Barack Obama, "Greatest Gun Salesman in America"
Last edited Wed Feb 22, 2012, 01:40 PM - Edit history (1)
I found this and thought it might complement a previous thread on the president and gun rights.
Last fall, I wrote about a surprising trend: gun sales have skyrocketed since Barack Obama became president. During that time, the stock of gunmaker Sturm Ruger (RGR) has outperformed gold. Analysts aren’t quite sure what’s causing the trend. Many anticipated a boost in sales after the election from gun owners fearful that Obama might outlaw assault weapons — the so-called “fear trade.” But they expected a brief spike, no more. Instead, gun sales kept rising, and they’ve continued to rise even since last fall. Ruger, which was up 400 percent at the time, is now up more than 500 percent.
http://www.businessweek.com/politics-policy/joshua-green-on-politics/archives/2012/02/barack_obama_greatest_gun_salesman_in_america.html
There is an interesting chart on the effect of guns to the economy in the linked article.
= new reply since forum marked as read
Elaborate. I thought it was a sacred civil right that was to be taken with seriousness.
I also just have to take the moment to laugh at your basic premise that the various amendments to the Constitution are "equal" in so far as they are drafted with equal force of law. No one denies that. What is denied is your ridiculous idea that the consequence of lose restriction on speech has the same consequence in terms of regulation as lose restriction on guns! Very obviously, the Second Amendment is constructed for the purpose of "a well-regulated Militia" and not be a hobby like writing offensive limericks. Cry me a fucking river. 
This is a tool designed to kill people.
So are these:
Winchester M1897 Trench Gun
Double barreled coach gun
Blunderbuss
Gladius
I frequently see the argument, "That weapon has only one purpose...to kill people...so it should be illegal". To which I would say, "I agree that it is designed to kill people...which is exactly why it should be legal".
I am curious just how far the anti-gunners among us would go in their Quixotic quest to ban all weapons. Which of these do they think should be illegal for the average citizen? All of them?
...of the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution as being designed to perpetuate the bourgeois fantasies of the gun culture. I will simply offer up this conclusion: those that buy into the anti-Federalist fantasy that any part of the Constitution was designed to do anything other than the expressly stated purposes included in that social contract are sorely misguided about the intent of the Founding Fathers in drafting such a document. I would also note that in the Second Amendment "Militia" is a singular, not a plural. Make of that what you will...
...the Internet Gunnerhood Bible. Good thing you guys have that otherwise you might get lost! 
Last edited Thu Feb 23, 2012, 06:47 PM - Edit history (1)
The overthrow of a tyrannical government! 
No but really, you're not going to go with "To provide for the calling for of the militia to execute the laws of the Union" - that's in the same vein as "suppressing insurrections." The Militia was not intended to supplant constables. By that logic you should march down to Citibank and make a citizens arrest!
...face it. Most people don't have the luxury of taking gun ownership to be a hobby. That is the privilege of a comfortable middle class and reflects a certain cavalier attitude about life and death.
Writing may be a hobby, firearm ownership is a serious matter. That so many take it to be a hobby, shows the degree to which people are callous about the serious effects of an item that can claim a life in seconds or less. I seriously question the grasp of social conscience of someone who would construe firearms ownership to be a matter of hobby, and not as a matter of life and death. No computer, no typewriter, no pen, nor paper is in and of itself, a deliverer of death, like a firearm. 
Prove it. You're telling me that baseball, hockey, football, and basketball is the same as hunting and soldiering? C'mon.
I suppose the interesting thing is that in some cultures certain sport is substituted for warfare. For example, lacrosse, but at the same time, I don't think you could find an Iroquois who would pretend that this is the same thing as hobby. Practiced as warfare the human emotion is the same in lacrosse as it is in warfare but no one is going to pretend that a lacrosse stick is the same thing as a club!
Guns are designed for violence, period. There is no other use to any end than the honing of that skill in and of itself. Your suppose sense of "zen-like experience" in relation to "precision rifle shooting" is culturally ingrained nonsense unrelated to a sense of pure pleasure - rather it is a product of indoctrination. Our society has many unflattering names for those who take pleasure in violence and its means and rightly so, because the idolization thereof is what contributes to the cultural norm that bashing someone's head in is radically different than blowing apart skeet. They are not. They are both acts of destruction and that is not the use of a tool as part of hobby. That is a sickness of mind, a love of violence expressed nominally as pleasure when it really is fetishism.
So let me put it like this: if there was a race with an "anti-rights Democrat" versus a "pro-rights Republican" how would you vote?
You're really that fascinated by putting a bullet through some paper? You don't understand the implications of refining this skill? Just admit it - guns can be used to kill people and animals and you like them for that reason. That is the reason they appeal to you. Being proficient with firearms makes you feel powerful in that you are able to exercise a destructive capacity. This is a different proposition than liking a hammer because you can build a table. It is is the difference between a warrior and a carpenter.
So sometimes you vote against Democrats when they disagree with you on a single issue such as guns?
Please, don't vote against Obama even though, yeah, he would pass gun control if possible
...I'm well-read in the social mechanics of militarism!
C'mon Straw Man - put on some body armor and get in the game! Kill "the enemy" that will inevitably attack you in your fantasies: http://www.democraticunderground.com/117213585 - yes you can 
It's never too late to give up the love of guns and take up service to your community as a cause.
I've got hope for a better world, do you?
a : a handheld device that aids in accomplishing a task
Note that that's the very first definition listed.
Let me put this way, is there any function of a gun that doesn't produce grievous injury? No.
Using a firearms to shoot at paper targets or tin cans does not produce grievous injury. You are objectively wrong.
Describing guns as hobby, or as tools, is an insult to the very concepts of what a hobby and tool are in actuality.
http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Weapon
A weapon is a tool used to kill or incapacitate a person or animal, or destroy a military target.
Is that definition an insult to the concept of what a tool is? Puh-leeze.
I've never seen anybody with a watermelon so big that it took a sword to cut it in half. The argument your are making that this could be anything other than the case is callous and foolish.
Er...when did I bring up watermelons, or argue about what it needs to cut them in half?
To the lot of your arguments I have but one reply: bollocks.
Well, it's easier to say that than to come up with a rational counter-argument, I'll give you that!
They are military/hunting activities that have been modified into a sporting event. They are about competition and not relaxation outside of an occupation. I for one take no joy in the infliction of harm upon others, the glorification of its means, or the practice thereof. Do you take joy in these things?
"It is entirely possible to engage in a recreational activity with a weapon without secretly or otherwise be thinking about violence." - You just made my point.
How can you bear arms and not anticipate that the purpose of that object is violence in thought if not action?
There's really no way to get around that one. "or you need to seriously rethink your aversion to weapons" - are you suggesting that I love weapons and imagine them to be something they are not?
me a river
...that when I picked up a slingshot and launched a rock at another rock, my next thought was launch one at my brother! 
I think all of those activities as they were turned into Olympic sports reflected competition between the various Greek states and wouldn't deny that some perished at the hands of another in them. The same could be said about the Roman Colosseum. There is a love of objects that find their use in violence that is inherent in those activities - that is the skill that is developed.
And your argument is an apologia for gun violence! We're not going to agree. Done.
If only - but I'm not the one spending lots of money on weapons, glorifying their use, and then claiming they don't lend themselves to such uses.
"You are saying that every Olympic athlete that competes in archery, shooting, javelin throwing, shot putting, are secretly doing so out of a love of weapons and violence. This is absurd."
I wouldn't describe them as hobbies, I would describe those athletes as largely professional with the amateur distinction pretty much being a joke. Hobby is pleasure outside of profession. The Olympic example is entirely professional! Moreover, when you go to the range and pull that trigger I really do question if pleasure can be found in such an act. I would argue that your purpose is not pleasure, but professionalization of your conception of yourself as a Militia member, which is what you claim to be.
Response to ellisonz (Reply #96)
Most people don't have the luxury of taking gun ownership to be a hobby. That is the privilege of a comfortable middle class and reflects a certain cavalier attitude about life and death.
So on one hand we have people wanting everyone to have the right to keep and bear arms, and on the other we have people wanting to make it as onerous and expensive as possible to turn that right into an even more elitist privilege.
...that is a lame mash-up of a painting and a photograph. In fact, your propaganda alteration exactly proves my point that the taking of gun-ownership to be a hobby reflects a cavalier comfortable middle class attitude about the usage of firearms. In the first image, we see what is likely a minuteman, using a firearm not as hobby, but as an occupation, a soldier and hunter. In the second image, we see the transformation of this idea into precisely what I describe, irrational detachment from the true being of the object. The use of guns as toys reflects indoctrination into a culture that rationalizes death and violence as a necessary and indeed often fortunate part of the social order. You should put down the Xbox controller and pick up some Plato my friend...
...just because it's become more elaborate doesn't mean that isn't the intent.
How many people died from bullet wounds in the US last year?
