Bill Clinton's Advice to Obama

[Magpai]

Sage advice for everyone, not just a fellow Democrat president. Though liberals do need this particular bit more, which is why I can hardly stand to listen to the political views of anyone but the most professional and objective on the left uninterrupted for more than a few minutes.

[Kryos]

So his advice is an appeasement politics with fanatics - that worked out well in he past.

[GreatOak]

A samurai/sword culture had to do both with a responsibility/duty to your lord, and was also a symbol of nobility and family, with swords being passed down for generations. I could understand that in the US for guns that are family heirlooms, but not really for that AR-15 Jimmy bought last week at the gun show (with no background check).

No, but using that gun to hunt, collect, build, or go to the range with is a part of gun culture. A couple people doing bad things doesn't invalidate generations of millions of people doing nothing wrong. The massive majority of gun owners have a respect and knowledge of guns akin to that displayed to swords in japan. It comes from our independent frontier culture

[Reeve]

Maybe you don't care, but I was pointing out that the government takes it seriously. You can lose your security clearance, and therefore job, for doing exactly what Clinton did. It calls into question your ethics and reliability. Except with Clinton...he's Clinton, so he doesn't even get a slap on the wrist.

Nope, because we like Clinton. That said, I thought it was pretty incredible that General Petraeus resigned after his extramarital affair came to light. That's a pretty personal thing, and I don't know why that should have to have an affect on his career, when he'd shown exemplary service otherwise.

[DeltrusDisc]

...I'm more interested in seeing how many Republicans who formerly wanted Clinton impeached will now praise him for this.

Good point. Yeah, he does make a lot of sense, I'm personally still confused and unsure, but I think if background checks were stronger and mental help wasn't so demonized, this wouldn't have been an issue in the first place. =/

[Tinykong]

Nope, because we like Clinton. That said, I thought it was pretty incredible that General Petraeus resigned after his extramarital affair came to light. That's a pretty personal thing, and I don't know why that should have to have an affect on his career, when he'd shown exemplary service otherwise.

Previous record really doesn't matter in terms of security clearance. People lose their clearance for merely getting divorced, or failing to report getting a line of credit somewhere or missing a single payment. It's really difficult to get high level clearance, and even harder to keep. With good reason, I suppose.

[mvallas]

No, but using that gun to hunt, collect, build, or go to the range with is a part of gun culture.

[snip]

I get the hunting and going to the range part... however, do forgive my ignorance, but how exactly do you use a gun to "collect" and "build" things?

[Reeve]

No, but using that gun to hunt, collect, build, or go to the range with is a part of gun culture. A couple people doing bad things doesn't invalidate generations of millions of people doing nothing wrong. The massive majority of gun owners have a respect and knowledge of guns akin to that displayed to swords in japan. It comes from our independent frontier culture

Right, but the "hunt, collect, build (wait, build?), or go to the range" culture isn't what is being attacked by the left so much as the, "I require the biggest baddest most modern firearms made to cause maximum damage to humans because it's my constitutional right to erroneously feel like a badass who could take on the US government" culture.

---------- Post added 2013-01-21 at 09:47 PM ----------

Previous record really doesn't matter in terms of security clearance. People lose their clearance for merely getting divorced, or failing to report getting a line of credit somewhere or missing a single payment. It's really difficult to get high level clearance, and even harder to keep. With good reason, I suppose.

Eh, I think marital infidelity is a personal thing and should have nothing to do with someone's job/security clearance.

[Xenofreak]

Btw, I'm gonna be shooting clay pigeons with my uncle next weekend, so I'm not totally against guns. I just find the desire to own assault rifles ludicrous.

But to me, why is using an AR-15, AK-47, or FAL to shoot targets for shits and giggles less acceptable than other guns? I can understand, and agree with, taking away the full auto functionality and 30+ round magazines. The thing is, once those features are gone, when it comes to the "I want to kill people" stage they are no longer much more preferable to anything else. They can't be hidden like smaller firearms, they have no larger a clip or far greater killing capacity (though a bit) than your average hunting rifle. The nice thing about no fully automatic and smaller clips is it also covers things like machine pistols or SMG's, which have that hidden aspect to varying degrees as well as the spray of bullets.

I really wish I could find the table I had before so I could see for sure, but rifles counted for about 1/10th of the murders by firearm if my memory serves. And that's all rifles, not just the AR-15 or other "assault" rifles. I'd be rather interested to see just how many the weapons that would be banned by the bill are actually responsible for. ~1000 were rifles if I remember correctly. You have to first figure out how many of those are attributed to the weapons being banned. Then how many of those were acquired illegally that weren't initially legally owned but then stolen? Because a ban won't get rid of all of the ones on the black market even if it cleans up the "stolen gun" problem. Then even once you have that number, how many of those people that used that future banned weapon that was initially acquired through legal means would have simply found a different one for the purpose they had in mind?

We definitely need to crack down on the issue of gun control, getting licensing and background checks sorted out in a reasonable manner. Punishments for those whose guns end up in the hands of criminals due to lack of care in keeping it safely locked away. Definitely need to crack down on those selling stolen guns and such. And we need to not let those who are paranoid about the "creeping death" previously mentioned stop us from putting in place reasonable restrictions on these guns and their ownership.

There are plenty of things we can currently do that will have a much greater effect than banning guns like the AR-15 without taking away anyone's right to own certain types of guns, and until we've exhausted the routes that don't take away anyone's rights we shouldn't be delving into the ones that do. I don't necessarily care too much for the ability to collect or fool around with those guns, but I generally see "infringing on the rights only a minority use for the betterment of the majority" as something that should be a last ditch effort, not the first thing thought of to be done. It would also be easier to get those who enjoy guns such as those to agree with the other measures if you weren't threatening to take away some of their guns.

[Reeve]

I get the hunting and going to the range part... however, do forgive my ignorance, but how exactly do you use a gun to "collect" and "build" things?

People collect guns. Not sure about the build part, unless they're referring to making guns from disparate parts.

---------- Post added 2013-01-21 at 09:49 PM ----------

But to me, why is using an AR-15, AK-47, or FAL to shoot targets for shits and giggles less acceptable than other guns? I can understand, and agree with, taking away the full auto functionality and 30+ round magazines. The thing is, once those features are gone, when it comes to the "I want to kill people" stage they are no longer much more preferable to anything else. They can't be hidden like smaller firearms, they have no larger a clip or far greater killing capacity (though a bit) than your average hunting rifle. The nice thing about no fully automatic and smaller clips is it also covers things like machine pistols or SMG's, which have that hidden aspect to varying degrees as well as the spray of bullets.

I really wish I could find the table I had before so I could see for sure, but rifles counted for about 1/10th of the murders by firearm if my memory serves. And that's all rifles, not just the AR-15 or other "assault" rifles. I'd be rather interested to see just how many the weapons that would be banned by the bill are actually responsible for. ~1000 were rifles if I remember correctly. You have to first figure out how many of those are attributed to the weapons being banned. Then how many of those were acquired illegally that weren't initially legally owned but then stolen? Because a ban won't get rid of all of the ones on the black market even if it cleans up the "stolen gun" problem. Then even once you have that number, how many of those people that used that future banned weapon that was initially acquired through legal means would have simply found a different one for the purpose they had in mind?

We definitely need to crack down on the issue of gun control, getting licensing and background checks sorted out in a reasonable manner. Punishments for those whose guns end up in the hands of criminals due to lack of care in keeping it safely locked away. Definitely need to crack down on those selling stolen guns and such. And we need to not let those who are paranoid about the "creeping death" previously mentioned stop us from putting in place reasonable restrictions on these guns and their ownership.

There are plenty of things we can currently do that will have a much greater effect than banning guns like the AR-15 without taking away anyone's right to own certain types of guns, and until we've exhausted the routes that don't take away anyone's rights we shouldn't be delving into the ones that do. I don't necessarily care too much for the ability to collect or fool around with those guns, but I generally see "infringing on the rights only a minority use for the betterment of the majority" as something that should be a last ditch effort, not the first thing thought of to be done. It would also be easier to get those who enjoy guns such as those to agree with the other measures if you weren't threatening to take away some of their guns.

I don't really like handguns either.

But I recognize they aren't going anywhere and I wouldn't bother trying to get rid of them.

[mvallas]

Eh, I think marital infidelity is a personal thing and should have nothing to do with someone's job/security clearance.

I imagine he's trying to stretch the idea to mean that if you're unfaithful to your wife and lie to a country full of strangers who shouldn't have any significance or say on your personal, romantic or sex life somehow means you're unfaithful to your country and their wishes. /shrug

[Tinykong]

Eh, I think marital infidelity is a personal thing and should have nothing to do with someone's job/security clearance.

I can kind of agree, but I see why the government would be concerned about it. If you can manage to lie to a spouse/friends/family, whats to say you wouldn't lie to the government too.

[mvallas]

I don't really like handguns either.

But I recognize they aren't going anywhere and I wouldn't bother trying to get rid of them.

Nobody's taking away any guns. Why do people keep acting like they're trying to take away their guns?

---------- Post added 2013-01-21 at 09:52 PM ----------

I can kind of agree, but I see why the government would be concerned about it. If you can manage to lie to a spouse/friends/family, whats to say you wouldn't lie to the government too.

...told ya Tinykong would say something silly like that. ^_^

[fooliuscaesar13]

Being impeached for lying really has nothing to do with his perspective/thoughts on gun control.

This is cute. If lying was a good reason to be impeached, zero politicians would ever last a week in the White House.
Lamest. Political. Bullshit. Ever.

[KingHorse]

Right, but the "hunt, collect, build (wait, build?), or go to the range" culture isn't what is being attacked by the left so much as the, "I require the biggest baddest most modern firearms made to cause maximum damage to humans because it's my constitutional right to erroneously feel like a badass who could take on the US government" culture.

While I agree with you on what is being attacked, I'll point out that where you set the bar for crazy is likely different than where other people may set that bar. There is only a very small minority of people that think the Constitution protects their right to own a tank. Most just want the right to own a hunting rifle, or a "sporting" rifle (what the Democrats call an assault rifle) without being called crazies because they avail themselves of one their rights. Rights, I might add, that they were taught were what makes America great.

[Tinykong]

Nobody's taking away any guns. Why do people keep acting like they're trying to take away their guns?

---------- Post added 2013-01-21 at 09:52 PM ----------



...told ya Tinykong would say something silly like that. ^_^

Yeah, because the government's vetting process for security clearance and revoking that clearance really is silly.... /rolleyes

---------- Post added 2013-01-21 at 09:56 PM ----------

This is cute. If lying was a good reason to be impeached, zero politicians would ever last a week in the White House.
Lamest. Political. Bullshit. Ever.

Sure, why should we hold our politicians (the President, especially) to a high moral standard. If they can't function in their job without lying, just let them lie about whatever they want.

Your thinking is part of the problem.

[Reeve]

While I agree with you on what is being attacked, I'll point out that where you set the bar for crazy is likely different than where other people may set that bar. There is only a very small minority of people that think the Constitution protects their right to own a tank. Most just want the right to own a hunting rifle, or a "sporting" rifle (what the Democrats call an assault rifle) without being called crazies because they avail themselves of one their rights. Rights, I might add, that they were taught were what makes America great.

I can understand that point of view. I disagree with it, and don't particularly like it, but I'm not going to try to stop people from owning those things. I would, however, like to draw the line somewhere. My preferred place to draw the line would be shotguns and hunting rifles only, but I recognize that as unrealistic. Failing that, restrictions on magazine capacity seem like a good thing to me.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

I think if you lie you should lose political points. No matter who you are.

[KingHorse]

The nice thing about no fully automatic and smaller clips is it also covers things like machine pistols or SMG's, which have that hidden aspect to varying degrees as well as the spray of bullets.

This just brought up an interesting thought: most of these mass shootings are conducted by people with little to not skill with firearms. A fully automatic weapon in the hands of an untrained nutball is still dangerous, but likely less dangerous than a semi-auto. The issue is that you have to exhibit quite a bit of control over your firearm to be effective with an automatic, and control is hardly the stock in trade of the crazies.

Anyone seen any statistics on mass shootings of innocent people (not gangVgang) using fully auto weapons? Even back when they were legal to purchase relatively easily? I can't seem to find them. I may be full of shit, don't know.

[GreatOak]

I get the hunting and going to the range part... however, do forgive my ignorance, but how exactly do you use a gun to "collect" and "build" things?

Collecting guns for show or building your own from parts like recievers