Quote:
Originally Posted by August
(Post 2028815)
Unfortunately Oberon it's a fact of life these days (and maybe always) that in American politics unless you fight back just as hard as you are attacked on an issue then just about anything can and will be rammed into law.
You might think that Feinsteins bill had no chance of succeeding but that's only true because gun rights supporters pushed back just as hard as it was promoted to keep it from gaining momentum. You need to blow the bugle loudly when calling the troops to form up otherwise you won't get their attention.
Another aspect is that both sides are not only playing to their base but also trying to influence the undecided and disinterested Their opinion almost always decides the issue and unfortunately they have a disturbing tendency to believe what isn't denied and countered.
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There is an old saying, I can't remember who first said it, that the only time that America has ever been united on something was when you had the War of Independence, and I'm sure that even then there was dissent in the ranks. It is a fact of life in many politics I think that the loudest voice tends to get the most attention, and I think it's the modern media that we have to thank for the fact that American politics gets so much attention globally. If we all got our news and communications purely through newspapers and telegraphs I think that these storms of emotion would be less frequent, but admittedly bigger when they broke.
I understand what you mean on those who believe what isn't denied or countered, those would be the 'Kardhassian' (or however it's spelt) watchers one would presume, who simply believe whatever is put in front of them. Although that being said, there are left and right wing versions of those, people who find it easier to just parrot what's told them than to actually think for themselves. I find it saddening that such people seem to hold such sway over a nation or organisation, but that is politics.
In regards to countering Feinsteins law, I fully expecting the gun supporters to oppose it, and in the way that America has been since the Sandy Hook shooting, I would have expected that very few trumpets were needed to be blown for the troops to pay attention, since they have been standing at attention since 20th January 2009 :03: but when you blow the trumpet too many times, you get the 'Boy who cried wolf' syndrome, and eventually more and more people disregard the message you're trying to get across, until it gets to the point when you really need someone to listen, and it's too late. It could be argued that Britain has passed that point, there are few in this nation who really care about politics any more since we have widely dismissed most politicians as utterly useless and yet there is too much apathy to replace them because no-one knows what they would be replaced by. Heck, maybe one day someone will elect a computer into office and we'll all be governed by machines....but I digress.
I think that, given the emotion around this topic, there is going to have to be further discussion between the two parties involved in the interpretation of the Second Amendment, primarily pro and anti-gun lobbyists and some form of compromise is going to have to be reached, if not now then certainly within the next decade, because now we're in a world of instant news and communication, the public has a greater consciousness and it fears what it sees whenever a lunatic gets a hold of a gun and kills a bunch of kids. Any such compromise is going to have to involve both an address of gun regulations as well as an address of mental health care and the entire system that should be in place to deny these sort of people access to weaponry that can cause mass casualties with relative ease.
At the moment, however, one side wants all and the other wants nothing, and there's, coming back to my earlier point, nothing in between. That's a receipe for trouble.
