government official. See what happens to you.
> 
> This isn't the 1800s, it's the 2000s. The notion of anyone being able to revolt against the government anymore is laughable. The government would wipe your ass off the face of the earth in an instance. Even if you miraculously managed to recruit millions of idiots and countless amounts of guns.


Complacency is an illness.. I swear..


----------



## granville (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> I never claimed to be a tough guy when I am actually not tough at all.
> 
> I wouldn't point my gun at anyone unless they were physically trying to harm me or others.
> 
> Better to try then to not try at all.


You said earlier in the thread that guns were for opposing a tyrannical government. I've heard this claim many times. In a hypothetical revolt, the rebellion would lose before it even began. Embarrassingly so.

No one stands any chance against the government's weaponry, this isn't the Civil War era 1800s where there was still a relatively even playing field among arms.


----------



## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> Because by law you cannot own a nuclear weapon and because of harmful effects it causes such as thermal burns from infrared heat radiation, radiation poisoning, etc.


Ok, then for the sake of this thought experiment, the weapon causes no side effects, and optionally kills either 1 person or everyone within a 5 mile radius, but I never use it on innocent people. Should I be allowed to own it?


----------



## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

granville said:


> You said earlier in the thread that guns were for opposing a tyrannical government. I've heard this claim many times. In a hypothetical revolt, the rebellion would lose before it even began. Embarrassingly so.
> 
> No one stands any chance against the government's weaponry, this isn't the Civil War era 1800s where there was still a relatively even playing field among arms.


That is your opinion and I disagree with it.

Just because you say that doesn't mean it holds any merit.


----------



## granville (Feb 20, 2019)

Memoir said:


> Complacency is an illness.. I swear..


What are you arguing? That guns would help you topple a world super power in the 21st century?


----------



## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

D34DL1N3R said:


> Gotta love a rightie asking why something or another happened with Dems, then linking to Fox News as a source. Lmao.



If it never happened, you'd have a point. If the mainstream outlets simply aren't reporting it because it's problematic for Democrats, that's a whole other discussion.

So, are you saying it didn't happen?




IncredulousP said:


> Ok, but what if I only used my handheld nuclear weapons for protection and never harmed innocents? Why am I not allowed to own it?



I answered this on the last page.


----------



## granville (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> That is your opinion and I disagree with it.
> 
> Just because you say that doesn't mean it holds any merit.


You're arguing that it would be possible to topple the US government with the guns available to citizens. At least that's what I assume you were claiming. That statement isn't a matter of opinion, it's just factually objectively wrong. No citizens militia (regardless of the size and amount of rifles and shotguns) would stand a chance in a hypothetical revolt against the US government.


----------



## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> Ok, then for the sake of this thought experiment, the weapon causes no side effects, and optionally kills either 1 person or everyone within a 5 mile radius, but I never use it on innocent people. Should I be allowed to own it?


I'm done with this. I said what I had to say and I am speaking for guns only.



granville said:


> You're arguing that it would be possible to topple the US government with the guns available to citizens. That isn't an opinion, it's just factually wrong.


It is your opinion that it wouldn't be possible. Stop. I have my freedom to use my gun to protect myself and if I had to face a tyrannical government knowing the odds are against me I would do it.


----------



## CallmeBerto (Feb 20, 2019)

granville said:


> You said earlier in the thread that guns were for opposing a tyrannical government. I've heard this claim many times. In a hypothetical revolt, the rebellion would lose before it even began. Embarrassingly so.
> 
> No one stands any chance against the government's weaponry, this isn't the Civil War era 1800s where there was still a relatively even playing field among arms.



So what you are saying. There is no point in trying because they would win? You do know that having arm citizens( and a lot of them) would give the government pause for such a thing? Like I'm not sure how you don't see this.


----------



## IncredulousP (Feb 20, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> I'm done with this. I said what I had to say and I am speaking for guns only


You're done because you have no retort and are afraid of having the logical fallacies of your beliefs pointed out. It's okay, feel free to mull it over for a bit. Personally, I don't believe anybody should own deadly devices with such violent capabilities as a gun, it is too easy to kill too many people when there are better, less lethal weapons for defense. If people are allowed to own something so violent and lethal as a weapon, they should then be allowed to own something like the theoretical weapon I described, since, as you said, it would only be used for defense, not on innocents, and is a person's right to defend themself.


----------



## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

granville said:


> You're arguing that it would be possible to topple the US government with the guns available to citizens. That isn't an opinion, it's just factually wrong.




If you can get the members of the military to wage war on their own families, you're probably right ... civilians have no chance at an armed rebellion. I don't think the military stays on the government's side in that event though. Not for now, but in the future maybe that becomes moot. AI and robot vehicles/soldiers are another matter.

I don't think it's a realistic scenario anyway, i.e. total war. Armed resistance in the event of unacceptable changes is more likely, providing a popular catalyst for a coup type takeover, not a 'toppling' of the government. The people who dream of this shit are bigger problems than 99% of the people in the US who own firearms though. Regardless of whether it's Stormfront Neo-Nazi loonies or ANTIFA loonies, they're loonies. Their fantasies reveal their mental problems.


----------



## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> You're done because you have no retort and are afraid of having the logical fallacies of your beliefs pointed out. It's okay, feel free to mull it over for a bit. Personally, I don't believe anybody should own deadly devices with such violent capabilities as a gun, it is too easy to kill too many people when there are better, less lethal weapons for defense. If people are allowed to own something so violent and lethal as a weapon, they should then be allowed to own something like the theoretical weapon I described, since, as you said, it would only be used for defense, not in innocents, and is a person's right to defend themself.


I'm done talking about it because I don't know enough about a non existing nuclear weapon to say if you should have it or not.


----------



## CallmeBerto (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> Ok, then for the sake of this thought experiment, the weapon causes no side effects, and optionally kills either 1 person or everyone within a 5 mile radius, but I never use it on innocent people. Should I be allowed to own it?



I can attempt to answer this. So if I understand this right. This weapon can kill 1 or a bunch of people within a 5-mile radius at once? Then no you can't own it. After all how the hell can you insure that everyone within that 5-mile radius is guilty of whatever crime is fit for death?

Again I think that is the weapon you are talking about.


----------



## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> nucular weaponz




Again, I answered this on the last page. The 2nd Amendment covers the weapons and equipment of the typical soldier in the field in time of war. Why? Because the US Supreme Court said so, and so far hasn't reversed itself. So unless the US Army starts issuing every soldier your imaginary micro-nuke, this is a moot point.


----------



## chrisrlink (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> It's already a crime for a convicted felon, domestic violence offenders, addicts, and persons adjudicated mentally ill to attempt to purchase or to possess firearms or ammunition. Likewise if a person lies about any of these things while attempting to purchase. Problem is, when the background check fails, they can just walk out of the shop. There's no means of enforcement in the current law.



what do you mean by adjudicated? as by the courts or by a medical professional cause what if by any chance the mentally ill person pissed off a alt right to the point the alt right person made a death threat? i'm not saying that happened to me (yet) but i know people if  convicted enough to commit murder (look at some of these jewish,muslim (even middle eastern despite not being muslim at all) getting assaulted even killed here in the US I'm on edge sometimes about some nutcase trying to kill me


----------



## PanTheFaun (Feb 20, 2019)

chrisrlink said:


> what do you mean by adjudicated? as by the courts or by a medical professional cause what if by any chance the mentally ill person pissed off a alt right to the point the alt right person made a death threat? i'm not saying that happened to me (yet) but i know people if  convicted enough to commit murder (look at some of these jewish,muslim (even middle eastern despite not being muslim at all) getting assaulted even killed here in the US I'm on edge sometimes about some nutcase trying to kill me


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

I'm all for greater scrutiny for anyone buying a gun in Florida, TBH.  The irony here of Republicans pushing for stricter gun laws is palpable, but I guess we always knew the NRA doesn't care about your gun rights unless you're white.


----------



## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

chrisrlink said:


> what do you mean by adjudicated?



Not my choice of words, that's what it says in US Code where it defines who is prohibited from purchasing and/or possessing firearms & ammo.




Xzi said:


> I'm all for greater scrutiny for anyone buying a gun in Florida, TBH.  The irony here of Republicans pushing for stricter gun laws is palpable, but I guess we always knew the NRA doesn't care about your gun rights unless you're white.



This was US House of Reps, not FL state legislature. It’s on a FL-based site because the (R) rep who introduced the amendment is from FL.


One thing I will agree with Lacius about ... this was an intentional poison pill. But it was poisonous to the Democrats. They want universal background checks, but specifically voted against law enforcement doing anything about it when a prohibited person tries to buy a gun. It's counter to common sense, but I do think the Republicans who proposed the amendment knew the Democrats would reject it.

The actual language of the amendment comes from another Democrat gun control bill btw, which the Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee all claim to support lol. So they like the idea, so long as a Democrat is sponsoring it I guess.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

IncredulousP said:


> Ok. If a weapon was invented that harnessed nuclear technology that could kill thousands in an instant and fits in the palm of your hands, should people be allowed to own them, for protection or hunting?



what the hell kind of comparison is that?
i understand your logic, or the idea you was trying to express,
but having a mobile or semi mobile nuclear device that can kill 1000s or 100k of people at once, in the hands of "civilians" is in no way on the same level as having a gun. even one with 30 round mags.

if the argument is that we don't need ar-15s or ak-47s, only hunting rifles or handguns,
that defeats the whole purpose of the 2nd amendment:

the reason we have guns is to protect ourselves against a tyrannical government.
the government has tanks, full auto machine guns (not semi-auto like we have)
rockets, nukes, and 100k-1mill plus of brainwashed "soldiers" to jump by their command.

and what do we have? some toy weapons? semi auto 20-30-45? rounds?
woooooow. much defense, much victory over bad government.
 we are already at a severe disadvantage, only our numbers can take them down at this point.

these random shootings that happen oh so conveniently spaced together, then broadcasted for a week or two on the news, followed by candle lit ceromony, followed by crying people, followed by.... really cant be helped or stopped.  ban or no ban.

**straightens tin-foil hat after it almost fell**


there are about what 3 guns to every american? i know its probably 1:1,
there are 331 million people in the United states alone.
not counting undocumented persons, no matter what race.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> if the argument is that we don't need ar-15s or ak-47s, only hunting rifles or handguns,
> that defeats the whole purpose of the 2nd amendment:
> 
> the reason we have guns is to protect ourselves against a tyrannical government.
> ...


And you think full autos are going to do anything against tanks and drones?  The whole purpose of the second amendment was defeated the moment we elected an authoritarian with the support and blessing of gun nuts.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

edited by me. cuz


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> my point is, we have already been slowly, and slowly stripped of our rights over decades, from gun restrictions to the god damn epa regulating how much our toilet is allowed to flush!!
> 
> and WE dont ELECT anyone!! our votes dont matter, its the electoral college, and even then, if personal interests are with a certain candidate, they will most likely win.
> 
> do you people not know anything??


This is all over the place, I'm not even sure how to respond.  My point was that we now have an authoritarian as president, and an oppressive government.  The exact situation that the second amendment was meant to prevent.  Not a single gun nut has the strength of their convictions, however, and as a result, there was never any chance of another revolution happening.

I'm very much aware of how the electoral college works, but your 'doom and gloom' philosophy fails to account for the fact that there's a push through state legislatures right now to end the electoral college.  Also it's only recently that the EC has resulted in presidents that the majority didn't vote for.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

Xzi said:


> This is all over the place, I'm not even sure how to respond.  My point was that we now have an authoritarian as president, and an oppressive government.  The exact situation that the second amendment was meant to prevent.  Not a single gun nut has the strength of their convictions, however, and as a result, there was never any chance of another revolution happening.
> 
> I'm very much aware of how the electoral college works, but your 'doom and gloom' philosophy fails to account for the fact that there's a push through state legislatures right now to end the electoral college.  Also it's only recently that the EC has resulted in presidents that the majority didn't vote for.




go watch the video with steven crowder when he interviews people and asks them if they think trump is an authoritarian and if we now have an oppresive government.
please watch the whole thing.
it is not biased. watch it, its funny

no, we dont have an oppressive government, and trump is not a facist, please look up those two words in the dictionary, and then come back here and tell me which of those things he has done? where are the policies proving what you just said??
ignorant, quit watching news and letting your brain and heart get molded by liberal communist scum.
use your brain ffs


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> omg.
> go watch the video with steven crowder when he interviews people and asks them if they think trump is an authoritarian and if we now have an oppresive government.
> 
> no, we dont have an oppressive government, and trump is not a facist, please look up those two words in the dictionary, and then come back here and tell me which of those things he has done? where are the policies proving what you just said??
> ...


You're a fucking dipshit.  Of course the people that voted for him don't think he's an authoritarian, but they're a goddamned cult.  They'll believe absolutely anything Cheeto Benito tells them to.

At this rate you'll be bringing up Scientologist talking points next.


----------



## Kioku_Dreams (Feb 20, 2019)

Xzi said:


> You're a fucking dipshit.  Of course the people that voted for him don't think he's an authoritarian, but they're a goddamned cult.  They'll believe absolutely anything Cheeto Benito tells them to.
> 
> At this rate you'll be bringing up Scientologist talking points next.


The same can be said about Democrats though. Yeah, I get where you're coming from.. But that argument can be used against you... There's a bad joke in there, I swear.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

Xzi said:


> You're a fucking dipshit.  Of course the people that voted for him don't think he's an authoritarian, but they're a goddamned cult.  They'll believe absolutely anything Cheeto Benito tells them to.
> 
> At this rate you'll be bringing up Scientologist talking points next.



and you believe anything you hear or read or see on tv for face value huh??
if you have proof, show me a policy that oppresses the nation????

where do you see that i said that i voted for trump??????
and no i didnt vote for him, i hate the government.
i never vote, never will.
jokes on you.

but i will argue when i hear a lie, or false info, no matter what party, ill defend hillary or condemn her if you show me proof.

you really are ignorant arent you...
im done talking to you.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

Memoir said:


> The same can be said about Democrats though. Yeah, I get where you're coming from.. But that argument can be used against you... There's a bad joke in there, I swear.


Not even remotely.  I still got my news from the news during the Obama administration, I didn't check his opinions on things first and then cement those opinions as fact in my mind.  There's never been a left-wing 'Q.'  Democrats have also never elected a know-nothing xenophobic reality TV star to the presidency.  There's simply no comparison.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

hmm, and im suuuuch a dipshit yet i just gained booko xp and leveled up just for the few comments i posted in this thread this afternoon.
have a good day bro.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

know-nothing xenophobic? lmao

you must be one of them skinny hipster dudes that vapes fruit loops and dont eat meat and inside you think your a girl when ur really a boy huh??
lmao
oh god yes..
youre making my day..
SEE I CAN BE NASTY TOO
And Scientology points?
see, youre brainwashed dude.
slow down before you make assumptions in your head.
no i think Scientology is completely ridiculous, but i also believe god is not real, and religion was made by an ancient branch of the now free masons to control humanity and dumb them down.
i dont fall for any of the shit, trump, hillary, god, satan,
see the pattern? this or that, this or that.. brain washed...


----------



## CORE (Feb 20, 2019)

Because they are busy looking into your political views online via the "Social" "Media" Trap that everyone has bought into to see who disagrees with them and are taking note to contact the TP or the PC if you "Disagree" 

Thought Police / Political Correct for those with Soy in their StarBucks


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> The news articles are rather focused on the illegal alien issue, but actually the amendment was not just to contact ICE when an illegal alien attempted to buy a gun, but to contact law enforcement when _any_ background check was rejected.
> 
> Attempting to purchase a gun when you're prohibited by law or by submitting a false 4473 form to a federally licensed firearms dealer (FFL) is a crime, so law enforcement should be alerted, right? Well, Democrats in the House Judiciary Committee voted to kill that amendment to their "Bipartisan Background Checks Act."
> 
> ...




Why do you read this trash?

You know it's propaganda and not true news because it doesn't have *any* comment, reply, view or input from the people they are targeting.

This amendment was designed to complicate HR8 to make it destine to fail later. It was part of many, many amendments pushed to make it look like republicans supported the bill while also filibustering it to death.

Republicans don't want HR8 *at all* as they think it is an attack on peoples rights (they don't like universal background checks) and the smart way for them to fight it is not to declare this so directly but to cause the bill to fail.

I'm pretty sure this tactic is covered in just about any high school pol sci text covering US politics.


*LPT if the "news" you are reading does not contain rebuttal STOP reading it. It's propaganda not news*


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> hmm, and im suuuuch a dipshit yet i just gained booko xp and leveled up just for the few comments i posted in this thread this afternoon.
> have a good day bro.


Ooh, internet points!  Maybe you can donate some of those to help find a cure for Trump's early-onset Alzheimer's.


----------



## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> *LPT if the "news" you are reading does not contain rebuttal STOP reading it. It's propaganda not news*




*looks at Fox link in my OP*

*sees mucho rebuttal coverage*

*scratches head*


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> *looks at Fox link in my OP*
> 
> *sees mucho rebuttal coverage*
> 
> *scratches head*


At least on the national level, Fox tends to make shit up a lot.  They also technically bill themselves as 'entertainment' and not news, so they never issue retractions for stories that later turn out to be false.

I do see some solid reporting out of local Fox affiliates sometimes, but that's a different story.


----------



## CORE (Feb 20, 2019)

So who is gonna win this years Wrestlemania oh no one watches Wrestling you say? 
You Watch the News dont you I mean Fake News!


----------



## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

Xzi said:


> At least on the national level, Fox tends to make shit up a lot.  They also technically bill themselves as 'entertainment' and not news, so they never issue retractions for stories that later turn out to be false.
> 
> I do see some solid reporting out of local Fox affiliates sometimes, but that's a different story.




Not trying to dissuade you or anyone else of your devotion to CNN as a bastion of truth and Fox as total hogwash. You’re entitled to your opinion. Just didn’t understand the guy saying it wasn’t news b/c there was no rebuttal. The Democratic position was represented thoroughly in the article.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> Not trying to dissuade you or anyone else of your devotion to CNN as a bastion of truth and Fox as total hogwash. You’re entitled to your opinion. Just didn’t understand the guy saying it wasn’t news b/c there was no rebuttal. The Democratic position was represented thoroughly in the article.


CNN is basically Fox now, they decided it would be easier if they didn't have to be weighed down by that pesky "journalistic integrity."

https://gbatemp.net/threads/cnn-ann...rience-to-head-2020-election-coverage.531828/



CORE said:


> So who is gonna win this years Wrestlemania oh no one watches Wrestling you say?
> You Watch the News dont you I mean Fake News!


Nobody _watches_ the news any more, unless maybe they're over sixty.  I read my news from various sources on the internet like most people.


----------



## kuwanger (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> The news articles are rather focused on the illegal alien issue, but actually the amendment was not just to contact ICE when an illegal alien attempted to buy a gun, but to contact law enforcement when _any_ background check was rejected.



I don't get it.

"Of a total of 8.6 million transactions processed by federal officials that year, 112,710 were rejected but only about 12,700 were referred for further investigation by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

In a review of 13 states that handle the background check forms themselves, 10 do not investigate or prosecute firearms denials, with some saying they have other law enforcement priorities.

One of the remaining three states, Pennsylvania, made 1,900 referrals for prosecution in 2017 and obtained about 470 convictions. Federal investigators were told that since 2014 the policy of the Pennsylvania Instant Check System has been to investigate all firearm denials."

Seems pretty obvious that (1) not all firearm denials are criminal (only ~24.7% in Pennsylvania resulted in convictions) and (2) it's on a State-by-State basis for most of what is legal or illegal.  Further, clearly plenty of States themselves aren't interested in prosecuting people--"they have other law enforcement priorities".  It's not even the issue of it being a poison pill.  It's literally a pointless exercise.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

Xzi said:


> At least on the national level, Fox tends to make shit up a lot.  They also technically bill themselves as 'entertainment' and not news, so they never issue retractions for stories that later turn out to be false.
> 
> I do see some solid reporting out of local Fox affiliates sometimes, but that's a different story.



that's my issue, they may portray they are entertainment, or something of the like, but other news companies don't, there is such thing as false news,and regardless of company, they are all right on the presidents paycheck.
fun fact, since you brought up trump being a fascist and is oppressing the nation
"sieg heil"
Obama/his administration has spent the most money in us history suppressing journalists and media.
trump spent 0.
if we are going by the term fascist in Merriam Webster.

i think it is trumps personality and his ego that people don't like, i really don't care for him either, but then again i don't care about any of them.

but i do enjoy a good conversation.
living in the country for the last 10 years will certainly bring forth a yearning to talk to people.
dipshits or not 

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------



Clydefrosch said:


> Why do you guys always have to bring your political bs into my videogame forums?
> 
> And why do you guys always insist that the anti-migrant parties law proposals aren't at all in pursuit of their anti-migrant agenda?



hm, the world doesnt revolve around you?

just like when someone made a post asking for sexual orientation threads or pokemon religion threads to be banned and Costello himself said if you dont like it dont read it, then he locked the thread.
freedom of speech, ya arse.
we are one of the only countries to have it, enjoy it while you can,
or i guess its because people like you take away that right just because you dont like certain words when placed in a certain order.
jesus h effin christ..


----------



## Lacius (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> Obama/his administration has spent the most money in us history suppressing journalists and media.


What are you even talking about?


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> Have you ever purchased a firearm from an FFL and completed the 4473? You cannot attempt to make the purchase without turning in a completed 4473. You cannot complete the 4473 without representing that you are legally eligible and not prohibited from purchasing. The background check is not run until you complete the form and all your answers say you are good to buy.



also not all areas require an ffl


----------



## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

Country's "Freedom of Speech." do not apply to private message boards.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

Lacius said:


> What are you even talking about?



exactly.
im out. 
holy crap....


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

Tigran said:


> Country's "Freedom of Speech." do not apply to private message boards.



yeah, youre right, and if someone in admin or above wants to do something they will. but i think they understand the words, freedom of speech,
remember the difference between that, and a call to action.


----------



## Tigran (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> yeah, youre right, and if someone in admin or above wants to do something they will. but i think they understand the words, freedom of speech,
> remember the difference between that, and a call to action.



I do not mean to be mean.. but is English your first language? Because some it seems difficult to read, and may be slightly why some of us are having difficulty.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> Obama/his administration has spent the most money in us history suppressing journalists and media.


Obama never called the press "the enemy of the people," and he never took away press passes for asking the "wrong" questions.  His administration did go after whistleblowers hard, but mostly for confidential/classified leaks.  Again there's simply no comparison.  Obama was a competent leader who inspired loyalty, Trump is a fucking childish baffoon who _demands_ loyalty under threat of NDA.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

supermist said:


> Reminds me of that not so inaccurate meme where Conservatives just make stuff up but at least Liberals will post a wikipedia article



you are outright offensive and toxic. why do i need to post a link??? like i have it on me right now??? im at work!!!!!
i just said that!!!
look it up yourself!!! i was just pointing it out!!!


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

Xzi said:


> Obama never called the press "the enemy of the people," and he never took away press passes for asking the "wrong" questions.  His administration did go after whistleblowers hard, but mostly for confidential/classified leaks.  Again there's simply no comparison.  Obama was a competent leader who inspired loyalty, Trump is a fucking childish baffoon who _demands_ loyalty under threat of NDA.



thats your opinion.
and the press is the enemy of the people. they are all liers.
good day sir.
i cant stop laughing...
if i stay any longer ill turn into a communist liberal scum


----------



## Hanafuda (Feb 20, 2019)

kuwanger said:


> Seems pretty obvious that (1) not all firearm denials are criminal (only ~24.7% in Pennsylvania resulted in convictions) and (2) it's on a State-by-State basis for most of what is legal or illegal.  Further, clearly plenty of States themselves aren't interested in prosecuting people--"they have other law enforcement priorities".  It's not even the issue of it being a poison pill.  It's literally a pointless exercise.




1)Just because an investigation doesn't end in a conviction doesn't mean there wasn't a crime. Criminal prosecution, which requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt, is extremely inefficient if you judge it by arrests vs. convictions. I'm fine with that -- it helps insure against wrongful convictions. In this case, it isn't even arrests btw, but referrals for investigation. There are many different reasons why these referrals could end up with no resulting criminal case ... person couldn't be found or identified due to using a false identity, person made a deal to turn state's evidence in exchange for a dismissal, person didn't lie but the background check system was in error (happens, Dylan Roof bought a gun because the system was in error), Prosecutor didn't give a shit, etc. For simple referrals to investigate to criminal convictions, 25% is actually pretty impressive.

2) This is federal law we're talking about here so legal or not is not determined on a State-by-State basis. But there's nothing currently in the federal law that compels FFL's to refer background check rejections to law enforcement. So lacking that enforcement mechanism, usually nothing happens.


*Edit:* considering how tragically off-topic the majority of posts in this thread over the last couple pages have gone due to the inane, indecipherable posts of one person, I now declare this thread to be about echidnas, and monotremes generally.


----------



## CORE (Feb 20, 2019)

"Obama Loyal" lol that man has helped to contribute to the state of decay the world now lays in the West along with the Traitors of UK Tories and the UN Globalists that and more is why this thread and others like it exist to divide.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

https://www.salon.com/2012/03/14/obamas_personal_role_in_a_journalists_imprisonment/

https://www.timesofisrael.com/journ...oto-suppressed-at-request-of-black-lawmakers/

https://dailycaller.com/2013/05/20/...ministrations-history-of-targeting-the-media/

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/30/...ld-trump-targets-journalists-thank-obama.html

https://www.politifact.com/punditfa...apper-obama-has-used-espionage-act-more-all-/

and that last one


----------



## CORE (Feb 20, 2019)

Trump is a Russian

Hug a Liberal Today So Tomorrow We Can Play


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> and the press is the enemy of the people. they are all liers.


You seriously need to learn to be more consistent with your arguments.  Is attacking the first amendment a good thing, or a bad thing?  Pretty simple decision.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 20, 2019)

Xzi said:


> You seriously need to learn to be more consistent with your arguments.  Is attacking the first amendment a good thing, or a bad thing?  Pretty simple decision.



what?? no, media controlled by other entities to lie to the public and spread false information, and in the long run create a disinformation ecosystem...
that...
is NOT freedom of speech
not when you are paid to say something no matter what if you want to keep your job


----------



## Lacius (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> https://www.salon.com/2012/03/14/obamas_personal_role_in_a_journalists_imprisonment/
> 
> https://www.timesofisrael.com/journ...oto-suppressed-at-request-of-black-lawmakers/
> 
> ...


I randomly picked one of your _sources_ (the first one), and it had nothing to do with President Obama suppressing journalists. It's like you did a quick Google search of "Obama journalists bad" and pasted the results. Did you read your _sources_?


----------



## Xzi (Feb 20, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> what?? no, media controlled by other entities to lie to the public and spread false information, and in the long run create a disinformation ecosystem...
> that...
> is NOT freedom of speech


The right to a press, free and independent of government influence, is included in the first amendment bud.  The opposite of that is called propaganda.


----------



## supermist (Feb 20, 2019)

Lacius said:


> It's like you did a quick Google search of "Obama journalists bad" and pasted the results.



I did this just now for fun and the results were pretty similar


----------



## Lacius (Feb 20, 2019)

supermist said:


> I did this just now for fun and the results were pretty similar


I wonder why.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 21, 2019)

Lacius said:


> I randomly picked one of your _sources_ (the first one), and it had nothing to do with President Obama suppressing journalists. It's like you did a quick Google search of "Obama journalists bad" and pasted the results. Did you read your _sources_?



i said he suppressed the media AND journalists
cant you read?
and yes i did, im not going to explain 8 years of his wrong doings
so yes i did a google search and you should too!! that is my whole point, quit relying on people to give you info, take what you hear, then research it.
holy balls

https://www.politifact.com/punditfa...apper-obama-has-used-espionage-act-more-all-/

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

listen to some immortal technique or something, theres a good song called the 4th branch, go to youtube and listen to it. you all are just brainwashed.
again, im out. peace.


----------



## Lacius (Feb 21, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> i said he suppressed the media AND journalists
> cant you read?
> and yes i did, im not going to explain 8 years of his wrong doings
> so yes i did a google search and you should too!! that is my whole point, quit relying on people to give you info, take what you hear, then research it.
> ...


What does that politifact statement have to do with what you're arguing? Administrations always go after whistleblowers breaking the law when it's their prerogative to do so. Whether or not you think that's a good thing, it's not the suppression of journalists, and it's definitely not fascism. It's an entirely different topic.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 21, 2019)

i didnt finish reading your post.
sorry.
but the whistleblower thing should be enough for anyone,
putting people in jail and or killing them behind closed doors by some means, just because they called out the governments bad doing, like edward snowden.
isnt that fishy to you?
in the least? im just trying to ignite a spark here is all im saying, you all have been for the most part respectful in this conversation, with the exception of a couple that made me lose my cool.

i am willing to debate facts. regardless of race, party, gender.
ok?

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

also journalists were suppressed/killed/raped,
photos erased.
but all this was years ago..
dont you remember any of it?
or is it them chemtrails getting to everyone?
im starting to lose my memory.. i try not to focus my mind in this horrible world if you know what i mean.
lmao 

EDIT:
another thought.
remember when Obama did the Muslim ban restricting several countries from entering the US?
when trump did it, everyone lost their minds, when Obama did it no-one batted an eye.
these people are all the same, and you guys argue for one side or the other.
we are divided.
and divided we will fall.
point is
f trump
f hillary
f obama
and .. you guessed it


----------



## Lacius (Feb 21, 2019)

LowEndC said:


> i didnt finish reading your post.
> sorry.
> but the whistleblower thing should be enough for anyone,
> putting people in jail and or killing them behind closed doors by some means, just because they called out the governments bad doing, like edward snowden.
> ...


President Obama never did a _Muslim ban_. Please don't be disingenuous in an effort to win a pointless argument in a pointless thread.
https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-...mparing-trumps-and-obamas-immigration-restri/


----------



## CallmeBerto (Feb 21, 2019)

@Lacius He is just a troll at this point lol


----------



## Lacius (Feb 21, 2019)

CallmeBerto said:


> @Lacius He is just a troll at this point lol


I know. At this point, I'm just correcting certain things I see as possible misconceptions on the political right.


----------



## LowEndC (Feb 21, 2019)

CallmeBerto said:


> @Lacius He is just a troll at this point lol



im not trolling anyone, you people need to wake up.
whats the point in arguing politics anyways?
either way you just get someone in office who has a nasty past whether you know it or not, and usually causes many deaths and peoples well being, i.e. jobs, taxes etc.
have fun.
im out of here.
it looks like Weedz is starting to delete my posts again for what was the reason?
"this isnt an image board"?
well images are allowed, so im getting picked on and i guess thats how you get someone to shut up huh,

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------



CallmeBerto said:


> @Lacius He is just a troll at this point lol



also, why did you go through all my posts and like them, then go and call me a troll??


----------



## kuwanger (Feb 21, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> 1)Just because an investigation doesn't end in a conviction doesn't mean there wasn't a crime. Criminal prosecution, which requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt, is extremely inefficient if you judge it by arrests vs. convictions. I'm fine with that -- it helps insure against wrongful convictions. In this case, it isn't even arrests btw, but referrals for investigation. There are many different reasons why these referrals could end up with no resulting criminal case ... person couldn't be found or identified due to using a false identity, person made a deal to turn state's evidence in exchange for a dismissal, person didn't lie but the background check system was in error (happens, Dylan Roof bought a gun because the system was in error), Prosecutor didn't give a shit, etc. For simple referrals to investigate to criminal convictions, 25% is actually pretty impressive.



Of the things you mention, only the parts about being about giving false identity to the point of not being able to identify the person for prosecution, the prosecutor not following up, or there just being an error in the background check system wrongly denying someone (funny you state the opposite problem) makes sense.  For the rest, it really should be a trivial thing if a attempting to get a gun and then failing a background check is a crime.  There would be little to no reason to "turn state's evidence in exchange for a dismissal" because the form itself is proof of guilt.  In that context, 25% is a horrible number.

It would seem pretty obvious, actually, that avoiding the issue of false identity would be very easy by requiring a person provide identity at submission time and FFL verifying the ID is valid.  Then, a cop could literally be waiting for the person to show up to pick up their gun even if they were using someone else's ID.  The system itself should be notifying the police, not the FFL.  The only way to circumvent it then would be FFL failing to do background checks or verifying the ID as required.



Hanafuda said:


> 2) This is federal law we're talking about here so legal or not is not determined on a State-by-State basis. But there's nothing currently in the federal law that compels FFL's to refer background check rejections to law enforcement. So lacking that enforcement mechanism, usually nothing happens.



The point is, there's no reason for there to be federal law to cover what should be State based punishment.  Guns being purchased in a State should be State matter, right?  If States refuse to criminalize or pursue/punish people, then that's the State's right, right?  It's also clear the federal government won't or can't pursue the matter, generally.  It seems pretty clear this is all showboating for all members involved at the federal level.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 21, 2019)

Xzi said:


> At least on the national level, Fox tends to make shit up a lot.  They also technically bill themselves as 'entertainment' and not news, so they never issue retractions for stories that later turn out to be false.
> 
> I do see some solid reporting out of local Fox affiliates sometimes, but that's a different story.



Interesting you couldn't provide a quote or that rebuttal.

You believe your news sources are so good. Yet after reading two of them you've had to come to a computer games forum for information?

Kind of pathetic if you think about it.


----------



## Taleweaver (Feb 21, 2019)

ERm...8 pages in 24 hours? Wow...

I tried reading some, but it was as I predicted. The moment you make a thread with an accusation, the discussion doesn't revolve around the issue but around personal ideologies.

Here's my answer: I don't have a fucking clue. And thanks to the nature of this thread, I only accidentally stumbled upon the meaning of "ICE" (Immigration and Customs Enforcement, right?  ).


If it was up to me: sure. Go ahead. Glad to see fox news pushing for stricter gun laws for a change. 

So while we're at it: how about we extend it to "inform ICE whenever ANYONE buys a gun...and have the potential gun owner deported out of the country." ? I know it's pretty radical, but you can bet that it'll seriously decrease gun violence in the US.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 21, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> You believe your news sources are so good. Yet after reading two of them you've had to come to a computer games forum for information.


First, I never said I come here to get my news (outside of gaming news), don't put words in my mouth.  Second, I do sometimes come here to post news and discuss news.  And third, this the current events and politics section, so that's obviously what you can expect to see discussed here.  You're not required to post in or read this section if it triggers you.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 21, 2019)

Xzi said:


> First, I never said I come here to get my news (outside of gaming news), don't put words in my mouth.  Second, I do sometimes come here to post news and discuss news.  And third, this the current events and politics section, so that's obviously what you can expect to see discussed here.  You're not required to post in or read this section if it triggers you.



Any objective party reading out messages will be able to tell you are quiet triggered currently and are simply projecting.

I made the assumption on good faith that you didn't not understand the news due to nativity. Now I see that quiet cynically you actively seek to exclude other views to let you maintain your own biased and unfounded views.

Like the rest of outrage culture.

I'd advise you to start reading a news with a wider base of views if you want to understand the news.

Or bury your head in the sand and complain that you're confused. Up to you.


----------



## Subtle Demise (Feb 21, 2019)

granville said:


> You said earlier in the thread that guns were for opposing a tyrannical government. I've heard this claim many times. In a hypothetical revolt, the rebellion would lose before it even began. Embarrassingly so.
> 
> No one stands any chance against the government's weaponry, this isn't the Civil War era 1800s where there was still a relatively even playing field among arms.


It wouldn't take much, actually. Several well-trained strike teams (if socialism ever became a thing, you can bet your ass major corporations would fund this)  could take out several key figures (mainly the chain of command: President, VP, Speaker of the House, and so on) and a good majority of Congress before boots even touched the ground. Besides, the bulk of the US Military is spread out all over the globe, and most of that specialized equipment is as well, and the time it would take to ship all that back over just wouldn't be feasible. Besides, who would order such a thing with the chain of command broken? Public executions also would have a serious impact on morale, and many soldiers would either desert or switch sides.

The worst thing a theoretical rebellion would have to face is the National Guard (has there ever been a recent attack on the White House or Capitol to measure the military response time? I'm willing to bet it's not as fast as government apologists would like to believe) and possibly UN troops. I'm kind of not so secretly hoping Trump is crazy enough to leave the UN (the fact that a foreign body is in charge of US drug policy is reason enough to leave). Anyway, it's all theoretical and probably won't ever happen in our lifetimes, and I myself have no plans to lead or take part in something like that (my children still need their father after all), so don't go reporting me as a terrorist or anything, just sharing my thoughts on what the Second Amendment means to me, and as someone mentioned earlier in the thread, even the Supreme Court agrees that civilians should be as well armed as our infantry.

As for the actual thread topic, the hypocrisy on both sides is sickening. Democrats: Guns are evil and everyone has  submit to background checks, except for a specific group of people. Republicans: why aren't we arresting this group of people who fail their background checks (even though we don't believe in background checks for firearms)? As if you needed any more proof that they are just two sides of the same coin. That's why I despise partisan politics and I think the whole voting based on the letter next to the person's name has to end.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------



LowEndC said:


> go watch the video with steven crowder when he interviews people and asks them if they think trump is an authoritarian and if we now have an oppresive government.
> please watch the whole thing.
> it is not biased. watch it, its funny
> 
> ...


The government has been oppressive since Lincoln suspended Habeus Corpus and declared that the Federal Government overruled states' rights. It's only recently that the states have begun to take some of that power back through marijuana legalization and defiance of federal gun laws.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 21, 2019)

Subtle Demise said:


> It wouldn't take much, actually. Several well-trained strike teams (if socialism ever became a thing, you can bet your ass major corporations would fund this)  could take out several key figures (mainly the chain of command: President, VP, Speaker of the House, and so on) and a good majority of Congress before boots even touched the ground. Besides, the bulk of the US Military is spread out all over the globe, and most of that specialized equipment is as well, and the time it would take to ship all that back over just wouldn't be feasible. Besides, who would order such a thing with the chain of command broken? Public executions also would have a serious impact on morale, and many soldiers would either desert or switch sides.
> 
> The worst thing a theoretical rebellion would have to face is the National Guard (has there ever been a recent attack on the White House or Capitol to measure the military response time? I'm willing to bet it's not as fast as government apologists would like to believe) and possibly UN troops. I'm kind of not so secretly hoping Trump is crazy enough to leave the UN (the fact that a foreign body is in charge of US drug policy is reason enough to leave). Anyway, it's all theoretical and probably won't ever happen in our lifetimes, and I myself have no plans to lead or take part in something like that (my children still need their father after all), so don't go reporting me as a terrorist or anything, just sharing my thoughts on what the Second Amendment means to me, and as someone mentioned earlier in the thread, even the Supreme Court agrees that civilians should be as well armed as our infantry.
> 
> ...



The Arab spring were examples of armed populace and what are your thoughts on how they played out?

For me Guns are obviously needed for effective revolution but I can't see such civil war breaking out in a decent democracy.

Democracy is its own vaccine against corruption  (effective in most cases).


----------



## Subtle Demise (Feb 21, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> The Arab spring were examples of armed populace and what are your thoughts on how they played out?
> 
> For me Guns are obviously needed for effective revolution but I can't see such civil war breaking out in a decent democracy.
> 
> Democracy is its own vaccine against corruption  (effective in most cases).


The US is a constitutional republic, meaning it's not a true democracy, rather we elect representives that vote on the issues for us. But when the representives no longer...well, represent us, what is supposed to happen in that case? Voting doesn't fix anything, because the majority of people only vote along two party lines, and won't give, say, Libertarianism a chance. Even the Green or Constitutionalist party would be a welcome change.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 21, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> Any objective party reading out messages will be able to tell you are quiet triggered currently and are simply projecting.


Okay, sure kid.  Now do you have anything to contribute to any discussion here, or did you only reply to me specifically to try to start a flame war?


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

If you are an illegal immigrant and you are apprehended by law enforcement for whatever reason, immigration should be contacted immediately. The violation is irrelevant, for all intents and purposes it could just as well be a parking ticket. If you're not a citizen or legal resident, deportation is the only correct course of action.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> The violation is irrelevant, for all intents and purposes it could just as well be a parking ticket. If you're not a citizen or legal resident, deportation is the only correct course of action.


If you're wanting to deport people for parking tickets, it's no wonder why people come here illegally in the first place.  They're going to be treated like second class citizens/illegals regardless.  The system is broken when there are a million ways to enter the US quickly but illegally, and only one way to enter the US legally, which can take years of paperwork.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> If you are an illegal immigrant and you are apprehended by law enforcement for whatever reason, immigration should be contacted immediately. The violation is irrelevant, for all intents and purposes it could just as well be a parking ticket. If you're not a citizen or legal resident, deportation is the only correct course of action.



"Papers please."

Generally a sure sign of an authoritarian regime.

Because it means police are randomly background checking randoms, hey maybe they thought you were illegal so they asked for papers. Then maybe you smelt of weed... Now randoms on the street, even citizens, are being searched without probably cause.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> "Papers please."
> 
> Generally a sure sign of an authoritarian regime.
> 
> Because it means police are randomly background checking randoms, hey maybe they thought you were illegal so they asked for papers. Then maybe you smelt of weed... Now randoms on the street, even citizens, are being searched without probably cause.


Is that something I said or is that a strawman you just built out of thin air to pretend that you have a point? The rule of law, separation of powers and legal/constitutional limitations still apply. I never said that I advocate for a police state, I said that illegal immigrants, when apprehended by the police, should be deported. It's a very simple concept that you choose to misinterpret in an attempt to muddy the waters. Let me give you an analogy - if you're a wanted felon on the run and you're being stopped by the police for a broken tail light, newsflash - your previous felony doesn't magically go away, you're going to get arrested. An illegal immigrant resides in the country illegaly, meaning he either illegally crossed the border *or* overstayed his visa. In either case that fact doesn't magically disappear in a cloud of ninja smoke - their very presence in the country is a violation of the rule of law in and out of itself and should be prosecuted accordingly. This is a non-controversial issue nearly universally around the globe, the only people who seem to have some kind of a moral hang-up about it are misguided Americans who seem to think that the U.S. is a magical plot of land that everyone is de facto entitled to inhabit. This is not the case - the U.S. is a sovereign country, and borders are one of the primary defining characteristics of a country.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Is that something I said or is that a strawman you just built out of thin air to pretend that you have a point? The rule of law, separation of powers and legal/constitutional limitations still apply. I never said that I advocate for a police state, I said that illegal immigrants, when apprehended by the police, should be deported. It's a very simple concept that you choose to misinterpret in an attempt to muddy the waters. Let me give you an analogy - if you're a wanted felon on the run and you're being stopped by the police for a broken tail light, newsflash - your previous felony doesn't magically go away, you're going to get arrested. An illegal immigrant resides in the country illegaly, meaning he either illegally crossed the border *or* overstayed his visa. In either case that fact doesn't magically disappear in a cloud of ninja smoke - their very presence in the country is a violation of the rule of law in and out of itself and should be prosecuted accordingly. This is a non-controversial issue nearly universally around the globe, the only people who seem to have some kind of moral hang-up about it are misguided Americans who seem to think that the U.S. is a magical plot of land that everyone is de facto entitled to inhabit. This is not the case - the U.S. is a sovereign country, and borders are one of the primary defining characteristics of a country.



All I am telling you is how those policies play out in history.

The real Americans did not think you people had a right to inhabit the land but here we are with your fat ass trying to kick out the next set of immigrants by being a keyboard warrior.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

Xzi said:


> If you're wanting to deport people for parking tickets, it's no wonder why people come here illegally in the first place.  They're going to be treated like second class citizens/illegals regardless.  The system is broken when there are a million ways to enter the US quickly but illegally, and only one way to enter the US legally, which can take years of paperwork.


Nice strawman. I don't want to deport people for parking incorrectly, I want to deport people who have no legal right to be in the country in the first place. How they get caught is irrelevant.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Nice strawman. I don't want to deport people for parking incorrectly, I want to deport people who have no legal right to be in the country in the first place. How they get caught is irrelevant.



Yeah "how they get caught is irrelevant" and the idea of probably cause are mutually exclusive.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> All I am telling you is how those policies play out in history.
> 
> The real Americans did not think you people had a right to inhabit the land but here we are with your fat ass trying to kick out the next set of immigrants by being a keyboard warrior.


That's cute. Who are the real Americans? Do you mean Native Americans (who aren't particularly native either, depending on how far back you want to go)? Most of the tribes had no concept of land ownership in the first place, many were migrating all the time, and often times they outright "sold" the land to the "invaders". Whatever the case may be, we're not talking about what happened centuries ago, we're talking about here and now, so stop deflecting. There is absolutely no legitimate reason why one law enforcement agency should conceal criminal activity of an apprehended individual from another law enforcement agency. If anything, they should work hand in hand for the purposes of law enforcement as equal members of the executive.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> That's cute. Who are the real Americans? Do you mean Native Americans (who aren't particularly native either, depending on how far back you want to go)? Most of the tribes had no concept of land ownership in the first place, many were migrating all the time, and often times they outright "sold" the land to the "invaders". Whatever the case may be, we're not talking about what happened centuries ago, we're talking about here and now, so stop deflecting. There is absolutely no legitimate reason why one law enforcement agency should conceal criminal activity of an apprehended individual from another law enforcement agency. If anything, they should work hand in hand for the purposes of law enforcement as equal members of the executive.



Cognitive dissonance much?


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> Yeah "how they get caught is irrelevant" and the idea of probably cause are mutually exclusive.


Nonsense. One has nothing to do with the other. If a police officer sees you smoking a meth pipe in your car, he has probable cause to search your vehicle. If that same officer finds an illegal weapon in your possession, he's not going to ignore it just because he didn't also hear a gunshot, that's asinine. The discovery of the weapon was a consequence of an already legal search. You have no case.


PrettyFly said:


> Cognitive dissonance much?


Explain. I thought I laid this out pretty plainly. You can't illegally cross a border of a country that doesn't exist.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Nice strawman. I don't want to deport people for parking incorrectly, I want to deport people who have no legal right to be in the country in the first place. How they get caught is irrelevant.


I understood you the first time, that doesn't make your opinion on this any less extreme.  You rarely even interact with a person who issues you a parking ticket, and its typically tied to your license plate number rather than a name.  Meter maids are not ICE officers.

The thing about illegal immigration that seemingly keeps going over your head is this: it's a game being played by corporate America.  Mexican labor only stays cheap if it stays illegal.  There's a reason why it remains so easy to enter the country illegally, and why we only ever discuss ineffective solutions like walls.  Gotta keep Trump's properties staffed, after all, and god forbid he has to pay minimum wage.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Explain. I thought I laid this out pretty plainly. You can't illegally cross a border of a country that doesn't exist.



He's what will happen. You go a small border town in the US, you're not white and a cop walks over and asks for ID. He makes up a lie about you smelling of weed and makes sure you're not illegal.

If they are not illegal he probably hassles them for not being white, and if they are illegal his violation of all the legals civil rights he intruded on goes justified in his eyes.

You can try and justify this stuff to yourself but like the saying goes to predict the future all you have to do is read the history.


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## PanTheFaun (Feb 25, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> He's what will happen. You go a small border town in the US, you're not white and a cop walks over and asks for ID. He makes up a lie about you smelling of weed and makes sure you're not illegal.
> 
> If they are not illegal he probably hassles them for not being white, and if they are illegal his violation of all the legals civil rights he intruded on goes justified in his eyes.
> 
> You can try and justify this stuff to yourself but like the saying goes to predict the future all you have to do is read the history.


Don't use the race card. It makes your argument invalid.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

Xzi said:


> I understood you the first time, that doesn't make your opinion on this any less extreme.  You rarely even interact with a person who issues you a parking ticket, and its typically tied to your license plate number rather than a name.  Meter maids are not ICE officers.
> 
> The thing about illegal immigration that seemingly keeps going over your head is this: it's a game being played by corporate America.  Mexican labor only stays cheap if it stays illegal.  There's a reason why it remains so easy to enter the country illegally, and why we only ever discuss ineffective solutions like walls.


No, the thing about illegal immigration is primarily people who are in the country when they shouldn't be. It's nice that you want to address the root causes, I approve, but the symptoms should be treated as well. You can do both simultaneously - disincentivise illegal immigration by streamlining the immigration process *and* actually punish those who choose not to go through it. Illegal immigration is an individual choice first and foremost, and choices have consequences. Nobody falls asleep in Mexico and wakes up in El Paso the next day because a strong gust of wind blew them across the border and the mere suggestion that this is anyone's fault but the immigrant's is asinine.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> Don't use the race card. It makes your argument invalid.



I will take that as you conceding.



Xzi said:


> The thing about illegal immigration that seemingly keeps going over your head is this: it's a game being played by corporate America.  Mexican labor only stays cheap if it stays illegal. .



Yup. People forget this, it's also why corporate America was a HUGE driver of women's working rights. Get women in the workplace, lower wages, then sell them shit men don't want to buy.

Cheap labour = Cheap productivity. If a country can't turn cheap productivity into profit its broken.

Illegal immigrants are the best thing since slavery for productivity.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> He's what will happen. You go a small border town in the US, you're not white and a cop walks over and asks for ID. He makes up a lie about you smelling of weed and makes sure you're not illegal.
> 
> If they are not illegal he probably hassles them for not being white, and if they are illegal his violation of all the legals civil rights he intruded on goes justified in his eyes.
> 
> You can try and justify this stuff to yourself but like the saying goes to predict the future all you have to do is read the history.


You are assuming underhanded action from a theoretical police officer that doesn't exist to make a point. You literally dreamt up a problem to counter a real-life solution to a real-life issue. It's not my job to fight imaginary scenarios - what do you want me to say? That the police should be well-trained and held to a high standard of morality? That was my position to begin with, I don't disagree with that. I do disagree with stereotyping based on profession and/or race. Your imaginary scenario has nothing to do with whether or not somebody is in the country legally or not. What I find curious, and what is evidence of the fact that you didn't think this through at all, is that you don't trust the police to do their job honestly, but you do trust that they won't call ICE on people. You're literally holding two logically inconsistent and incompatible ideas in your head at the same time. But what do I know, I suffer from cognitive dissonance, right?


----------



## PanTheFaun (Feb 25, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> I will take that as you conceding.


Incorrect. No cop goes out of their way to mess with someone just because they are a different race.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

PanTheFaun said:


> Incorrect. No cop goes out of their way to mess with someone just because they are a different race.


"Muh institutional racism" is just a convenient way to stifle debate and halt any form of reform, it's not an actual argument and it shouldn't be humoured.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> No, the thing about illegal immigration is primarily people who are in the country when they shouldn't be. It's nice that you want to address the root causes, I approve, but the symptoms should be treated as well.
> 
> Nobody falls asleep in Mexico and wakes up in El Paso the next day because a strong gust of wind blew them across the border and the mere suggestion that this is anyone's fault but the immigrant's is asinine.


Nine times out of ten that choice is made because of the jobs that are available for illegals in the US.  Treating the symptoms does absolutely nothing until we treat the root causes, and we've never even taken step one in that regard.  At the end of the day, even the most anti-immigration president we've ever had employs illegals, so I don't expect any meaningful changes to the system to come from him.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

Xzi said:


> Nine times out of ten that choice is made because of the jobs that are available for illegals in the US.  Treating the symptoms does absolutely nothing until we treat the root causes, and we've never even taken step one in that regard.  At the end of the day, even the most anti-immigration president we've ever had employs illegals, so I don't expect any meaningful changes to the system to come from him.


How is this an argument? "More will come anyways because of X, so let's just leave them alone"? That's not how the law works. Many, many more people will be murdered in the future, that doesn't mean that we should halt all prosecution of killers going forward because "we haven't addressed the root cause". Either there is a law or there isn't, either it is meaningful and applied or it doesn't mean anything at all, there is no middle position.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> You are assuming underhanded action from a theoretical police officer that doesn't exist to make a point.



And I'll take this as you conceding.

Let me ask you this, why do you guys come here to circle jerk like this?

Does it make you feel better about your presumably sub-par lives to plot like Pinky and the Brain?

Because your "no policeman has ever been racist" argument sounds suspiciously like denial and is obviously false.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> How is this an argument? "More will come anyways because of X, so let's just leave them alone"? That's not how the law works. Many, many more people will be murdered in the future, that doesn't mean that we should halt all prosecution of killers going forward because "we haven't addressed the root cause". Either there is a law or there isn't, either it is meaningful and applied or it doesn't mean anything at all, there is no middle position.


How is it not an argument?  It's an argument for removing the availability of jobs for illegals, which immediately removes the appeal of immigrating illegally.

Here's an easy solution: going forward, ten years jail time as a mandatory minimum for the CEO/company head for _each_ illegal worker employed.  Watch how quick those open positions evaporate, and how fast illegal immigration drops off after that.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

Xzi said:


> How is it not an argument?  It's an argument for removing the availability of jobs for illegals, which immediately removes the appeal of immigrating illegally.
> 
> Here's an easy solution: going forward, ten years jail time as a mandatory minimum for the CEO/company head for _each_ illegal worker employed.  Watch how quick those open positions evaporate, and how fast illegal immigration drops off after that.



Heh, guess you just realised you're opposite sides of the same authoritarian coin.


----------



## regnad (Feb 25, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> Also, why hasn't CNN, CBS, NBC, ABC, etc reported this story? It _is_ newsworthy, isn't it???



I feel like that's your answer right there.

Either 1) the libtard media is in a grand conspiracy, a conspiracy which includes every single media outlet, and FOX News alone is brave enough to reveal the truth, or 2) it's being intentionally misrepresented by FOX news in order to stir up the MAGAers.

What's your guess?


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> And I'll take this as you conceding.
> 
> Let me ask you this, why do you guys come here to circle jerk like this?
> 
> ...


You can take it however you like, I'm not in charge of your reading comprehension. Ultimately you're stereotyping. You just said that imaginary Evil Cop will assume that a tan person is in the country illegally while you yourself assume that every cop will just make up a probable cause to justify arrest. You also don't trust Evil Cop to be fair and expect him to act maliciously in spite of a piece of paper called the law, but you trust that he will not maliciously call ICE in accordance to another piece of paper. So does he follow instructions or doesn't he? You're a walking, talking contradiction and you can't even see it when it's pointed out to you. I came here to voice an opinion on the subject, you didn't like my opinion, it's not the end of the world.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 25, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> Heh, guess you just realised you're opposite sides of the same authoritarian coin.


Just offering a real solution.  It's like Foxi said: there shouldn't be a lot of leniency for people breaking the law, and employers know up front whether they're hiring a legal citizen or not.  Short of real punishments for employers, everything else about the immigration debate is largely meaningless banter.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> You can take it however you like, I'm not on charge of your reading comprehension. Ultimately you're stereotyping. You just said that imaginary Evil Cop will assume that a tan person is in the country illegally while you yourself assume that every cop will just make up a probable cause to justify arrest. You also don't trust Evil Cop to be fair and expect him to act maliciously in spite of a piece of paper called the law, but you trust that he will not maliciously call ICE in accordance to another piece of papee. So does he follow instructions or doesn't he? You're a walking, talking contradiction and you can't even see it when it's pointed out to you.



The best thing about the US is (or was?) that safeguards are built in. The idea was to dream of a perfect world but build for one full of evils.

The reality that people are racist, every human is racist. Tribalism is built into every fibre of our being.

So when you make laws you have to factor for that. You might think of it as a "strawman" but it's just worst case scenario thinking.

Laws written with the best intentions will be used with the worst and it's riddled with unintended consequences.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

Xzi said:


> Just offering a real solution.  It's like Foxi said: there shouldn't be a lot of leniency for people breaking the law, and employers know up front whether they're hiring a legal citizen or not.  Short of real punishments for employers, everything else about the immigration debate is largely meaningless banter.


I agree with you. Employers who choose to hire illegal immigrants should be punished, and the punishment should be severe, involving revoking licenses where applicable. This part of the equation has been neglected and it's a big mistake - it certainly incentives operating in the country illegally and should be addressed.



PrettyFly said:


> The best thing about the US is (or was?) that safeguards are built in. The idea was to dream of a perfect world but build for one full of evils.
> 
> The reality that people are racist, every human is racist. Tribalism is built into every fibre of our being.
> 
> ...


Laws are already made with the express expectation that they will not be followed, that's why the criminal code exists in the first place. If you don't have the gut to punish criminals, you have no business talking about penalties in the legal system. Either you're willing to enforce the law or you're proposing anarchy. The laws are only laws when they're binding.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Laws are already made with the express expectation that they will not be followed, that's why the criminal code exists in the first place. If you don't have the gut to punish criminals, you have no business talking about penalties in the legal system. Either you're willing to enforce the law or you're proposing anarchy. The laws are only laws when they're binding.



In case I've missed something what precisely about illegals are you so opposed to?

Is it their effect on the labour market?

Is it simply because that's the law?


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 25, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> In case I've missed something what precisely about illegals are you so opposed to?
> 
> Is it their effect on the labour market?
> 
> Is it simply because that's the law?


However I answer this question, it will not be satisfactory to you. I've had this conversation before, y'know. The beauty of it is that I really don't have to justify my position - dura lex, sed lex. There's absolutely no reason why I should feel comfortable with unvetted individuals operating illegally in the country. It's not fair to me as a citizen, it's not fair to legal immigrants who worked hard to earn their legal status and, finally, it's not even fair to the illegal immigrants themselves who cannot access the multitude of services provided by the state, or even their own Social Security, as they primarily use fake SS numbers or SS numbers belonging to deceased citizens. I'm an immigrant myself, I came to the country I live in legally. I legally found employment, I recently purchased my first house and I pay my taxes on time. I hope that any other immigrant would pay their host country the same amount of respect and follow the law of the land. It's the host that welcomes the guest, not the other way around, and guests must necessarily follow the rules of the host. Those rules may not always seem fair, but the great thing about being a legal immigrant is having the ability to influence those rules through participating in the democratic process. While we're on the subject of the democratic process, it's about time the U.S. implemented Voter ID nationwide, it's long overdue.


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## PrettyFly (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> However I answer this question, it will not be satisfactory to you.



Not looking to argue here just understand.

I think I am hearing that part of it is about "earning the privileges" the US offers you and you worked hard for.

That is of course very reasonable.

Well what about cutting back the welfare state in the US? Would you be more open to immigration then?

Personally I don't like paying for anyone. I don't care if they are English (like I am) or Polish. As far as I am concerned a bum is a bum.

Cutting back on the welfare state would "treat the root cause" as it were IMO. 

What do you think of that?


----------



## Xzi (Feb 25, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> While we're on the subject of the democratic process, it's about time the U.S. implemented Voter ID nationwide, it's long overdue.


It really isn't, documented voter fraud is nearly non-existent.  Election fraud is more of a pressing issue, but a different issue.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

PrettyFly said:


> Not looking to argue here just understand.
> 
> I think I am hearing that part of it is about "earning the privileges" the US offers you and you worked hard for.
> 
> ...


I am most certainly for cutting back on welfare. Any welfare recipient should be aware of the fact that welfare exists in order to enable them to go through a rough patch in life, it's not a primary source of income.


Xzi said:


> It really isn't, documented voter fraud is nearly non-existent.  Election fraud is more of a pressing issue, but a different issue.


This is another instance of two separate issues that can be addressed simultaneously. I am opposed to illegal immigrants voting just as much as I am opposed to dead citizens voting. I'm not a fan of magically disappearing/appearing ballots either, but that's not the subject of this thread. My point was that any voter heading to the ballot box should be expected to prove that they are in fact entitled to vote, it's another non-issue in every country besides the United States. In my country they say that some people "can't see the forest for the trees" - you can't address the simple and obvious problems, you're just too busy arguing about the minutiae.


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## tatripp (Feb 26, 2019)

RaptorDMG said:


> I agree that police should be notified when someone tries to buy a gun when they're not allowed although I still don't get why Americans need to have guns in the first place



Guns and free speech are awesome!!! 'MERICA
-We need guns to defend ourselves against tyrannical governments (it wouldn't be the first time our country had to do this)
-We need guns to protect our homes 
-We trust our citizens enough to let them use weapons
-They are so fun to shoot


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## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> You can't address the simple and obvious problems, you're just too busy arguing about the minutiae.


It's not minutiae, as usual the difference in opinion between us comes down to who is actually responsible for the problem.  Your instinct seems to be to blame the people living in this country first, whereas I blame the people at the top who like to manufacture misinformation and wedge issues for everybody else to bicker about.  The election in North Carolina last year is a prime example of the candidate himself orchestrating election fraud.  Yet he's facing no real consequences.  Until we fix _that_, the double standard under the law for wealthy/connected individuals in this country, not much else is going to get done.  You can't fix things from the bottom up when it's clear that things at the top are most broken.


----------



## Viri (Feb 26, 2019)

RaptorDMG said:


> I agree that police should be notified when someone tries to buy a gun when they're not allowed although I still don't get why Americans need to have guns in the first place


Because they're cool! I own two hand guns. I might get myself an AR-15 in the future.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

tatripp said:


> Guns and free speech are awesome!!! 'MERICA
> -We need guns to defend ourselves against tyrannical governments (it wouldn't be the first time our country had to do this)
> -We need guns to protect our homes
> -We trust our citizens enough to let them use weapons
> -They are so fun to shoot


There's a simpler reason - the presumption of innocence. There's no reason for the state to assume that the weapon you purchase will be used to commit a crime, the reason for your purchase is yours only and none of the state's business. Anything short of a right to bear arms is overstepping the boundaries, the state should not intrude in the private lives of its citizens. What you do with your money is up to you as long as you excercising your freedom doesn't violate anyone else's rights. People argue about the immutable right to self-defense and self-determination till they're blue in the face when the most obvious answer here is that it's just nobody else's business for as long as you don't take your gun and aim it at another person without provocation/justification.



Xzi said:


> It's not minutiae, as usual the difference in opinion between us comes down to who is actually responsible for the problem.  Your instinct seems to be to blame the people living in this country first, whereas I blame the people at the top who like to manufacture misinformation and wedge issues for everybody else to bicker about.  The election in North Carolina last year is a prime example of the candidate himself orchestrating election fraud.  Yet he's facing no real consequences.  Until we fix _that_, the double standard under the law for wealthy/connected individuals in this country, not much else is going to get done.  You can't fix things from the bottom up when it's clear that things at the top are most broken.


Any form of accountability starts with personal responsibility. I don't look at things from a systemic lens because I treat the United States as unique in the sense that it's a country built by industrious individuals which is only loosely tied with common values. It's a melting pot of different races, religions and creeds who all came together to form a nation based on the power of the individual. I believe that the United States has flourished over the centuries specifically because the government was minimal and marginalised and the individual was allowed to excercise immutable freedoms, this state of matters has only changed in relatively recent history. As such, I focus on individuals as opposed to the system. With that said, I would like the "people at the top" to be held to the same standard and punished accordingly when it is warranted - they need to be held responsible for any wrongdoing just as much as anybody else.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Any form of accountability starts with personal responsibility. I don't look at things from a systemic lens because I treat the United States as unique in the sense that it's a country built by industrious individuals which is only loosely tied with common values. It's a melting pot of different races, religions and creeds who all came together to form a nation based on the power of the individual. I believe that the United States has flourished over the centuries specifically because the government was minimal and marginalised and the individual was allowed to excercise immutable freedoms, this state of matters has only changed in relatively recent history. As such, I focus on individuals as opposed to the system.


How do you square your beliefs with the fact that the US' most prosperous decades were also those in which we had our highest marginal tax rates?  Because it seems to me that is at the core of so many modern day issues, thus the problem _is_ systemic and also has a systemic solution.  I'm in agreement with Rutger Bregman on that one.


----------



## PrettyFly (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> I am most certainly for cutting back on welfare. Any welfare recipient should be aware of the fact that welfare exists in order to enable them to go through a rough patch in life, it's not a primary source of income.



Is the cheap labour an issue to you?

Because it seems like with cut back welfare any illegal who comes would have to work hard for cheap.

Isn’t this ideal?


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> How do you square your beliefs with the fact that the US' most prosperous decades were also those in which we had our highest marginal tax rates?  Because it seems to me that is at the core of so many modern day issues, thus the problem _is_ systemic and also has a systemic solution.  I'm in agreement with Rutger Bregman on that one.


I can justify it by saying that it's simply untrue. Which decade would you like to tackle first?



PrettyFly said:


> Is the cheap labour an issue to you?
> 
> Because it seems like with cut back welfare any illegal who comes would have to work hard for cheap.
> 
> Isn’t this ideal?


I don't have an issue with that, I'm against the idea of a minimum wage. Market forces should decide what the value of someone's labour is - if we're talking about systemic issues that motivate employers to hire illegal immigrants, that's one of them. A minimum wage for labour that simply doesn't justify it directly incentives hiring illegal immigrants who do not have to be paid said minimum wage - they can be given half of it under the table. This directly undercuts the ability of low skilled citizens to compete on the job market.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> I can justify it by saying that it's simply untrue. Which decade would you like to tackle first?


AFAIK it wasn't until the mid-80s that the marginal tax rate finally dipped below ~70%.  Every decade prior to that had about the same rate or even higher.  The 1950s is the decade the right-wing always considers the "golden age."  To some extent I can see why, you could buy a house, car, and support an entire family on one income.  The marginal tax rate also happened to be 90%.

Income inequality has been consistently skyrocketing since the 90s, and again it's easy to see how that would tie in to so many other national issues.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> AFAIK it wasn't until the mid-80s that the marginal tax rate finally dipped below ~70%.  Every decade prior to that had about the same rate or even higher.  The 1950s is the decade the right-wing always considers the "golden age."  To some extent I can see why, you could buy a house, car, and support an entire family on one income.  The marginal tax rate also happened to be 90%.
> 
> Income inequality has been consistently skyrocketing since the 90s, and again it's easy to see how that would tie in to so many other national issues.


The right wing does not consider the 1950's to be a golden age of anything, the 1950's were a decade of tepid growth after the war. The country was ripe with economic opportunities simply because the war drew to a close. As you might imagine, the casualties of said war greatly reduced the supply of able bodied workers, but the demand was high. This relation stimulated wages upwards, hence the relative prosperity of citizens. The top marginal tax rate was 91%, however tax avoidance was high, exemptions were plentiful and the actual effective top marginal tax rate was 42%. With those factors accounted for, tax revenues were relatively the same and the top 1% paid in just as much as they have prior, in many cases less than before.



https://taxfoundation.org/taxes-rich-1950-not-high/

If we're taking about prosperous times, we should talk about the roaring 20's instead. The only problem with that decade was caused by market speculation which eventually led to a crash, which is not unusual on a market that's speculative by nature.

As far as prosperity goes, people are the most prosperous when they are taxed the least and when the demand for their labour is high. The relationship between tax revenues and tax rates is not linear - taxing people at higher rates does not mean that revenues will be higher. For instance, if you told me that I am allowed to earn X and anything I earn past the point of X will be automatically seized by the state, I am simply not going to work past that point because I don't fancy being a slave. What you've effectively done is you kept revenue stagnant, but you killed my productivity and therefore stifled the economy. I'm taxed the same amount, but there is less wealth being generated over time. There is a golden mean somewhere between 0% and 100%, and it's not immediately obvious where that golden mean is, it's subject to fierce debate.

*EDIT:* Just so that we're 100% clear, I consider any form of an income tax to be a punitive tax on the industrious, I'm simply playing the devil's advocate here. If I can't get rid of the income tax, marginal tax rates and all of the assorted nonsense, I will certainly advocate for lower, not higher taxes.


----------



## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> The right wing does not consider the 1950's to be a golden age of anything, the 1950's were a decade of tepid growth after the war. The country was ripe with economic opportunities simply because the war drew to a close. As you might imagine, the casualties of said war greatly reduced the supply of able bodied workers, but the demand was high. This relation stimulated wages upwards, hence the relative prosperity of citizens. The top marginal tax rate was 91%, however tax avoidance was high, exemptions were plentiful and the actual effective top marginal tax rate was 42%. With those factors accounted for, tax revenues were relatively the same and the top 1% paid in just as much as they have prior, in many cases less than before the war.
> View attachment 158933
> https://taxfoundation.org/taxes-rich-1950-not-high/
> 
> ...


Basically to simplify your post. Higher taxes doesn’t always more more collected. We would have to tax at a rate that’s not too high that’ll discourage people, but not too low that’ll cause us to hardly collect any taxes at all and not fund programs.

In either case less is collected and we should find a good middle ground tax rate that’s actually productive.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> Basically to simplify your post. Higher taxes doesn’t always more more collected. We would have to tax at a rate that’s not too high that’ll discourage people, but not too low that’ll cause us to hardly collect any taxes at all and not fund programs.
> 
> In either case less is collected and we should find a good middle ground tax rate that’s actually productive.


Sometimes less is more. I want the government to incentivise private citizens to be industrious as opposed to fleecing them at every opportunity. The more industrious the nation is the higher the receipts, not just from the income tax, but from all taxation. Let's not forget that the income tax itself was supposed to be a countermeasure against an expected loss of tariff revenue, in just a few years it became the primary source of revenue for the federal government instead, and the government has been growing ever since. At some point between 1913 and now the economy became a game of Hungry Hungry Hippos.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> The right wing does not consider the 1950's to be a golden age of anything, the 1950's were a decade of tepid growth after the war. The country was ripe with economic opportunities simply because the war drew to a close. As you might imagine, the casualties of said war greatly reduced the supply of able bodied workers, but the demand was high. This relation stimulated wages upwards, hence the relative prosperity of citizens. The top marginal tax rate was 91%, however tax avoidance was high, exemptions were plentiful and the actual effective top marginal tax rate was 42%. With those factors accounted for, tax revenues were relatively the same and the top 1% paid in just as much as they have prior, in many cases less than before the war.
> View attachment 158933
> https://taxfoundation.org/taxes-rich-1950-not-high/


The effective tax rate means little to nothing without taking the highest wages of the period as well as wage disparity into consideration.  I'd wager the rich in the 1950s still ended up paying a greater portion of their total income, especially if you account for inflation.



Foxi4 said:


> For instance, if you told me that I am allowed to earn X and anything I earn past the point of X will be automatically seized by the state, I am simply not going to work past that point because I don't fancy being a slave. What you've effectively done is you kept revenue stagnant, but you killed my productivity and therefore stifled the economy.


This is nonsense.  We're talking about people making over 10 million a year.  Rarely are they contributing any actual labor or value to the economy themselves, that's what their employees do.


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## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

@Foxi4 People want introduce high taxes to discourage people from smoking or discourage people from eating junk food.

Yet that same logic from the same people doesn’t apply to what that’ll cause to business.

I think they are mostly focused on the rich avoid paying taxes. Which is why the argument doesn’t register.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> The effective tax rate means little to nothing without taking the highest wages of the period as well as wage disparity into consideration.  I'd wager the rich in the 1950s still ended up paying a greater portion of their total income, especially if you account for inflation.


You can say that, but you have no evidence to support that. Actual statistics show conclusively that the tax receipts of the federal government were equivalent to those before the higher marginal tax rates were introduced.


> This is nonsense.  We're talking about people making over 10 million a year.  Rarely are they contributing any actual labor or value to the economy themselves, that's what their employees do.


Define "labour". It's easy for you to say that these people don't actually do anything, but I somehow doubt that you're earning in excess of 10 million a year, even though you seem to be a doing a lot, or at least talking a lot. Again, if you're going to tell me that anything I earn past 10 million dollars will be seized and I already know that I earn, say, 15 million a year, I'm not going to give you 5 million dollars - I'm just going to move because I can afford to. You're not going to see 90% of my income past that bracket, and if you play rough, you're not going to see any of my income at all because the cost of me selling my assets and relocating is lower than the cost of your ridiculous Robin Hood-style plan to steal my money.


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## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Again, if you're going to tell me that anything I earn past 10 million dollars will be seized and I already know that I earn, say, 15 million a year, I'm not going to give you 5 million dollars - I'm just going to move because I can afford to.


This is the same threat the rich made over FDR's New Deal, and it rang empty then just as it rings empty now.  The rich continue to live and operate in the states with the highest tax rates, because they're fully aware that those are the states where people also have higher wages and the most buying power.  They're also aware that the second they take their ball and go home, a new small business will pop up to take their place and take their sales.

Hell, we're so far down the rabbit hole now that we're to the point of several billionaires asking to have their own taxes raised.  The current rate of growth in income inequality is unsustainable, and even several people at the top can see that.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> This is the same threat the rich made over FDR's New Deal, and it rang empty then just as it rings empty now.  The rich continue to live and operate in the states with the highest tax rates, because they're fully aware that those are the states where people also have higher wages and the most buying power.  They're also aware that the second they take their ball and go home, a new small business will pop up to take their place and take their sales.
> 
> Hell, we're so far down the rabbit hole now that we're to to point of several billionaires asking to have their own taxes raised.


FDR's New Deal was terrible and prolonged The Great Depression, he was far from a saviour, but that's neither here nor there. We're talking about the 1%, which is in fact capable of moving their assets rapidly when the circumstances call for it. The present administration is favourable to them, so there is no sudden exodus. Things are very different in Britain with BREXIT looming over future economic prospects or Venezuela which is in the middle of a financial crisis and is, slowly but surely, heading towards a possible coup d'etat:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/02/opinion/sunday/millionaires-fleeing-migration.html

It's almost as if millionaires were migrating whenever their fortunes are at risk, funny how that works.

Now, back to labour. In case it's not painfully obvious how the rich contribute to the economy, they generate jobs by opening/maintaining businesses, they stimulate industry growth via investing capital and, ultimately, they make the decisions in their own companies. I know that as a left-winger you don't consider anything short of shoveling coal to be beneficial to the economy or to be a form of labour, but that's not how it works. In order for the average Joe to work an average job, there has to be an exceptional Steve who is willing to stake his own money in the process of creating an environment that enables Joe to work. The Steves of this world take the risks, the Joes can jump from company to company. Let's not forget that the gross majority of businesses in general fail within the first few years - we're talking about a figure in the whereabouts of 90%, depending on where you look. The businesses that do work long term are clearly doing something right, primarily thanks to their management which, ultimately, chooses the path the company takes on the market. Think of it as a ship - it takes many sailors to run it, but the captain decides where it goes and his decisions make it sink or swim.

*EDIT:* Just as a side note, why is wealth inequality bad? I've never heard a good argument on that subject. It seems to me that all this nonsense about some people having more money than others is motivated by envy more than anything else.


----------



## Captain_N (Feb 26, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> https://www.floridadaily.com/democr...-ice-when-illegal-immigrants-try-to-buy-guns/
> 
> https://www.foxnews.com/politics/de...gal-immigrants-fail-firearm-background-checks
> 
> ...



They do just want to control you. crazy Bernie and Cortez are socialists that want the government to have more control over you. They want you to rely on the government for income and higher level schooling. I for the life of me, dont know why people think more government is better. doe anyone here want a 70% tax rate?


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## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> FDR's New Deal was terrible and prolonged The Great Depression, he was far from a saviour, but that's neither here nor there. We're talking about the 1%, which is in fact capable of moving their assets rapidly when the circumstances call for it. The present administration is favourable to them, so there is no sudden exodus. Things are very different in Britain with BREXIT looming over future economic prospects or Venezuela which is in the middle of a financial crisis and is, slowly but surely, heading towards a possible coup d'etat:
> 
> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/02/opinion/sunday/millionaires-fleeing-migration.html
> 
> ...


Speaking of Ships

Rich people jokes



--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------



Captain_N said:


> The do just wont to control you. crazy Bernie and Cortez are socialists that want the government to have more control over you. They want you to rely on the government for income and higher level schooling. I for the life of me, dont know why people think more government is better. doe anyone here want a 70% tax rate?


Oh My God, Cortez is literal the lefts Donald Trump


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> Speaking of Ships
> 
> Rich people jokes
> 
> Oh My God, Cortez is literal the lefts Donald Trump


That was quite funny, Jobs was always a good speaker. As for Cortez, she's anything but a left-wing Donald Trump - she's a bartender with the IQ of a kumquat. Whenever she, like, tries to say something, I, like, can't help but get, like, an aneurism. It baffles me that, like, she got elected. Like, what is even going on? Is this reality? Did I mention that she says "like" a lot? This woman unironically wrote that she wants to level and rebuild every single building in America, get rid of air travel completely and build railroads across the ocean, and it doesn't matter how much it will cost, all what matters are "the future benefits we will reap". What's even funnier is that people actually took the time to calculate the cost of her Green New Deal, going into multiple trillion dollar estimates, in an effort to argue against a proposal that's automatically ridiculous and untenable just on the face of it. It's like trying to argue that we shouldn't send a manned expedition into the Sun - yeah, no kidding, we know. I sincerely hope that the media give her all the attention, I really do want her to be the new young face of the Democratic party, it makes the alternatives look much more appealing.


----------



## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> That was quite funny, Jobs was always a good speaker. As for Cortez, she's anything but a left-wing Donald Trump - she's a bartender with the IQ of a kumquat. Whenever she, like, tries to say something, I, like, can't help but get, like, an aneurism. It baffles me that, like, she got elected. Like, what is even going on? Is this reality? Did I mention that she says "like" a lot? This woman unironically wrote that she wants to level and rebuild every single building in America, get rid of air travel completely and build railroads across the ocean, and it doesn't matter how much it will cost, what matters is "the future benefits we will reap". What's even funnier is that people actually took the time to calculate the cost of her Green New Deal in an effort to argue against a proposal that's automatically ridiculous and untenable just on the face of it. I sincerely hope that the media give her all the attention, I really do want her to be the new young face of the Democratic party, it makes the alternatives look much more appealing.


The Green New Deal is less about environmentalism and more about Socialist Agenda.

And the Jobs and tax revenue lost in New York with the recent Amazon No deal. I was smacking my head so hard. She thought tax breaks was actual money the city had and was giving to Amazon. 

She has a degree in Economics by the way. How she got it I have no idea. She’s going to be popular though. Become a millionaire and rise to power because media constantly covers her, just like they did Trump. It’s free screen time for her.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> The Green New Deal is less about environmentalism and more about Socialist Agenda.
> 
> And the Jobs and tax revenue lost in New York with the recent Amazon No deal. I was smacking my head so hard. She thought tax breaks was actual money the city had and was giving to Amazon.
> 
> She has a degree in Economics by the way. How she got it I have no idea. She’s going to be popular though. Become a millionaire and rise to power because media constantly covers her, just like they did Trump. It’s free screen time for her.


I too can't help but wonder how qualified she is considering the fact that she keeps embarrassing herself on national television with her lack of knowledge on the most basic economic or political concepts. Her primary debate strategy seems to be dodging the question. Not that it matters, I think she'll fizzle out quite quickly, it's a fad. She's the left's sweetheart because of "young generation, girl power, yay!", but eventually they too will realise that this vessel is, unfortunately, empty.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> We're talking about the 1%, which is in fact capable of moving their assets rapidly when the circumstances call for it.


The 1% probably never need to move their money, it's already positioned so that they pay as little in taxes as possible.  Save those those few billionaires who realize what a bad outcome this creates, anyway.



Foxi4 said:


> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/02/opinion/sunday/millionaires-fleeing-migration.html
> 
> It's almost as if millionaires were migrating whenever their fortunes are at risk, funny how that works.


That's an opinion piece.  I just told you that conservatives tend to be hypocritical on this issue.  The Koch brothers will tell you that South Carolina is the best state for business, yet they mostly sleep in New York.  So forgive me if I can't take this type of opinion seriously.



Foxi4 said:


> *EDIT:* Just as a side note, why is wealth inequality bad? I've never heard a good argument on that subject. It seems to me that all this nonsense about some people having more money than others is motivated by envy more than anything else.


_Income_ inequality, not wealth inequality.  I don't really care how much money someone inherits from their parents, unless they break the law to circumvent taxes on it or something like that.  The issue is that Americans' buying power is in decline, and has been for some time.  We're one of the richest countries on Earth, but you sure as shit wouldn't know it walking down any main street in the Midwest.  The buildings, streets, and bridges haven't been updated since the 70s.  Small businesses are extinct.  It looks more like Eastern Europe.

Perhaps you don't have any issue with letting large swaths of the US rot into cultural and economic wastelands, but it doesn't quite sit right with me.



Foxi4 said:


> As for Cortez, she's anything but a left-wing Donald Trump


You're absolutely correct, there is no left-wing equivalent to Donald Trump.  The left-wing has never run a vapid reality TV star for president, and probably never will.



Foxi4 said:


> I too can't help but wonder how qualified she is considering the fact that she keeps embarrassing herself on national television with her lack of knowledge on the most basic economic or political concepts. Her primary debate strategy seems to be dodging the question. Not that it matters, I think she'll fizzle out quite quickly, it's a fad. She's the left's sweetheart because of "young generation, girl power, yay!", but eventually they too will realise that this vessel is, unfortunately, empty.


She's a first-year congresswoman and you're holding her to a higher standard than you do for the president.  It's also the right-wing that highlights everything she does, the left is just sitting back and laughing at their pathetic attempts to smear her.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> The 1% probably never need to move their money, it's already positioned so that they pay as little in taxes as possible.  Save those those few billionaires who realize what a bad outcome this creates, anyway.
> 
> 
> That's an opinion piece.  I just told you that conservatives tend to be hypocritical on this issue.  The Koch brothers will tell you that South Carolina is the best state for business, yet they mostly sleep in New York.  So forgive me if I can't take this type of opinion seriously.
> ...


Connect the dots for me, how is an outdated infrastructure in any way connected to income inequality? We've already established that marginal tax rates have minimal effect, if any, on the total tax receipts. In fact, tax revenue hit a record high under Trump, and that's after a significant tax cut, which further disproves your theory that a tax hike would increase revenues, but that's of course besides the point.

I fail to see a direct correlation between *personal income* of U.S. citizens and *public* infrastructure spending. It would seem to me that if the states lack funding for their infrastructure, they're spending money frivolously elsewhere, and if it's as bad as you claim, they weren't spending it frivolously since yesterday, nor since 2016, it must've been a while. How outdated is the infrastructure? A decade, would you say? Barack Obama-level outdated, perhaps?

I jest, but what I'm basically saying is that this is a big government problem. You are funding an army of pencil pushers instead of efficiently spending money wherever it needs to go, it has nothing to do with taxation and everything to do with administration. What I will say is that the best way to revitalise a neighbourhood is to allow private business to prosper - this is tried and true.


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## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> I too can't help but wonder how qualified she is considering the fact that she keeps embarrassing herself on national television with her lack of knowledge on the most basic economic or political concepts. Her primary debate strategy seems to be dodging the question. Not that it matters, I think she'll fizzle out quite quickly, it's a fad. She's the left's sweetheart because of "young generation, girl power, yay!", but eventually they too will realise that this vessel is, unfortunately, empty.


The amount of jobs and tax revenue they could’ve brought to New York to pay for their crumbling infrastructure. 

She then starts prancing around how it was a victory against greedy capitalism. I just faced palmed so hard. How can she be this dumb. 3 billion better then 27 billion in her world. I think she won’t go away and will get more popular.







https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.th...dria-ocasio-cortez-becomes-comic-book-heroine


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## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> The amount of jobs and tax revenue they could’ve brought to New York to pay for their crumbling infrastructure.
> 
> She then starts prancing around how it was a victory against greedy capitalism. I just faced palmed so hard. How can she be this dumb. 3 billion better then 27 billion in her world.
> 
> ...


To some people equality in squalor is preferable. Don't ask me why, I don't know either.


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## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Connect the dots for me, how is an outdated infrastructure in any way connected to income inequality?


That's not a hard dot to connect: when the average wage goes up, local government receives more tax dollars to spend on infrastructure.  It also attracts more businesses to the area.



Foxi4 said:


> I jest, but what I'm basically saying is that this is a big government problem. You are funding an army of pencil pushers instead of efficiently spending money wherever it needs to go, it has nothing to do with taxation and everything to do with administration. What I will say is that the best way to revitalise a neighbourhood is to allow private business to prosper - this is tried and true.


This is great on paper, but in practice the Republican party does the exact opposite: they promote anti-competitive practices and cutthroat corporate takeovers so that small businesses never stand a chance.  That's why all these Midwest towns have one Wal-Mart and maybe a couple restaurants if you're lucky.



Foxi4 said:


> To some people equality in squalor is preferable. Don't ask me why, I don't know either.


Again you're just not getting the fact that America is one of the richest nations on Earth.  We've got the resources to take care of every American citizen and still have billions of dollars left over, but that's rarely been the priority.  Gotta start more endless wars and give out more corporate welfare instead.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> That's not a hard dot to connect: when the average wage goes up, local government receives more tax dollars to spend on infrastructure.  It also attracts more businesses to the area.


Again, tax revenue does not linearly increase with increased taxation. Increasing individual tax brackets does not necessarily increase tax revenues. In fact, the opposite can be true - lowering taxes can motivate people to increase spending, which in turn causes more money to change hands in the private sector, appreciate wages further, increase revenues from the local state-level sales tax and cause both private and public buildings to look better as a result. Sometimes $20 at the end of each month is the difference between painting and not painting your fence, surely you know this.


> This is great on paper, but in practice the Republican party does the exact opposite: they promote anti-competitive practices and cutthroat corporate takeovers so that small businesses never stand a chance.  That's why all these Midwest towns have one Wal-Mart and maybe a couple restaurants if you're lucky.


Whataboutism is not an argument, I'm not a republican, who are you arguing with?


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Again, tax revenue does not linearly increase with taxation. Increasing tax brackets does not necessarily increase tax revenues. In fact, the opposite can be true - lowering taxes can motivate people to increase spending, which in turn causes more money to change hands in the private sector, appreciate wages further, increase revenues from the local state-level sales tax and cause both private and public buildings to look better as a result. Sonetimes $20 at the end of each month is the difference between painting and not painting a fence, surely you know this.


It's not a linear connection, but it's still bound to increase taxes collected when you increase the lowest wage available in an area.  Since these are not people at the top we're talking about, they don't have nearly as many options to dodge taxes.



Foxi4 said:


> Whataboutism is not an argument, I'm not a republican, who are you arguing with?


You said this was a "big government problem," I'm just pointing out the flaw in that reasoning.  It's actually the party that claims to want small government which is stifling small business and wage growth all over the country.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> Again you're just not getting the fact that America is one of the richest nations on Earth.  We've got the resources to take care of every American citizen and still have billions of dollars left over, but that's rarely been the priority.  Gotta start more endless wars and give out more corporate welfare instead.


That's a ridiculous, Saders-esque assessment with no basis in fact. You'll run out of millionaires to tax real quick. The country is already trillions of dollars in the hole, I don't know where you're getting your figures from. If you have a location of the dollar trees you speak of, send me the coordinates, I'll take some of that free money.



Xzi said:


> It's not a linear connection, but it's still bound to increase taxes collected when you increase the lowest wage available in an area.  Since these are not people at the top we're talking about, they don't have nearly as many means to dodge taxes.
> 
> 
> You said this was a "big government problem," I'm just pointing out the flaw in that reasoning.  It's actually the party that claims to want small government which is stifling small business and wage growth all over the country.


You neglect to mention that increasing wages without increasing the productivity will lead to either price hikes or inflation, most likely both, which in turn depreciates the value of the dollar and you end up where you started. This is not how money works. The only way to make people more rich is to increase productivity, and increased productivity is primarily achieved by a favourable economic climate. The recent tax reductions produced record tax revenue and decreased unemployment to an all-time low, if that didn't increase the amount of money available to local governments then there's a money hole somewhere that you need to eliminate.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> That's a ridiculous, Saders-esque assessment with no basis in fact. You'll run out of millionaires to tax real quick. The country is already trillions of dollars in the hole, I don't know where you're getting your figures from. If you have a location of the dollar trees you speak of, send me the coordinates, I'll take some of that free money.


Yeah, and those trillions of dollars went somewhere, didn't they?  To wars and re-building in the Middle East, to corporate handouts and subsidies, and now to a fucking wall in the middle of the desert.  Imagine what the country would look like now if we had spent that money on infrastructure, jobs programs, and research in technology/medicine.  Point is that the money is going to be spent in one way or another, yet somehow you seem to prefer it continue being wasted.


----------



## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> It's not a linear connection, but it's still bound to increase taxes collected when you increase the lowest wage available in an area.  Since these are not people at the top we're talking about, they don't have nearly as many options to dodge taxes.
> 
> 
> You said this was a "big government problem," I'm just pointing out the flaw in that reasoning.  It's actually the party that claims to want small government which is stifling small business and wage growth all over the country.


Big Government use to be a Liberal problem. Liberate from government and still means that in many parts of the world. U.S. is a place that used the word differently. But It’s still like the original label in the U.S. under Classic Liberals. It’s not just Republicans.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> Yeah, and those trillions of dollars went somewhere, didn't they?  To wars and re-building in the Middle East, to corporate handouts and subsidies, and now to a fucking wall in the middle of the desert.  Imagine what the country would look like now if we had spent that money on infrastructure, jobs programs, and innovations in technology/medicine.  Point is that the money is going to be spent in one way or another, yet somehow you seem to prefer it continue being wasted.


I'm all for the wall, but I'm not an interventionist, you're arguing with a strawman again. The border wall funding is supposed to be in the whereabouts of 5 billion dollars and it's aimed specifically at defending the U.S. border, it would generate job opportunities in the U.S. and it *would* reduce illegal immigration and its negative impacts on low-skilled workers in America. The war in Iraq cost $1.1 trillion dollars directly and anywhere between $5 and $8 trillion dollars indirectly, and it was fought in the interest of... I'm not particularly sure who. I think you're crying over a drop in the bucket, the wall is most definitely not a frivolous spend, it would improve border security, just like other walls have improved border security in other countries, from Israel through Greece and Hungary. This isn't even debatable, but apparently the U.S. is the only country not allowed to build a barrier on the border for some reason.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> You neglect to mention that increasing wages without increasing the productivity will lead to either price hikes or inflation, most likely both, which in turn depreciates the value of the dollar and you end up where you started. This is not how money works. The only way to make people more rich is to increase productivity, and increased productivity is primarily achieved by a favourable economic climate. The recent tax reductions produced record tax revenue and decreased unemployment to an all-time low, if that didn't increase the amount of money available to local governments then there's a money hole somewhere that you need to eliminate.


This is assuming employees are already getting paid an amount consistent with the amount of value their labor is producing.  Which is almost never the case, or McDonald's workers would be getting paid ~$20 an hour.  There's a lot of wiggle room below that ceiling in which the company can still turn a very reasonable profit.



Foxi4 said:


> The border wall funding is supposed to be in the whereabouts of 5 billion dollars and it's aimed specifically at defending the U.S. border, it would generate job opportunities in the U.S. and it *would* reduce illegal immigration and its negative impacts on low-skilled workers in America.


25 billion*, 5 billion is just to get the fucking thing approved and started.  Temporary jobs don't mean shit when those same laborers could be working on infrastructure or a million other projects which would provide a direct benefit to American citizens.  And again, I see no big decline in the amount of illegal immigration happening until the people who employ illegals are targeted for punishment.  Overstaying a work visa is a lot easier than trekking through the desert.


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## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> This is assuming employees are already getting paid an amount consistent with the amount of value their labor is producing.  Which is almost never the case, or McDonald's workers would be getting paid ~$20 an hour.  There's a lot of wiggle room below that ceiling in which the company can still turn a very reasonable profit.
> 
> 
> 25 billion*, 5 billion is just to get the fucking thing approved and started.  Temporary jobs don't mean shit when those same laborers could be working on infrastructure or a million other projects which would provide a direct benefit to American citizens.  And again, I see no big decline in the amount of illegal immigration happening until the people who employ illegals are targeted for punishment.  Overstaying a work visa is a lot easier than trekking through the desert.


Here’s a recent article. Time and time again it has been said when you raise wages they fire workers because they can’t afford them. What is fair? If they are being replaced by Kiosks because it’s cheaper for a business. If $15 did this then a $20 wage will cause disaster.

*After Winning a $15 Minimum Wage, Fast Food Workers Now Battle Unfair Firings*


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## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> Here’s a recent article. Time and time again it has been said when you raise wages they fire workers because they can’t afford them. What is fair? If they are being replaced by Kiosks because it’s cheaper for a business.
> 
> *After Winning a $15 Minimum Wage, Fast Food Workers Now Battle Unfair Firings*


They don't _have_ to fire people, they're choosing to.  Several businesses already run on skeleton crews to maximize profit, so they wouldn't be able to fire more people even if they wanted to.  That's capitalism for ya, 'greed is good' and yada yada...


----------



## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> They don't _have_ to fire people, they're choosing to.  Several businesses already run on skeleton crews to maximize profit, so they wouldn't be able to fire more people even if they wanted to.  That's capitalism for ya, greed is good and yada yada...


The problem is you can’t force a business however you want it to run, just like I can’t force you to buy things you don’t want to. Business buy labor. Forcing a business to essentially buy someone they don’t want to keep is bad, it’s holding a gun to their head if you get government involved.

The market is changing, technology exits that can replace workers. You can’t just raise wages without paying attention to the current state of the market and it’s consequences of high wages.

Are you going to complain the Ford and the assembly line is evil because it replaced human workers with machines that are more faster and efficient. The assembly line is why anything is mass produced nowadays and why our standard of living is so high.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> The problem is you can’t force a business however you want it to run, just like I can’t force you to buy things you don’t want to. Business buy labor. Forcing a business to essentially buy someone they don’t want to keep is bad, it’s holding a gun to their head if you get government involved.


I'm not suggesting they should be forced to hire employees they don't like, not sure where you got that idea.  Paying more than the competition is a great way to attract more qualified and competent individuals, though.



SG854 said:


> The market is changing, technology exits that can replace workers. You can’t just raise wages without paying attention to the current state of the market.
> 
> Are you going to complain the Ford and the assembly line is evil because it replaced human workers with machines that are more faster and efficient. The assembly line is why anything is mass produced nowadays and why our standard of living is so high.


Now we're veering off to another topic again, automation.  Ultimately we're going to have to instate a universal basic income as a solution to this, there doesn't seem to be any way around that.  Automation threatens up to 80% of jobs in the US, and thus it threatens collapse of the entire economy if consumers no longer have any spending power.  Jobs for humans will be mostly relegated to the arts and entertainment industries, and people will just have to find ways to occupy their time otherwise.


----------



## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> That was quite funny, Jobs was always a good speaker. As for Cortez, she's anything but a left-wing Donald Trump - she's a bartender with the IQ of a kumquat. Whenever she, like, tries to say something, I, like, can't help but get, like, an aneurism. It baffles me that, like, she got elected. Like, what is even going on? Is this reality? Did I mention that she says "like" a lot? This woman unironically wrote that she wants to level and rebuild every single building in America, get rid of air travel completely and build railroads across the ocean, and it doesn't matter how much it will cost, all what matters are "the future benefits we will reap". What's even funnier is that people actually took the time to calculate the cost of her Green New Deal, going into multiple trillion dollar estimates, in an effort to argue against a proposal that's automatically ridiculous and untenable just on the face of it. It's like trying to argue that we shouldn't send a manned expedition into the Sun - yeah, no kidding, we know. I sincerely hope that the media give her all the attention, I really do want her to be the new young face of the Democratic party, it makes the alternatives look much more appealing.


That's what trump SAID she said, but she said no such thing. The green new deal you describe is not the one being proposed. Trump thinks "net zero emissions" means "zero emissions", which to him means no airplanes. "net zero emissions" actually means working on ways to reclaim excess carbon, for example, through technology or what have you. If you want to figure out what her deal actually is, rather than the strawman created by fox news/donald trump, research it yourself. Al-jazeera and associated press are excellent non-biased sources of information.




SG854 said:


> The problem is you can’t force a business however you want it to run, just like I can’t force you to buy things you don’t want to. Business buy labor. Forcing a business to essentially buy someone they don’t want to keep is bad, it’s holding a gun to their head if you get government involved.
> 
> The market is changing, technology exits that can replace workers. You can’t just raise wages without paying attention to the current state of the market and it’s consequences of high wages.
> 
> Are you going to complain the Ford and the assembly line is evil because it replaced human workers with machines that are more faster and efficient. The assembly line is why anything is mass produced nowadays and why our standard of living is so high.



Indeed, we are approaching the singularity and automation will replace many skilled and blue-collard jobs at...some point. the best approach to save our way of life is to implementing the UBI, because that'll preserve the positives of capitalism, mitigate some of the bad of capitalism, and allow for automation to take over. Glad you're seeing the writing on the wall as well . Though I would like to add that at current wages, many people have to hold down 3 jobs to make ends meet. If they got paid properly, they could be fired from 2 of their jobs and be far happier because of it. It'll probably be important to look less at how many firings there are and count people who don't have any job.


----------



## tatripp (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> Al-jazeera and associated press are excellent non-biased sources of information.



I don't know how you can say Al-jazeera is a non-biased source. It's funded by the Qatari government which is a pretty evil group that is extremely anti-Semitic and extremely biased. Maybe they don't fit well on the American political spectrum, but they are extremely biased. AP is usually pretty good.


----------



## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> I'm not suggesting they should be forced to hire employees they don't like, not sure where you got that idea.  Paying more than the competition is a great way to attract more qualified and competent individuals, though.
> 
> 
> Now we're veering off to another topic again, automation.  Ultimately we're going to have to instate a universal basic income as a solution to this, there doesn't seem to be any way around that.  Automation threatens up to 80% of jobs in the US, and thus it threatens collapse of the entire economy if consumers no longer have any spending power.  Jobs for humans will be mostly relegated to the arts and entertainment industries, and people will just have to find ways to occupy their time otherwise.


Well you said greed is good as a criticism, because they don’t want workers and choose to fire them because machines can do the work at a much cheaper price when you raise wages.

They run on skeleton crews but still able to afford to fire workers. It’s not greed if the want to save money any more then it’s greed when a normal person wants to pay the cheapest they can and look for discounts at a store. We all want to save and keep more money for ourselves.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------



osaka35 said:


> That's what trump SAID she said, but she said no such thing. The green new deal you describe is not the one being proposed. Trump thinks "net zero emissions" means "zero emissions", which to him means no airplanes. "net zero emissions" actually means working on ways to reclaim excess carbon, for example, through technology or what have you. If you want to figure out what her deal actually is, rather than the strawman created by fox news/donald trump, research it yourself. Al-jazeera and associated press are excellent non-biased sources of information.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


The 3 jobs is simply not true. Ocasio Cortez made a claim that most people are working 2 jobs to makes ends meet and can’t afford food. Which politifact rated her pants on fire. The vast majority works one job.

https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-...dria-ocasio-cortez-wrong-several-counts-abou/

The Green New deal literally says they want to get rid of farting cows.


----------



## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

tatripp said:


> I don't know how you can say Al-jazeera is a non-biased source. It's funded by the Qatari government which is a pretty evil group that is extremely anti-Semitic and extremely biased. Maybe they don't fit well on the American political spectrum, but they are extremely biased. AP is usually pretty good.


I know fox has painted them that way, but the worst of it seems to be anti-israel rather than anti-semitic (those aren't the same thing). But they're far better than anything except AP, usually. I did find a few things on wikipedia about instances of anti-semitism, but they seem extremely rare instances of individuals, rather than mentality, like with fox.

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/al-jazeera/



SG854 said:


> Well you said greed is good as a criticism, because they don’t want workers and choose to fire them because machines can do the work at a much cheaper price when you raise wages.
> 
> They run on skeleton crews but still able to afford to fire workers. It’s not greed if the want to save money any more then it’s greed when a normal person wants to pay the cheapest they can and look for discounts at a store. We all want to save and keep more money for ourselves.
> 
> ...



I was more basing that on all my college friends holding down several part time jobs than what she said. Most hold 2, a few hold 3. the third is usually a gig job though, meaning it comes and goes and they get paid under the table. I suppose it might be more interesting to see the brackets of who holds the multiple jobs. If it's evenly spread out or if it's generally one grouping of people who have the multiple jobs. she should have said "even those who do work 2 jobs find it difficult to feed their family" or something along those lines. Rather than making a positive statement of a situation, she should have used how even multiple minimum wage jobs doesn't meet basic needs in many places around the country.

And yes, farting cows is a huge problem. Did you not know this? Doesn't matter how silly it sounds, only thing that matters is real-world impact. Simply changing their diets helps a lot, and things like that could be considered "getting rid of farting cows".


----------



## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> I know fox has painted them that way, but the worst of it seems to be anti-israel rather than anti-semitic (those aren't the same thing). But they're far better than anything except AP, usually. I did find a few things on wikipedia about instances of anti-semitism, but they seem extremely rare instances of individuals, rather than mentality, like with fox.
> 
> https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/al-jazeera/
> 
> ...


It’s a very tiny fraction.

And when you compare over the years, multiple job workers have decreased from 94 and continue to decrease. A small spike up during the recession but continue to decrease to numbers lower then before the recession. So more Americans aren’t working multiple jobs to make ends meet. And a very tiny fraction of a fraction work 70 to 80 hours a week.

Here’s a quote from the article I linked.
Most aren’t working more then before to make ends meet.


> It’s also worth noting that on average, Americans aren’t working more today than they have been in the recent past. The average number of hours worked in the private sector has hugged tightly to about 34.5 hours a week since 2006, except for a dip during the Great Recession.



If you want demographics  who are working more maybe college students? I don’t know because they won’t have time for college if they work so much.


----------



## Longshot56 (Feb 26, 2019)

Hanafuda said:


> No, it's not complicated. They're committing a felony. So deport them. If they're legal residents/citizens, prosecute them.
> 
> Unfortunately, this particular crime is committed over 100,000 times a year with few consequences.
> 
> ...


Dude, i agree. However, we don't have to go 1984 on people. Also, listen to people when they suggest things that conflict with your opinion. If you don't, you look like a dick


----------



## tatripp (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> I know fox has painted them that way, but the worst of it seems to be anti-israel rather than anti-semitic (those aren't the same thing). But they're far better than anything except AP, usually. I did find a few things on wikipedia about instances of anti-semitism, but they seem extremely rare instances of individuals, rather than mentality, like with fox.
> 
> https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/al-jazeera/



Al-Jareera is less biased than many other outlets most of the time and so is AP, but the AP articles I read about the Green New Deal were completely biased and give credibility to the plan when it is clearly absurd. If you read the actual text of the resolution, you will want to bash your brains out. It seriously feels like a student wrote this for Environmental Science 101 on his way to class using the voice to text feature of his phone. It is the dumbest thing that I have ever read. It almost feels like a conservative satirical piece, but it's actually serious. 
This is actually a quote from the proposal about a complaint between wages: "(C) a gender earnings gap that results in women earning approximately 80 percent as much as men, at the median"
This is an outright lie and it has been proven that this gap is mostly caused by choice.

The vast majority of the document is making very unrealistic promises that, even if the plan was adopted, would never actually workout. In ten years, the Green New Deal plans on "meeting 100 percent of the power demand in the United States through clean, renewable, and zero-emission energy sources, including..."
This is completely stupid. There are countless problems with this such as cost, technology not being available, potential governmental overreach issues, it's not realistic, would require a complete overhaul of the economy, the government inefficiency of putting all of the pieces together, etc.

Nancy Pelosi hates it so much that she basically told a bunch of children who supported it that they didn't know what they were talking about. What is this world coming to when I actually agree with Nancy Pelosi on something?


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> They run on skeleton crews but still able to afford to fire workers.


I don't think you understand what a skeleton crew is, it's the bare minimum necessary to keep operations running smoothly.  If they fire someone from a skeleton crew, they have to immediately hire someone else or risk losing profit to inefficiency.  I know for a fact that a lot of corporations have been running on skeleton crews in most locations since the 2007-08 crash and recession.  The only problem with this, from the corporation's perspective, is that their threats of firing people if wages go up become meaningless.  They'll occasionally fire people regardless, or people will quit when they realize there's no upward mobility, so it becomes a revolving-door job.


----------



## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

tatripp said:


> Al-Jareera is less biased than many other outlets most of the time and so is AP, but the AP articles I read about the Green New Deal were completely biased and give credibility to the plan when it is clearly absurd. If you read the actual text of the resolution, you will want to bash your brains out. It seriously feels like a student wrote this for Environmental Science 101 on his way to class using the voice to text feature of his phone. It is the dumbest thing that I have ever read. It almost feels like a conservative satirical piece, but it's actually serious.
> This is actually a quote from the proposal about a complaint between wages: "(C) a gender earnings gap that results in women earning approximately 80 percent as much as men, at the median"
> This is an outright lie and it has been proven that this gap is mostly caused by choice.
> 
> ...


Right, choice. But what are leading to those choices, and what gaps still exist when choice is taken into account? It still exist, just varies from field to field. I wouldn't say outright lie as a generalization that should be specified, especially if there's a resolution to be had. Point is to have a mechanism in place in order to address any gaps based on gender discrimination when it does occur, rather than just the blanket dismissal you get now. Quibble about the numbers, sure, but the lack of mechanism to address the problem is..well, problematic.

And the goals are aimed at turning the tide against climate change, or more specifically in our current situation, global warming. This has many other benefits, such as not relying on foreign countries for our energy needs and making it easier to transition to electric vehicles, among other things. Having the goal of going completely renewal is about about an attitude and a direction. There are many many things we could be doing today, that we just aren't doing. And I agree, it is impossible to meet 100% right now. We need better batteries, we need higher efficiency solar cells, wind, water, geothermal, we need better infrastructure, we need better support from the populace and from lawmakers. But that's the point of the deal. To address these issues so even if we don't meet the 10 year goal, we've created the paradigm shift needed to get our butts in gear. Even if it could be written better, I certainly agree with the sentiment and the goal.

The easy parallel is we're trying to convince folks we need to go to the moon in a few years.


----------



## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> I know fox has painted them that way, but the worst of it seems to be anti-israel rather than anti-semitic (those aren't the same thing). But they're far better than anything except AP, usually. I did find a few things on wikipedia about instances of anti-semitism, but they seem extremely rare instances of individuals, rather than mentality, like with fox.
> 
> https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/al-jazeera/
> 
> ...


Not just farting cows but also airplanes. Wanna swim to Japan or Mexico? You can’t take a boat either because it’s runs  on fuel, which will be bad for environment.

And they won’t invest in creating new nuclear plants in the new deal. Why? I don’t know because Neclear Plants are zero energy emissions.

Are we going to stop having heat? Or electricity? Give up Smart Phones? Stop using stove tops? No one is going to give up these things. They preach we need to stop farting cows but won’t give up things they use in their everyday life.

They give a plan without much on how to execute said plan. The Green New deal is wacky and Cortez is using climate change as an excuse to push for socialism. It has less to do with environmentalism which is what the New Deal was suppose to be about.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------



Xzi said:


> I don't think you understand what a skeleton crew is, it's the bare minimum necessary to keep operations running smoothly.  If they fire someone from a skeleton crew, they have to immediately hire someone else or risk losing profit to inefficiency.  I know for a fact that a lot of corporations have been running on skeleton crews in most locations since the 2007-08 crash and recession.  The only problem with this, from the corporation's perspective, is that their threats of firing people if wages go up become meaningless.  They'll occasionally fire people regardless, or people will quit when they realize there's no upward mobility, so it becomes a revolving-door job.


I thought Skeleton Crew was small amount of workers. 

Are you talking bare minimum in pay to keep operations running?


----------



## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> Not just farting cows but also airplanes. Wanna swim to Japan or Mexico? You can’t take a boat either because it’s runs  on fuel, which will be bad for environment.
> 
> And they won’t invest in creating new nuclear plants in the new deal. Why? I don’t know because Neclear Plants are zero energy emissions.
> 
> ...


net zero emissions is not the same as zero emissions. we can have emissions, but we need someway to offset it. Think of it as limiting our emission "spending" to be more conservative  thinking of it in this way, the green deal is about generating more "money" and limiting "spending".

I agree, new nuclear is far far safer than anything we currently have. It should be heavily invested in.

Why would you give up those things? we're talking about obvious changes. Change the diet of cows is an easy first step. How is that the equivalent of giving up technology? I don't understand your parallel.

You can't even get people to agree that a plan is needed, much less how to agree to a plan. I mean, farting cows is a huge deal, but folks treat it like a punchline. I don't get it.


----------



## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> net zero emissions is not the same as zero emissions. we can have emissions, but we need someway to offset it. Think of it as limiting our emission "spending" to be more conservative  thinking of it in this way, the green deal is about generating more "money" and limiting "spending".
> 
> I agree, new nuclear is far far safer than anything we currently have. It should be heavily invested in.
> 
> ...


I know about the net zero emissions is not the same as zero emmision because it’s literally on the same sentence as the farting cows and airplanes in the new deal.

From the Green New Deal.



> We set a goal to get to net-zero, rather then zero emissions, in 10 years because we aren’t sure that we’ll be able to fully get rid of farting cows and airplanes that fast,


In other words we want to get rid of farting cows but not in 10 years because we can’t, but later down the line though. 

Airplanes? Phones? Electricity? They contribute to climate change also. Cutting down on meat or changing cow diet won’t solve problems if we aren’t cutting other things we use in everyday life. You won’t decrease video game playing time to save the planet, or internet using.


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## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> I know about the net zero emissions is not the same as zero emmision because it’s literally on the same sentence as the farting cows and airplanes in the new deal.
> 
> From the Green New Deal.
> 
> ...


Not everything is equivalent. Cows produce an insane amount of methane. Change their diet and you put a large dent in our carbon footprint. Simple and easy, no need to give up your stuff. It's not the final step, but a good first step.

And yes, airplanes produce a lot of the heat trapping stuff. 'tis true. Do you know how much compared to cows? It is a funny comparison. But point is, if you want to keep stuff that produces, like airplanes, then you need to offset it by investing in tech that captures more of the heat trappin' stuff. Certain algae, for example, captures way way way more carbon than trees do. So rather than plant trees to capture carbon, perhaps figure out how many algae plants are needed to offset airplane travel or non-nuclear energy. Try and minimize how much carbon planes produce by investing in new tech, and try and figure out how to maximize carbon capture through biology or other tech.

There is a way forward that allows us to grow our energy use, and keep our tech, while reducing our carbon footprint. We just have to adjust how we approach the problem. Or, at least, admit there is a problem to be resolved.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> Airplanes? Phones? Electricity? They contribute to climate change also.


Uhh...yeah.  The idea is to convert the means of production for all our electricity to renewable sources.  Not only would that make us energy independent from the rest of the world, but it's also cheaper than fossil fuels now and would save us money.  The only reason we haven't completely converted already is the fossil fuel industry and the insane amount of lobbying they do.


----------



## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> Not everything is equivalent. Cows produce an insane amount of methane. Change their diet and you put a large dent in our carbon footprint. Simple and easy, no need to give up your stuff.
> 
> And yes, airplanes produce a lot of the heat trapping stuff. 'tis true. Do you know how much compared to cows? It is a funny comparison. But point is, if you want to keep stuff that produces, like airplanes, then you need to offset it by investing in tech that captures more tech. Algae, for example, captures way way way more carbon than trees do. So rather than plant trees to capture carbon, perhaps figure out how many algae plants are needed to offset airplane travel or non-nuclear energy. Try and minimize how much carbon planes produce by investing in new tech, and try and figure out how to maximize carbon capture through biology or other tech.
> 
> There is a way forward that allows us to grow our energy use, and keep our tech, while reducing our carbon footprint. We just have to adjust how we approach the problem. Or, at least, admit there is a problem to be resolved.


Yes exactly tech is the answer because people won’t change their behaviors for things we use in everyday life.

But the Green New Deal is insane. First page talks about environmentalism, which is good. 2nd page talks about racial inequality, gender pay gap, and a bunch of things which has nothing to do with saving the climate. It talks more about universal health care and education then actual environmental solutions.

Then she sends out a tweet to people that criticize the Green New Deal saying “we’re in charge.”

Cortez Tweet

No, you’re not in charge. We’re in charge. You were elected to represent the people, not the other way around. That’s what our country was founded on.

You’re New Deal has little to do with environmentalism and solutions and more about things that has nothing to do with it. That’s why we criticize it. Come up with an actual environmental plan


----------



## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> Yes exactly tech is the answer because people won’t change their behaviors for things we use in everyday life.
> 
> But the Green New Deal is insane. First page talks about environmentalism, which is good. 2nd page talks about racial inequality, gender pay gap, and a bunch of things which has nothing to do with saving the climate. It talks more about universal health care and education then actual environmental solutions.
> 
> ...


It's a roadmap. Where we should be environmentally, socially, economically, and ethically. Not sure its perfect, but can't say I disagree with any of the sentiments or the goal. How likely it is we're going to be able to achieve these best results is a different conversation, but it seems we're still talking about the validity of goals at all. It's a platform of equity and sustainability, of justice and preserving american ideals.

And the "we're in charge" bit is her saying, 'here, this is how we're going to fix things. You haven't even admitted there is a problem. So until you admit there's a problem, and provide your own way of solving it, we'll be the only game in town.' Meaning, we're in charge, because we're the only ones trying to fix things.


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## PrettyFly (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> I don't have an issue with that, I'm against the idea of a minimum wage. Market forces should decide what the value of someone's labour is - if we're talking about systemic issues that motivate employers to hire illegal immigrants, that's one of them. A minimum wage for labour that simply doesn't justify it directly incentives hiring illegal immigrants who do not have to be paid said minimum wage - they can be given half of it under the table. This directly undercuts the ability of low skilled citizens to compete on the job market.



We’re probably mostly on the same page except I believe in small government across the board.

And I still believe what you propose is not only open to abuse but ideal for abuse.


----------



## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> That's what trump SAID she said, but she said no such thing. The green new deal you describe is not the one being proposed. Trump thinks "net zero emissions" means "zero emissions", which to him means no airplanes. "net zero emissions" actually means working on ways to reclaim excess carbon, for example, through technology or what have you. If you want to figure out what her deal actually is, rather than the strawman created by fox news/donald trump, research it yourself. Al-jazeera and associated press are excellent non-biased sources of information.


Did you or did you not read the original text? I have. And I'm talking about the *original* text, not the amended proposal that mysteriously replaced it once everyone started to make fun of her. It only took hours before it was taken down amids ridicule, damn those cows and their methane-rich farts!

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/...-case-of-aocs-scrubbed-green-new-deal-details

Now, I would absolutely love to spend more time making fun of AOC, but I don't see how this is relevant in a discussion about illegal immigration - I would return to the subject at hand. That being said, if the Green New Deal was introduced in earnest and truly aimed to reach its goals within 10 years, the economy would be impacted so severely that chances are nobody would even want to illegally cross the border - why move from a third-world country to a stone age country?


Xzi said:


> This is assuming employees are already getting paid an amount consistent with the amount of value their labor is producing.  Which is almost never the case, or McDonald's workers would be getting paid ~$20 an hour.  There's a lot of wiggle room below that ceiling in which the company can still turn a very reasonable profit.


This is the case 100% of the time. If it wasn't, another corporation would immediately pay the same employees 5 cents more per hour to undercut the competition. You're referring to the idea of surplus value which is a socialist red herring - your labour is only worth as much as people are willing to pay you for it.


> 25 billion*, 5 billion is just to get the fucking thing approved and started.  Temporary jobs don't mean shit when those same laborers could be working on infrastructure or a million other projects which would provide a direct benefit to American citizens.  And again, I see no big decline in the amount of illegal immigration happening until the people who employ illegals are targeted for punishment.  Overstaying a work visa is a lot easier than trekking through the desert.


It could cost 50, it's still a drop in the bucket of the overall budget. Walls work. The evidence is overwhelming. When Hungary erected its border wall, illegal crossings have decreased by *99%* over the course of two years, from 391,000 in 2015 to 1, 184 in 2017. The same results can be seen in many other countries that have chosen to erect physical barriers on their borders.




Image source: https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016...out-border-wall-one-stunning-chart-has-answer

Official announcement by Hungarian Chief Security Advisor: http://www.kormany.hu/en/government...rotecting-the-border-continue-to-be-necessary

Naturally where there's a will, there's always a way, but a physical barrier of this nature is not only a physical, but also a mental obstacle which does reduce unwanted illegal migration.



PrettyFly said:


> We’re probably mostly on the same page except I believe in small government across the board.
> 
> And I still believe what you propose is not only open to abuse but ideal for abuse.


We do seem to have more in common than was initially apparent. I assume you're a libertarian yourself, nice to see a fellow freedom lover.


----------



## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> This is the case 100% of the time. If it wasn't, another corporation would immediately pay the same employees 5 cents more per hour to undercut the competition.


What are you talking about?  Different corporations do pay different rates for the same position.  That doesn't mean people are going to go job shopping for an extra $0.05 an hour, there are other considerations to make as well.



Foxi4 said:


> You're referring to the idea of surplus value which is a socialist red herring - your labour is only worth as much as people are willing to pay you for it.


It has nothing to do with Socialism, your labor is worth whatever profit the company is making from it on a daily basis.  It's not nearly as obscure or intangible as you'd like to make it seem.



Foxi4 said:


> It could cost 50, it's still a drop in the bucket of the overall budget. Walls work. The evidence is overwhelming.  When Hungary erected its border wall, illegal crossings have decreased by *99%* over the course of two years, from 391,000 in 2015 to 1, 184 in 2017. The same results can be seen in many other countries that have chosen to erect physical barriers on their borders.


Hungary is a small country bordered by six other countries, it's not exactly relevant to the US' situation.  Especially considering that our Southern border crossings are already at a thirty-year low.  Not a single American would see tangible benefits from a wall in the desert, and if you're happy to blow $50 billion on a vanity project, you have zero right to complain when that kind of money gets spent on real issues like climate change or infrastructure.

Kind of a moot point anyway, since the majority of citizens are against the wall and Trump wasn't able to get it through Congress as a result.  His emergency declaration also seems extremely unlikely to hold up to legal scrutiny.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

Xzi said:


> What are you talking about?  Different corporations do pay different rates for the same position.  That doesn't mean people are going to go job shopping for an extra $0.05 an hour, there are other considerations to make as well.
> 
> 
> It has nothing to do with Socialism, your labor is worth whatever profit the company is making from it on a daily basis.  It's not nearly as obscure or intangible as you'd like to make it seem.
> ...


We'll have to agree to disagree on all three points, especially the first - you and I both know that you're smart enough to understand a hyperbolic statement when you see one. Obviously I didn't mean precisely 5 cents, the point was that wages in particular industries generally hover around a similar point. It's also absolutely untrue that "your labour is worth as much as the profit your company generates from it" - you flipping burgers at home is worth zero dollars. The only reason why the task is at all valuable to McDonald's is because they've invested capital into creating an environment in which you flicking your wrist to make a burger flip can be a part of a multi-step process which collectively generates money, and they're the ones running and maintaining the process, which has additional costs besides wages. Your statement is obviously false and subject to a simple test - if you think the task is worth more than you are offered, go do it somewhere else for the value you think it's worth. If you can't find anyone offering that value, newsflash, it isn't worth as much as you think it is. The same applies to literally anything else - if you think you have a painting that's worth $1000 and fail to sell it, but keep getting offers of $600, you have a $600 painting, and that's that. Anything and everything is *only* worth as much as people are willing to pay for it, that's the definition of value. You can *think* it's worth more, but you can't go out there and buy a $1000 worth of anything else with it, so *it's not worth a $1000 dollars*, simple as.


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## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

Why would someone want ICE dissolved? because it's super weird to combine immigration issues with a completely separate criminal enforcement agency. Incredibly aggressive criminal enforcement. Why treat someone who has overstayed their visa with a dedicated police agency? It's pretty dang telling. even ICE officials say they want it broken up, though mainly because they want them under separate banners so local law enforcement will actually cooperate with non-immigration stuff.




Foxi4 said:


> Did you or did you not read the original text? I have. And I'm talking about the *original* text, not the amended proposal that mysteriously replaced it once everyone started to make fun of her. It only took hours before it was taken down amids ridicule, damn those cows and their methane-rich farts!
> 
> https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/...-case-of-aocs-scrubbed-green-new-deal-details


Did you read the article? It doesn't support your position.

After reading the article, seems like you're talking either about an FAQ on her website, and it was probably a typo by an assistant or something like that, or an early draft with typos and incomplete ideas. "original text" meaning "incomplete draft"? Not sure why that's your biggest sticking point. Though I suppose some early draft being misrepresented as the final document (where I'm assuming someone eventually corrected the zero/net zero before a final version) is what trump was talking about. Why am I not surprised. I mean, considering the intent of the document, it'd be silly to latch onto an early draft's typos as a reason to dismiss the whole thing.



Foxi4 said:


> It could cost 50, it's still a drop in the bucket of the overall budget. Walls work. The evidence is overwhelming. When Hungary erected its border wall, illegal crossings have decreased by *99%* over the course of two years, from 391,000 in 2015 to 1, 184 in 2017. The same results can be seen in many other countries that have chosen to erect physical barriers on their borders.


Like the wall between east berlin and west berlin?  I mean, it did keep people out I suppose. Peace Lines in Northern Ireland is an interesting situation as well, kind of supports your position but kind of doesn't. The question is, how many people cross that aren't crossing at border crossings or airplane or whatnot? I was under the impression most try and cross legally and then just stay. I know airplanes are the much preferred method for many of the contraband.

The effectiveness of walls so far from what I can see is "they stop going where the walls is going...they just find a way around them somewhere else". I'm guessing soon as you build a wall, folks will blow holes or dig underneath or the like. If it's patrolled less or the same as now, it could take a long time to find holes, as well as repair them. Not sure if the cost to benefit ratio is really there to support it. And there's always the ethical issues it brings up.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> Why would someone want ICE dissolved? because it's super weird to combine immigration issues with a completely separate criminal enforcement agency. Incredibly aggressive criminal enforcement. Why treat someone who has overstayed their visa with a dedicated police agency? It's pretty dang telling. even ICE officials say they want it broken up, though mainly because they want them under separate banners so local law enforcement will actually cooperate with non-immigration stuff.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


It was a complete document that was too stupid to exist, so it was pulled down to be touched up by people who actually know what they're talking about before being reuploaded. You can mischaracterise it all you want, the GND is a ridiculous proposal that's untenable and stupid in equal measure.


> Like the wall between east berlin and west berlin?  I mean, it did keep people out I suppose. Peace Lines in Northern Ireland is an interesting situation as well, kind of supports your position but kind of doesn't. The question is, how many people cross that aren't crossing at border crossings or airplane or whatnot? I was under the impression most try and cross legally and then just stay. I know airplanes are the much preferred method for many of the contraband.
> 
> The effectiveness of walls so far from what I can see is "they stop going where the walls is going...they just find a way around them somewhere else". I'm guessing soon as you build a wall, folks will blow holes or dig underneath or the like. If it's patrolled less or the same as now, it could take a long time to find holes, as well as repair them. Not sure if the cost to benefit ratio is really there to support it. And there's always the ethical issues it brings up.


You say it like it's a joke, but the Iron Curtain served its primary purpose and the Berlin Wall effectively separated the prosperous capitalist side of Germany from the empoverished communist side. The division is visible *to this day*, I know this because it used to be metaphorically at my own doorstep, I've been to the area a number of times and you can tell the difference. It's an enormous testament that the wall, which be it rightly or wrongly, effectively separated the two sides. Do I approve of dividing a nation? Perhaps if the idea was to wall off California, but as a general principle, no. Did the wall work? 100%.

"As soon as you build a wall people will do X" neglects all the boots on the ground and technology that goes into patrolling a border *in addition to* a physical barrier. You people are acting as if you've never heard of a radar, or a drone, or even something as standard-issue as a seismograph. Y'know how we know there are tunnels at the border? Because we can detect them being dug, to a great degree of accuracy. Moreover, a wall doesn't just go up, it goes deep under the ground as well, making digging under it impractical. As a physical barrier it not only prevents climbers, it primarily stops vehicles which are much harder to deal with. Every single naysayer will simultaneously disparage an obvious solution like a wall while happily clapping when AOC says "you do it better then, until you do, I'm the boss". Don't like the wall? Do it better then, until then the wall is the solution on the table.

As for your ethical dilemma, here's a better one - 8 out of 10 female illegal immigrants are raped in the process of illegally crossing the border, either by the people trafficking them or by their fellow compatriots. Sex trafficking of women *and* children is commonplace, the promise of crossing the border is often times just a kidnapping in disguise. Where is that in your calculus?


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## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> It was a complete document that was too stupid to exist, so it was pulled down to be touched up by people who actually know what they're talking about before being reuploaded. You can mischaracterise it all you want, the GND is a ridiculous proposal that's untenable and stupid in equal measure.
> You say it like it's a joke, but the Iron Curtain served its primary purpose and the Berlin Wall effectively separated the prosperous capitalist side of Germany from the empoverished communist side. The division is visible *to this day*, I know this because it used to be metaphorically at my own doorstep, I've been to the area a number of times and you can tell the difference. It's an enormous testament that the wall, be it rightly or wrongly, effectively separated the two sides. Do I approve of dividing a nation? Perhaps if the idea was to wall off California, but as a general principle, no. Did the wall work? 100%. "As soon as you build a wall people will do X" neglects all the boots on the ground and technology that goes into patrolling a border *in addition to* a physical border. You people are acting as if you've never heard of a radar, or a drone, or even something as standard-issue as a seismograph. Y'know how we know there are tunnels at the border? Because we can detect them being dug, to a great degree of accuracy. Moreover, a wall doesn't just go up, it goes deep under the ground as well, making digging under it impractical. As a physical barrier it not only prevents climbers, it primarily stops vehicles which are much harder to deal with. Every single naysayer will simultaneously disparage an obvious solution like a wall while happily clapping when AOC says "you do it better then, until you do, I'm the boss". Don't like the wall? Do it better then, until then the wall is the solution on the table.


did the article you posted mischaracterize it as well? You should read the presented version, rather than any rough draft (altered or otherwise). It's a good goal, worthy of at least being read and understood. discussing individual aspects is needed, i'm sure, but the goals should at least be agreeable to everyone. I'm not sure how they couldn't be. We're talking about long-term, human race scope ideals. 

I don't understand. You're saying we currently know where all tunnels are being dug along the border? in real-time? 

There are better solutions than a wall, they're just more complicated and focus on the issues caused by current policy. I'm also still curious about the amount of folks crossing at border crossings/planes rather than where there is no checkpoints. Pretty sure I did mention the border patrol, though. 

The point is, what are you thinking will be accomplished? Keep people from crossing into the united states without consent? why? what will be the results of this? What tangible benefits will there be, and why do you think a wall will accomplish that?


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## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> did the article you posted mischaracterize it as well? You should read the presented version, rather than any rough draft (altered or otherwise). It's a good goal, worthy of at least being read and understood. discussing individual aspects is needed, i'm sure, but the goals should at least be agreeable to everyone. I'm not sure how they couldn't be. We're talking about long-term, human race scope ideals.
> 
> I don't understand. You're saying we currently know where all tunnels are being dug along the border? in real-time?
> 
> ...


We've already discussed the negative impact of illegal immigration from a variety of angles - it affects on employment and puts legal citizens at a disadvantage on the job market, particularly in the low-skilled sector, it depreciates wages, it's a humanitarian issue due to the hardships involved in crossing the border in the first place, it creates a caste of sub-citizens who are not afforded equal protection under the law nor any access to the multitude of state services, particularly Social Security, it contributes to criminal activity in border town as the immigrants are unvetted, the list just goes on and on. You have a legal immigration system - if you think it's too lengthy and convoluted, I wholeheartedly agree that it should be addressed, but you can't just pretend that illegally crossing the border is a non-issue, it's a crime. Either you have a border and enforce it or you don't have a border at all. If you think in earnest that everyone is welcome and nothing should be done about illegal immigrants operating illegally in the country, leave your front door open. Something tells me that if you had some squatters in the attic, you would call the police to have them removed from your property - this is no different, it's just the scale that's larger. I also outright reject the notion that "the wall is bad because there are better solutions" - first of all, walls work which has been proven conclusively across many very different nations, secondly the "better solutions" are not materialising, so you're just spinning and deflecting. The Democrats themselves were calling for a physical boundary at the border until 5 minutes ago when Trump suggested one, at which point it became an unpopular position - all of this nonsense has nothing to do with immigration and everything to do with underhanded politics and the party line.

As for the article posted, it describes a document that was hosted on *her* website, read it again. Quote for context.


> By the afternoon of Feb. 7, Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., removed the document from her website without explanation but following backlash and even ridicule over the radical plans outlined within it, including a call to "eliminate emissions from *cows or air travel*" — which would *functionally ban the latter* — and to provide “economic security for all who are unable or *unwilling to work*.”


Evil GOP goblins made her and her staff write a bunch of nonsense that had to be scrapped ASAP, for sure.


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## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> We've already discussed the negative impact of illegal immigration from a variety of angles - it has a negative impact on employment and puts legal citizens at a disadvantage on the job market, particularly in the low-skilled sector, it depreciates wages, it's a humanitarian issue due to the hardships involved in crossing the border in the first place, it creates a caste of sub-citizens who are not afforded equal protection under the law nor any access to the multitude of state services, particularly Social Security, it contributes to criminal activity in border town as the immigrants are unvetted, the list just goes on and on. You have a legal immigration system - if you think it's too lengthy and convoluted, I wholeheartedly agree that it should be addressed, but you can't just pretend that illegally crossing the border is a non-issue, it's a crime. Either you have a border and enforce it or you don't have a border at all. If you think in earnest that everyone is welcome and nothing should be done about illegal immigrants operating illegally in the country, leave your front door open. Something tells me that if you had some squatters in the attic, you would call the police to have them removed from your property - this is no different, it's just the scale that's larger.


Which goes back to how many folks cross legally vs how many cross illegally. In 2016, there were a total of 739,478 overstays, compared to 563,204 illegal border crossings, though it's hard to get precise numbers. From what I'm reading, the majority of folks just overstay their visa. Is a wall preferable because it's easier to understand and implement? Since undocumented folks have been going down since before trump, why are wanting to build it now?


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## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> Which goes back to how many folks cross legally vs how many cross illegally. From what I'm reading, the majority of folks just overstay their visa. Is a wall preferable because it's easier to understand and implement? Since undocumented folks have been going down since before trump, why are wanting to build it now?


People who overstay visas are a separate and much less pressing issue.


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## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> People who overstay visas are a separate and much less pressing issue.


why less pressing? I'd imagine making immigration a process that wasn't a nightmare of a near-impossibility would help far more than a wall and would address both problems. Why not find the solution that solves both problems rather than just one or the other? And wouldn't putting up a wall make overstay visas even worse of a problem?


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## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> why less pressing? I'd imagine making immigration a process that wasn't a nightmare of a near-impossibility would help far more than a wall and would address both problems. Why not find the solution that solves both problems rather than just one or the other? And wouldn't putting up a wall make overstay visas even worse of a problem?


People who overstay their visas are vetted and could have very well forgotten the expiry date of their visa, they're less of an unknown quantity compared to illegal immigrants who cross the border illegally, thus becoming de facto criminals day one.


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## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> People who overstay their visas are vetted and could have very well forgotten the expiry date of their visa, they're less of an unknown quantity compared to illegal immigrants who cross the border illegally, thus becoming de facto criminals day one.


so what you're saying is...ICE isn't needed? :3 teasing, but I don't disagree. As a general rule of thumb, if you give people a legal way to do things, they prefer doing that. If you want people to do things legally, give them a real way of doing it. I'd much rather see that solution than a wall which most likely won't do what folks pushing for it will hope it does. I can't think it'd be as expensive as a solution, either. Plus makes the USA less of a wanker.


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## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> Why would someone want ICE dissolved? because it's super weird to combine immigration issues with a completely separate criminal enforcement agency. Incredibly aggressive criminal enforcement. Why treat someone who has overstayed their visa with a dedicated police agency? It's pretty dang telling. even ICE officials say they want it broken up, though mainly because they want them under separate banners so local law enforcement will actually cooperate with non-immigration stuff.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


It was definitely not mischaracterized. And not erreneuous information.

Original faq sheet had things that they supposedly claim people are mischaracterizing, removed it, then said original faq was a mistake even though Cortez’s office told News orginizations to report it so it wasn’t in just the original FAQ, then they started gas lighting. So exactly what was erroneous about the faq sheet, if the office told reporters what to report.

They were simply back pedaling and trying to downlplay how stupid the GND was. It was straight up communism. It talked about things that didn’t have anything to do with environmentalism like racial disparities.

The final resolution is still close to the original pulled document.



osaka35 said:


> why less pressing? I'd imagine making immigration a process that wasn't a nightmare of a near-impossibility would help far more than a wall and would address both problems. Why not find the solution that solves both problems rather than just one or the other? And wouldn't putting up a wall make overstay visas even worse of a problem?


People that overstay visa is a problem previous president failed to address. Why not do both? Why not have a wall with security and a way to enforce laws with people that over stay with visa’s. We don’t only have to do one thing.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> so what you're saying is...ICE isn't needed? :3 teasing, but I don't disagree. As a general rule of thumb, if you give people a legal way to do things, they prefer doing that. If you want people to do things legally, give them a real way of doing it. I'd much rather see that solution than a wall which most likely won't do what folks pushing for it will hope it does. I can't think it'd be as expensive as a solution, either. Plus makes the USA less of a wanker.


You can do both, but I don't disagree. You must have a secure border and means to legally enter the country. As Trump said it, "a big, big wall with many big gates in it to welcome people in", metaphorically speaking. Other than that, zero tolerance.


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## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> It was definitely not mischaracterized. And not erreneuous information.
> 
> Original faq sheet had things that they supposedly claim people are mischaracterizing, removed it, then said original faq was a mistake even though Cortez’s office told News orginizations to report it so it wasn’t in just the original FAQ, then they started gas lighting. So exactly what was erroneous about the faq sheet, if the office told reporters what to report.
> 
> ...


Because when the left is more concerned about budgets and responsible spending than the right, something had gone terribly wrong. Why spend money on two things when one will do? I'd rather spend wisely than waste money. Return On Investment, if you will.

And think of it as an economic platform for humanity, where green energy is needed as we're eventually going to run out of other fuels. It sounds like you have some ideological hangups preventing you from seeing the real-world impacts this plan would have. I personally don't like aspects of it, like it needs new nuclear as part of the plan, but the plan can be adjusted. It seems fairly straight forward and logical to me, but I deal with this sort of stuff frequently.


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## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> Because when the left is more concerned about budgets and responsible spending than the right, something had gone terribly wrong. Why spend money on two things when one will do? I'd rather spend wisely than waste money. Return On Investment, if you will.
> 
> And think of it as an economic platform for humanity, where green energy is needed as we're eventually going to run out of other fuels. It sounds like you have some ideological hangups preventing you from seeing the real-world impacts this plan would have. I personally don't like aspects of it, like it needs new nuclear as part of the plan, but the plan can be adjusted. It seems fairly straight forward and logical to me, but I deal with this sort of stuff frequently.


Will it though? Do you know actually how much it will cost to do both? I heared reports that it’ll save money, which we can use to do both, then having illegals stay in the country which are costing use millions.




I’m for a GND. Just not the one Cortez is proposing because it’s unrealistic and she is using environmentalism to push for a borderline communist agenda.

She is just listing things to do without any plan. That’s not helpful at all. Plenty of people have been doing that for years, so what different with this GND? We need to cut back on this and that. Okay, how? Give us a reasonable plan, a goal to work towards. Don’t just throw things in the air.


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## osaka35 (Feb 26, 2019)

SG854 said:


> Will it though? Do you know actually how much it will cost to do both? I heared reports that it’ll save money, which we can use to do both, then having illegals stay in the country which are costing use millions.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I haven't seen any report that it would save money. Why not do the cheaper, more policy-related thing, and then figure out the financials of the wall? Less people have been crossing than previously, and it'd probably be quicker to change policy than build a wall.

I mean, it is a resolution, not a plan. The plan comes after it's agreed we need a plan to address the issues. Think of it as a "these are the goals we need to achieve" rather than a "here's a plan to accomplish these goals". The second comes after we can agree to the first. Which we're having a hard time agreeing on, it would seem.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/02/11/whats-actually-green-new-deal-democrats/

so the "no airplanes" bit was about how we would fund technology that would replace the need for airplanes, it would seem. Not sure how feasible that is, but I'm all down for smarter tech. The FAQs looks to have been silly in parts, but doesn't reflect the resolution.


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## SG854 (Feb 26, 2019)

osaka35 said:


> I haven't seen any report that it would save money. Why not do the cheaper, more policy-related thing, and then figure out the financials of the wall? Less people have been crossing than previously, and it'd probably be quicker to change policy than build a wall.
> 
> I mean, it is a resolution, not a plan. The plan comes after it's agreed we need a plan to address the issues. Think of it as a "these are the goals we need to achieve" rather than a "here's a plan to accomplish these goals". The second comes after we can agree to the first. Which we're having a hard time agreeing on, it would seem.
> 
> ...


I’ll get back to you on the border topic. But the GND a bit ridiculous? No the socialism in it is flat out ridiculous.

It’s a very basic list, it doesn’t even go into detail how it affects the environment. It basically just says emissions bad need change.. You won’t do any convincing and getting people to agree with just a basic list.

And is that all we’re doing? Agreeing that Climate Change is a thing and need fix to it. That’s it? That’s the point of the GND. What’s even the point of the resolution.

Why not just go straight to a plan? The FDR New Deal had a plan which is what the GND is based on. Is the purpose of the GND to put Cortez in charge of a plan. Is that why it exists? If her solutions suck, and someone else has a better plan, is it too bad because we picked her lead things. What’s even the point of this Green New Deal. Give solutions. No more of this resolution, they been giving goals and no plan for over 10 yrs. Give a plan, no more goals.


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## Xzi (Feb 26, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Your statement is obviously false and subject to a simple test - if you think the task is worth more than you are offered, go do it somewhere else for the value you think it's worth. If you can't find anyone offering that value, newsflash, it isn't worth as much as you think it is.


I don't expect anyone to pay the total profit they're making off your labor, that would leave the company with net zero.  Again though that doesn't mean there isn't wiggle room between what you _are_ getting paid and what they _could_ be paying you in most positions.  That's why you can work somewhere for a few years, leave, and go work that same position somewhere else for higher pay.  The profitability of that position didn't go up during those years, so that's acknowledgment right there that you could've been getting paid more all along.



Foxi4 said:


> We'll have to agree to disagree on all three points.


Yeah we might as well call it there.  Our political ideologies are about as polar opposite as it gets, libertarian versus social democrat, so we're not going to agree on most things.



SG854 said:


> Why not just go straight to a plan? The FDR New Deal had a plan which is what the GND is based on.


Because Republicans have the Senate and the executive branch.  There's no point in unveiling a plan that has no chance of becoming reality.  Might as well wait until the Democrats are actually in a position to move on it.


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## Taleweaver (Feb 28, 2019)

Hi guys,

I haven't kept up with this discussion, and I don't really want to interfere. But based on this recent thread that's also about ICE, I want to change my previous opinion (this one:



Spoiler






Taleweaver said:


> ERm...8 pages in 24 hours? Wow...
> 
> I tried reading some, but it was as I predicted. The moment you make a thread with an accusation, the discussion doesn't revolve around the issue but around personal ideologies.
> 
> ...





).

Do I believe the allegations made in that thread? As harsh as it sounds...I'm going with "that's only accidentally relevant here". At the very least, that thread strongly indicates a lack of follow-up on their inmates. You can bicker all that you want about whether it's the fault of democrats, republicans, the ICE, the refugees themselves, the lack of wall or anything...but the ICE is not up to properly performing the task as it is. Piling up extra tasks upon departments that are already understaffed is a bad idea. And in this specific case, 'bad' is a euphemism for 'horrible'.


It's not really a fair answer to the OP because this new info wasn't known, but that doesn't make the answer less relevant:

Why don't democrats want the ICE contacted if illegal immigrants attempt to buy guns? Because while they're doing the job of the police in addition to their own tasks, they aren't making sure their inmates don't rape each other.


...oh, and also: the cases of ICE officers allegedly raping immigrants should be properly investigated and (if needed) charged. The very last thing you want is the sort of situations like the following:
*Gun store owner* _(on phone)_: hi...ICE? Can you guys come over? I have someone in my stores that doesn't have proper papers.
*ICE*: _*sigh*_ not ANOTHER one!  Just tell him to come back with the papers, okay? I'm tired of dealing with these clowns that don't want their names on the record.
*Owner*: oh, it's not a him. It's an exotic hot chick that wants to...
*ICE*: WE'LL BE RIGHT THERE!!!


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## Foxi4 (Feb 28, 2019)

Taleweaver said:


> Hi guys,
> 
> I haven't kept up with this discussion, and I don't really want to interfere. But based on this recent thread that's also about ICE, I want to change my previous opinion (this one:
> 
> ...


"Some law enforcement officers are bad apples, plus they're busy, so let's just not call them" - solid logic.

Let's go through this step by step. An illegal immigrant walks into a gun store. He or she provides false documentation and fraudulently fills in a government form, which is a felony punishable by up to 5 years in prison, in addition to fines. The correct response is putting that form in the shredder and pretending that didn't happen? Okay.


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## Taleweaver (Feb 28, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> "Some law enforcement officers are bad apples, plus they're busy, so let's just not call them" - solid logic.


No. Sorry. This won't work.  I didn't read the second part of your reply because you're completely misreading what I said, drawing a wrong conclusion from it and then assuming that's what I meant. So I'm truly sorry if I explained it in a way that confused you (and perhaps others), but it's not what I said. 

I'm saying that ICE has other problems to solve right now. I'm very willing to discuss the usefulness on whether or not ICE should or shouldn't be involved in illegal immigrants attempting to buy firearms, but NOT RIGHT NOW.

It's a simple matter of priorities. Making sure that corruption is within accessible limits trumps adding extra tasks. Just like "evacuating the building when it's on fire" trumps any task you and me might have while working anywhere indoors.

Does this convey my intended message better?


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## TPMJB (Feb 28, 2019)

RaptorDMG said:


> If they know they can't legally get a gun they'd likely turn to illegal means instead


I don't really care what illegal means they use, since they'll be back in their home country. Let them deal with it.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 28, 2019)

Taleweaver said:


> No. Sorry. This won't work.  I didn't read the second part of your reply because you're completely misreading what I said, drawing a wrong conclusion from it and then assuming that's what I meant. So I'm truly sorry if I explained it in a way that confused you (and perhaps others), but it's not what I said.
> 
> I'm saying that ICE has other problems to solve right now. I'm very willing to discuss the usefulness on whether or not ICE should or shouldn't be involved in illegal immigrants attempting to buy firearms, but NOT RIGHT NOW.
> 
> ...


ICE does not have other problems to worry about. The agency was established exclusively to deal with immigration and customs, deporting immigrants is literally their job. You don't have to be sorry, I'm merely explaining to you the consequences of what you're saying. I don't care if they're understaffed and underfunded, they're supposed to step in when an illegal immigrant is apprehended, for *whatever reason*, that's the sole reason for their existence.


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## SG854 (Feb 28, 2019)

Relevant

They are now going to be notified.

The 26 Democrats Who Voted To Pass ICE Amendment In New Gun Bill


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## Foxi4 (Feb 28, 2019)

SG854 said:


> Relevant
> 
> They are now going to be notified.
> 
> The 26 Democrats Who Voted To Pass ICE Amendment In New Gun Bill


Good. There's no reason why law enforcement shouldn't work together, it makes perfect sense and I don't understand why it's in any way controversial.


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## SG854 (Feb 28, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> Good. There's no reason why law enforcement shouldn't work together, it makes perfect sense and I don't understand why it's in any way controversial.


I don’t get it either why it’s up for debate. It’s common sense.

I don’t get the Democratic Party. They hate ICE, but the were largely responsible for the creation of ICE. They were against illegal immigration, now they are for it.

They support for ending ICE but when given the opportunity they voted no on ending ICE. Make up your damn mind.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 28, 2019)

SG854 said:


> I don’t get it either why it’s up for debate. It’s common sense.
> 
> I don’t get the Democratic Party. They hate ICE, but the were largely responsible for the creation of ICE. They were against illegal immigration, now they are for it.
> 
> They support for ending ICE but when given the opportunity they voted no on ending ICE. Make up your damn mind.


It's all optics, nobody in their right mind would just get rid of their own border, that's asinine. ICE is a necessary evil required to enforce immigration law, the Democrats know this, they're just posturing for naive voters who don't follow the actual activities in Congress.


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## SG854 (Feb 28, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> It's all optics, nobody in their right mind would just get rid of their own border, that's asinine. ICE is a necessary evil required to enforce immigration law, the Democrats know this, they're just posturing for naive voters who don't follow the actual activities in Congress.


That’s exactly what they are doing. They are just fishing for votes.

Being against Illegal immigration is a non issue in the majority of countries but they turned a non issue into an issue just so they can paint themselves as the good guy and get people to vote for their side. It’s manipulation. And it’s clearly obvious.


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## Xzi (Feb 28, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> "Some law enforcement officers are bad apples, plus they're busy, so let's just not call them" - solid logic.


I've seen the cops make situations worse several times, and I'm white.  I'd definitely never call them if I was any darker.



Foxi4 said:


> ICE is a necessary evil required to enforce immigration law, the Democrats know this, they're just posturing for naive voters who don't follow the actual activities in Congress.


ICE was only just established in 2003.  Funny how easy it was to live without that "necessity" for over a century.  If they're going to keep operating, then there are going to have to be a lot of reforms and a lot more oversight going forward.  And if they won't accept that, _then_ it's time to abolish the agency.  Leaving open a revolving door for pedos is _not_ okay, no matter what your opinion on the immigration debate.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 28, 2019)

Xzi said:


> I've seen the cops make situations worse several times, and I'm white.  I'd definitely never call them if I was any darker.


It's that kind of ridiculous caricaturisation of law enforcement that allows crime to fester, particularly in ethnic or low-income neighbourhoods.


> ICE was only just established in 2003.  Funny how easy it was to live without that "necessity" for over a century.


You're being disingenuous. Before ICE, immigration was handled by the Immigration and Naturalization Service, directly under the auspices of the DOJ. Pretending that the issue wasn't handled before is just silly, the government simply established that it is more sensible to let the executive handle obvious law enforcement matters as opposed to leaving it to the judiciary. There has always been a need for immigration law enforcement.

EDIT: I made a small boo-boo here - the phrasing implies that the DOJ is part of the judiciary branch when it is a part of the executive - this was unintentional, and although it didn't cause confusion, I felt the need to correct it for future readers.


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## Steena (Feb 28, 2019)

Xzi said:


> I've seen the cops make situations worse several times, and I'm white.  I'd definitely never call them if I was any darker.


dumbest statement i've heard in 9 years of gbatemp
probably why i should not click on the politics tab of a softmod console portal, i am the one to blame, but, jesus christ, get a grip.


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## Xzi (Feb 28, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> It's that kind of ridiculous caricaturisation of law enforcement that allows crime to fester, particularly in ethnic or low-income neighbourhoods.


They have to improve their own reputation in low-income neighborhoods, and they can start by addressing all the unarmed people they shoot in those neighborhoods on a yearly basis.  Why would you call the cops on an innocuous drug deal when the odds are that they're gonna turn it violent when they show up?



Foxi4 said:


> You're being disingenuous. Before ICE, immigration was handled by the Immigration and Naturalization Service, directly under the hospices of the DOJ. Pretending that the issue wasn't handled before is just silly, the government simply established that it is more sensible to let the executive handle obvious law enforcement matters as opposed to leaving it to the judiciary. There has always been a need for immigration law enforcement.


The question is: did the previous agency also have zero oversight and allow the same amount of criminality in their ranks?  If not, then we _should_ abolish ICE and go back to the previous system.  If it was just as bad, we need a whole new set of rules and laws governing ICE.



Steena said:


> dumbest statement i've heard in 9 years of gbatemp


I'm glad you find my personal experiences to be dumb.  Not sure what I'm supposed to with that info, however, as I can't go back in time and change them.  C'est la vie.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 28, 2019)

Xzi said:


> They have to improve their own reputation in low-income neighborhoods, and they can start by addressing all the unarmed people they shoot in those neighborhoods on a yearly basis.  Why would you call the cops on an innocuous drug deal when the odds are that they're gonna turn it violent when they show up?
> 
> 
> The question is: did the previous agency also have zero oversight and allow the same amount of criminality in their ranks?  If not, then we _should_ abolish ICE and go back to the previous system.  If it was just as bad, we need a whole new set of rules and laws governing ICE.
> ...


His point is that you're projecting your personal experience on the rest of law enforcement, it's the definition of a subjective point of view. If you replace "the police" with any other group, you would rightfully call it an -ism of some kind. Surely you can see this inconsistency in your worldview.


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## Xzi (Feb 28, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> His point is that you're projecting your personal experience on the rest of law enforcement, it's the definition of a subjective point of view. If you replace "the police" with any other group, you would rightfully call it an -ism of some kind. Surely you can see this inconsistency in your worldview.


I'm not sure what this is even supposed to mean.  Police are a race now?  And yeah, it's my opinion, that's why I'm the one stating it.  Not suggesting anybody else has to share my opinion, but it's not exactly a secret that people in low-income neighborhoods try to avoid getting police involved whenever possible.  They have their own reasons for that, far be it for anyone outside that situation to say it's wrong.


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## SG854 (Feb 28, 2019)

Xzi said:


> I've seen the cops make situations worse several times, and I'm white.  I'd definitely never call them if I was any darker.
> 
> 
> ICE was only just established in 2003.  Funny how easy it was to live without that "necessity" for over a century.  If they're going to keep operating, then there are going to have to be a lot of reforms and a lot more oversight going forward.  And if they won't accept that, _then_ it's time to abolish the agency.  Leaving open a revolving door for pedos is _not_ okay, no matter what your opinion on the immigration debate.


I’m darker then you and I never had problems with law enforcement whenever I got pulled over. They were always nice. You would have to be paranoid of cops if you think they are after black and brown people.


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## Xzi (Feb 28, 2019)

SG854 said:


> You would have to be paranoid of cops if you think they are after black and brown people.


Really?  You don't think the statistics for unarmed civilians shot by police annually might have something to say contrary to that?

Remember the case where the black security guard stopped a shooting, then when the cops showed up they shot and killed the security guard?  It happened not _that_ long ago:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/12/us/police-officer-shoots-security-guard-chicago.html

It's that type of thing that really shakes the foundation of trust in police nationwide, not only in low-income neighborhoods.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 28, 2019)

Xzi said:


> I'm not sure what this is even supposed to mean.  Police are a race now?  And yeah, it's my opinion, that's why I'm the one stating it.  Not suggesting anybody else has to share my opinion, but it's not exactly a secret that people in low-income neighborhoods try to avoid getting police involved whenever possible.  They have their own reasons for that, far be it for anyone outside that situation to say it's wrong.


If I apply your logic I can just as easily say that if I had one bad experience with an illegal immigrant, all illegal immigrants mustn't be trusted. "Immigrant" is not a race, they come from all over the world, right? Bowl-of-Skittles thinking through and through. As for people in low income neighbourhoods "having their own reasons" not to call the police, I absolutely can and do criticise that. You can't keep complaing that your neighbourhood is crime-ridden and the police "isn't doing anything" while simultaneously refusing to report crimes that you've witnessed with your own eyes, or even been a victim of. What are *you* doing to clean up your neighbourhood? Because if it's "nothing", you're part of the problem. You've waived your right to complain when you chose not to act.


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## SG854 (Feb 28, 2019)

Xzi said:


> Really?  You don't think the statistics for unarmed civilians shot by police annually might have something to say contrary to that?
> 
> Remember the case where the black security guard stopped a shooting, then when the cops showed up they shot and killed the security guard?  It happened not _that_ long ago:
> 
> ...


I could bring up a whole bunch of statistics on how it’s just not true and why people are misinterpreting those statistics. There are books on this subject by Heather Mac Donald that shows why cops are not out to get darker people.


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## Foxi4 (Feb 28, 2019)

SG854 said:


> I could bring up a whole bunch of statistics on how it’s just not true and why people are misinterpreting those statistics. There are books on this subject by Heather Mac Donald that shows why cops are not out to get darker people.


There's actually a confirmed reverse bias in terms of police interventions. Police officers are much more likely to use lethal force when dealing with white suspects because nobody is going to kick up a fuss on a national scale when a white drug dealer gets shot. Black people on the other hand are more likely to face violence of the "stop resisting" variety because police departments are afraid of being branded racist. There's recently been a study on this subject which confirms as much.


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## SG854 (Feb 28, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> There's actually a confirmed reverse bias in terms of police interventions. Police officers are much more likely to use lethal force when dealing with white suspects because nobody is going to kick up a fuss on a national scale when a white drug dealer gets shot. Black people on the other hand are more likely to face violence of the "stop resisting" variety because police departments are afraid of being branded racist. There's recently been a study on this subject which confirms as much.


There are debates where Heather Mac Donald’s made those exact points you made.

The problem is people take a few cases and use it as if it’s representative of the entire police force.

 We are already seeing the negative consequences of cops being afraid of doing their job because of being accused of being racist. The Ferguson Effect.


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## Xzi (Feb 28, 2019)

Foxi4 said:


> If I apply your logic I can just as easily say that if I had one bad experience with an illegal immigrant, all illegal immigrants mustn't be trusted. "Immigrant" is not a race, they come from all over the world, right? Bowl-of-Skittles thinking through and through.


"Immigrant" is not a unified, institutionalized group getting paid to do a specific job.  I'm not going to entertain this fallacy that words can mean whatever we want them to.  Being wary of police doesn't make you racist or xenophobic, especially when you've had experiences that made you wary in the first place.



Foxi4 said:


> As for people in low income neighbourhoods "having their own reasons" not to call the police, I absolutely can and do criticise that. You can't keep complaing that your neighbourhood is crime-ridden and the police "isn't doing anything" while simultaneously refusing to report crimes that you've witnessed with your own eyes, or even been a victim of.


The police are the ones who ruined their own reputation in these neighborhoods.  So if they want to fix it, they have to be the ones to actively repair their reputation bit by bit.  They can't just say, "don't worry we won't shoot you when you call us from now on," and have that be the end of it.  Actions speak louder than words.


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## SG854 (Feb 28, 2019)

Xzi said:


> "Immigrant" is not a unified, institutionalized group getting paid to do a specific job.  I'm not going to entertain this fallacy that words can mean whatever we want them to.  Being wary of police doesn't make you racist or xenophobic, especially when you've had experiences that made you wary in the first place.
> 
> 
> The police are the ones who ruined their own reputation in these neighborhoods.  So if they want to fix it, they have to be the ones to actively repair their reputation bit by bit.  They can't just say, "don't worry we won't shoot you when you call us from now on," and have that be the end of it.  Actions speak louder than words.


If you pay attention to what the people in these neighborhoods are saying, and not how news depicts them, they are begging cops to come in and help them. 

But cops are afraid of coming in because they don’t want to be branded racist and make national news. They actually have huge respect for cops for keeping them safe. 

Some have to sleep in bathtubs so they won’t be hit by stray bullets from gang violence at night. This is how bad it is.


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## Xzi (Feb 28, 2019)

SG854 said:


> If you pay attention to what the people in these neighborhoods are saying, and not how news depicts them, they are begging cops to come in and help them.


There is no "one size fits all" here, some neighborhoods would prefer more police presence, while others would prefer less.



SG854 said:


> But cops are afraid of coming in because they don’t want to be branded racist and make national news.


How is that an excuse for not doing your job?  "Hey, I decided not to come in to work today, don't wanna 'accidentally' be branded a racist.  So when's my bonus due?"  If there are cops out there like that, they need to be replaced.  And god forbid low-income neighborhoods start making more diverse hires for the police force, right?  They might actually know how to interact with the community they come from.


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## SG854 (Feb 28, 2019)

Xzi said:


> There is no "one size fits all" here, some neighborhoods would prefer more police presence, while others would prefer less.
> 
> 
> How is that an excuse for not doing your job?  "Hey, I decided not to come in to work today, don't wanna 'accidentally' be branded a racist.  So when's my bonus due?"  If there are cops out there like that, they need to be replaced.  And god forbid low-income neighborhoods start making more diverse hires for the police force, right?  They might actually know how to interact with the community they come from.


How about having your life ruined if your branded a racist. Getting fired, having criminal charges put out against you for something you didn’t do.


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## Xzi (Feb 28, 2019)

SG854 said:


> How about having your life ruined if your branded a racist. Getting fired, having criminal charges put out against you for something you didn’t do.


I'm not sure what reality you're living in, but in this one, cops can get away with anything up to and including murder.  They're also free to be racist to their heart's content when they're around other cops.  Is it really that hard to not make an ass of yourself in public, though?  Police aren't the only ones who have to act with common decency, so let's not pretend we're lumping a whole lot of unreasonable responsibility on them.


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## SG854 (Feb 28, 2019)

Xzi said:


> I'm not sure what reality you're living in, but in this one, cops can get away with anything up to and including murder.  They're also free to be racist to their heart's content when they're around other cops.  Is it really that hard to not make an ass of yourself in public, though?  Police aren't the only ones who have to act with common decency, so let's not pretend we're lumping a whole lot of unreasonable responsibility on them.


They can’t just murder anyone or be racist all you want, you’ll be all over the news. This doesn’t happen. This isn’t a 3rd world country.

Police are having a hard time doing their job because everything they do, even if it’s useful like Broken Windows policing, is criticized and called racist. They can’t do their job right and reduce crime. Which is why crime rates have sky rocketed after Feurgeson.


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## Xzi (Feb 28, 2019)

SG854 said:


> They can’t just murder anyone or be racist all you want, you’ll be all over the news. This doesn’t happen. This isn’t a 3rd world country.


There are literally cases all the time where a cop gets off with just some vacation time after shooting an unarmed civilian.  Cops protect each other, and judges tend to protect them too.

On the racism front, again there's no way to know what is said behind closed doors.  You're lying to yourself if you think there aren't casual racists that have been cops for years.



SG854 said:


> Police are having a hard time doing their job because everything they do, even if it’s useful like Broken Windows policing, is criticized and called racist. They can’t do their job right and reduce crime. Which is why crime rates have sky rocketed after Feurgeson.


Gimme a break.  They're cops, not pre-teens.  If a person is so awkward and insecure that they can't filter out racism between their thoughts and their mouth, then they have no business becoming a cop in the first place.

We probably shouldn't get into the subject of the crime rate going up, you wouldn't like what I have to say on the topic.


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## Foxi4 (Mar 1, 2019)

Xzi said:


> "Immigrant" is not a unified, institutionalized group getting paid to do a specific job.  I'm not going to entertain this fallacy that words can mean whatever we want them to.  Being wary of police doesn't make you racist or xenophobic, especially when you've had experiences that made you wary in the first place.
> 
> 
> The police are the ones who ruined their own reputation in these neighborhoods.  So if they want to fix it, they have to be the ones to actively repair their reputation bit by bit.  They can't just say, "don't worry we won't shoot you when you call us from now on," and have that be the end of it.  Actions speak louder than words.


It's literally stereotyping an entire group of people based solely on their occupation. You can call it fallacious all you want, that doesn't make it so. The police is not a charity, the police is a law enforcement organisation under the auspices of the government - they don't have to do PR work, they have an effective monopoly on law enforcement. Any PR work they do invest time into is just more evidence of good will - they don't have to do that, they just want people to help them catch criminals. "These neighbourhoods" can just deal with their inhibitions because there is no alternative or they can get used to more intensive patrolling.


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## SG854 (Mar 1, 2019)

Xzi said:


> There are literally cases all the time where a cop gets off with just some vacation time after shooting an unarmed civilian.  Cops protect each other, and judges tend to protect them too.
> 
> On the racism front, again there's no way to know what is said behind closed doors.  You're lying to yourself if you think there aren't casual racists that have been cops for years.


The entire Police Force? So essentially you are making an assumption without any proof, that because they are behind closed doors without anyone watching they must be cooking up something bad. This is how your logic goes.

You can’t let a few cases where cops do lie in court be representative of what the police force actually is.



Xzi said:


> Gimme a break.  They're cops, not pre-teens.  If a person is so awkward and insecure that they can't filter out  between their thoughts and their mouth, then they have no business becoming a cop in the first place.
> 
> We probably shouldn't get into the subject of the crime rate going up, you wouldn't like what I have to say on the topic.



This isn’t a situation about being a pre teen. This is literally dozens of cameras on cops, where even if they conduct a procedure correctly, can be misconstrued by media to make it out like they were doing a racist act when they weren’t.

And another problem is people are not interpreting statistics correctly. Unarmed does not mean not dangerous. Someone that is unarmed can still be a violent threat. Cops have died by there own guns because the criminals reached for it.

You can be considered unarmed but be bashing the cops head breaking their nose with a police radio. Or considered unarmed and bite a cops finger off. These are real cases that happened. This a problem I have with media coverage because they don’t let you know this bit.

Heather Mac Donald has a book called War on Police, which you won’t read. But I’m putting it out as my source. It goes into detail about statistics and how it doesn’t fit the narrative that cops are targeting groups unjustly.


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