Political Ideologies & Definitions

It is essentially about interpretation of the constitution, both sides have their merits. I was just providing a classic example to daybreaker, not necessarily ammending defintions.

 

When government does "anything"

 

A fair point. I find myself disagreeing with other self-identified liberals on this one with fair regularity. I don't think that all arguments in favor of gun control are inherently unconstitutional, but this is something that some people that call themselves liberals seem to be willing to overlook the constitution on.

 

It is also an issue that rides the slippery slope. Both sides have merits, but both sides of the issue have illogical elements. For moderates and centrists, it is a hard issue to develop a concrete stance on.

 

Where are conservatives on the 17th amendment and the senators being elected without direct vote? I suppose in this and a few other cases the founders could not see too far into the future. But all the other ones are time tested truths we should all diligently adhere to in order to preserve our liberty and god given rights and talents.

 

Example---

 

Where did you dig those definitions up? They are retardedly one-sided.

 

Personally, I consider myself a centrist. To be more specific, I am a Libertarian-leaning Centrist. Gun control and gun rights are incredibly hard issue for me to take a stand on.

Personally, I am strongly opposed to gun ownership. However, outside of my personal beliefs, I feel that we the people should be able to fully exercise the right to keep and bear arms for states to maintain "a well regulated militia." Essentially, I consider the 2nd Amendment when the Bill of Rights was written to be supreme.

The problems come when framing my stance in the context of recent Supreme Court cases. In McDonald vs. Chicago, the Supreme Court incorporated the 14th Amendment into the 2nd Amendment by preventing states and localities from infringing upon the right to keep and bear arms. In Parker vs. District of Columbia, the Supreme Court ruled that "a well regulated militia" was not the sole measure for determining matters of gun control and gun rights.

Therefore, these two cases have forced me to boil down my stance to "let the states decide." If I go any further, I would have to start advocating for radical change to the jurisdiction of the federal court system, and the rendering of the above cases null and void. I would also have to justify my stances of incorporation on other amendments, which are not consistent with my stance on the 2nd Amendment.

To take a third way stance, one rides the slippery slope between liberty and tyranny, radicalism and moderation. The two polar stances require just as much illogical characteristics. On one end, you have those that feel no government can infringe upon one's right to keep and bear arms. These people disregard a fundamental aspect of an orderly system of justice, preventing rampant vengeance. With unbridled liberty, you risk order.

On the other end, you have those that want the government to impose significant restrictions on one's right to keep and bear arms. These people disregard the 2nd Amendment, and ikely trample upon it. With unchecked order, you get tyranny, and you lose liberty.

 

Malcontentism? I made it up myself, you dont like it? Perhaps you can lay out your contention for me.

 

'Unconstitutional', in the sense of being against the expressed and documented wishes of the founding fathers, is an argument I tend to think seems a little over-used in the US. The US constitution can be ammended, and has been ammended, without damaging the essential central intent of the constitution overall - there's no specific 'constitutional' reason to not ammend it again, and the founding fathers included provision for that to happen if circumstances made it necessary (so 'ammending the constitution' cannot possibly itself be 'unconstitutional'!). It's also not a 'constitutional' problem to pass a new ammendment in direct contradition of a previous one, of course - that happened with prohibition. There's nothing 'unconstitutional' about changing the constitution (or proposing a change that would require a constitutional ammendment), as long as it is done constitutionally!

There is also a slight potential ambiguity in the wording of the second ammendment on the subject - does 'the people' refer to 'the people' as a group (as in 'we, the people') to enable them to defend society (so the guns could be kept in secure, communal storage, not in the home, for example), or to individual people (so everyone has unrestricted right to have any gun for any purpose)? Obviously, the answer to that has been established legally by the courts, but was it what the wording was actually intended to mean by those who wrote it? Perhaps, perhaps not, but more importantly the question of whether they would still have felt the same way a couple of hundred years later, if they were alive in the current context, is quite another thing - any answer given to that can't possibly be anything other than mere speculation. Having been legally established what it means, though, gun control would need an ammendment - there's no issue wuith doing that, if the necessary support were gained (which it almost certainly wouldn't be, of course!).

A constitutional ammendment could, for example, be passed to say something like "'The people', as a society, have the right to securely store, and access when necessary, arms for the purposes of defence of the state or community. Individuals have the right to hold and use private arms for the purposes of hunting, sporting and pest control, as long as they are not used to injure or threaten other members of society.", which would give a legal situation roughtly similar to the UK (with additional provision for 'militias', which we don't have over here).

As it happens, I, as another liberal, also disagree with what many 'liberals' say about gun control in the US. While I support most of the UK gun control laws (with the exception of the complete hand gun ban, which I believe is unnecessary and draconian), the controls we have in the UK wouldn't work in the US, because the culture regarding firearms is so completely different. We never had, wanted or needed guns at the levels they exist in the US, so the controls didn't 'remove' firearms, but just prevented them building up (and were passed with huge and continuing public support, of course). That wouldn't be possible in the USA, so our style of gun control regulations could never work there - it would be pointless trying. That doesn't mean there's nothing that could be done to tighten up the regulations to try to reduce gun-related crime, of course, but that would have to be more about carrying concealed weapons, storing guns safely (so children can'tr get near them), and so on. Trying to remove guns from US society, and bring the levels of gun ownership down to UK levels, would be at best complete waste of time (and could be alot worse in terms of armed people in conflit with each other!), with or without a constitutional ammendment.

In terms of the OP, the essence of 'liberalism', of whatever kind, is the preservation and enhancement of individual freedom and liberty. Sadly, many who oppose liberals don't seem to understand that, and many who call themselves 'liberals' (in the US in particular) don't seem to either! In the modern context, 'modern liberals' recognise the need to protect individual freedom from impositions by other individuals, as well as undue interference from the state, so the freedom of the individual stops only where it is being used to destroy or unduly limit the freedom of others. This differs slightly from the neo-classical liberalism of 'libertarians', who favour a complete theoretical 'unlimited freedom for all' approach, so anyone is free to do virtually anything to anyone else, including using their own freedom to dominate others, especially those who might be 'weaker-willed' (i.e. have less desire to 'win', at whatever cost there may be to others) than themselves - to me that seems like an allowance for individual liberty to be removed altogether, as long as those doing the removal are acting freely of their own free will in doing so, which doesn't seem like a very good way of ensuring an enduring free society, but that's just my opinion, of course!

 

I was referring to the OP. I probably should have quoted it.

 

Thats fine, I was open to hear any critiscism anyone may have about this new contraversial term.

 

I propose you stop putting up stupid threads.

 

This is very much how I see it. I think the libertarians are very philosophically pure, except that they take the concept of liberty to a logical conclusion that goes full-circle and allows for slavery.

 

T-bagger, one who is farther right and distance themselves form the failures of the BUuush administration just to get re-elected.