While i agree with him strongly on this issue, he seemed pretty tired, and at moments befuddled at the debates last night. It reminded me of being high as hell is high school during class and getting called on when I wasn't paying attention. I won't get to not vote for him because I'm a democrat, so feel free to ignore me.

wow, he really did learn a lot as a fake NY district attorney.

neglogon: wow, he really did learn a lot as a fake NY district attorney.

Wow, it's not like he doesn't have a real law degree or anything!

I don't think I could have said it better.

Wait, wait, wait; what the fark is this? A candidate articulating his beliefs clearly and rationally on a conbative issue?

Knucklepopper: Wait, wait, wait; what the fark is this? A candidate articulating his beliefs clearly and rationally on a conbative issue?

He's had a lot of time to practice - it's the only solid issue stance he's got.

Knucklepopper: Wait, wait, wait; what the fark is this? A candidate articulating his beliefs clearly and rationally on a conbative issue?

It's not like what he said was all that groundbreaking. This whole article is basically a rambling overly long piece that resembles any Fark comment decrying the horrors of gun control. It boils down to "if you make owning a gun a crime only criminals will own guns."

I just heard him on Wolf Blitzer's show.

Fred Thompson on illegal immigration: "If you steal a radio and a television, and you have to give back the radio, that's amnesty."

This is probably one of the few topics where I agree with him.

GaryPDX: I don't think I could have said it better.

The most self-evident post in the history of Fark.com.

7of7: It's not like what he said was all that groundbreaking. This whole article is basically a rambling overly long piece that resembles any Fark comment decrying the horrors of gun control. It boils down to "if you make owning a gun a crime only criminals will own guns."

In other words, it is yet another example of a conservative supporting an essential right, one that millions of Americans hold near and dear. There are many who don't support this right of course... pretty much every Dem candidate and (in the past) some of the Republican candidates (Giuliani and Romney come to mind.)

Well, he ought to know...he was there when it was written.


Put this nag out to pasture, not in the White House.

colovion: essential right

You can call it that if you want. I'm just saying Fred Thompson shouldn't get any accolades for this article since it's a glorified Fark rant.

Damn. Next thing you know, he'll be an ACLU member.

Afternoon_Delight: I agree with every word of it.

BTW, what's laughably pathetic is the chorus of liberals sneering that McCain and Thompson are 'too old', yet Nancy Pelosi's age is just fine - same for Byrd, Kennedy and all the rest.

I always new that smug, arrogant liberals were hypocrites on class & race, but now they're attacking people based solely on their age.


That's pretty weak... and it's pitiful.

/There's no hate like liberal hateTM.

Exactly when has anyone ever commented on Pelosi's age? And you do appreciate that there is a world of difference between the senility of the executive vs. the senility of a member of congress, even someone in a leadership position. Just look at the later years of the Reagan administration for evidence of the trouble a senile president can bring.

/There is no stupid like Afternoon_Delight stupid^SM.

DirtyDeadGhostofEbenezerCooke: Damn. Next thing you know, he'll be an ACLU member.

Doubtful. The ACLU supports the "collective right" view of the Second Amendment making it one of the many things they are utterly wrong on.

colovion: DirtyDeadGhostofEbenezerCooke: Damn. Next thing you know, he'll be an ACLU member.

Doubtful. The ACLU supports the "collective right" view of the Second Amendment making it one of the many things they are utterly wrong on.

It appears that we will get an answer to that question in this years SC session. I am intrigued to see how that comes out.

Afternoon_Delight: Like the Berlin Wall coming down?

And all the shiatty german house and techno music that came out of it

Afternoon_Delight: Like the Berlin Wall coming down?

Are you really that historically naive to think that his yelling at the wall made it come down? If so, my new slogan is really apt. First, the wall came down during Bush I's term, so even your naive view of history is in error. The end of the Soviet Union had many fathers, but if you want to credit one person for the demise of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, thank Harry Truman for the courage to implement George Kennan's plan which proved effective. Reagan just happened to be there near the end.

MacEnvy: Knucklepopper: Wait, wait, wait; what the fark is this? A candidate articulating his beliefs clearly and rationally on a conbative issue?

He's had a lot of time to practice - it's the only solid issue stance he's got.

Which is made even more humorous by the fact that IIRC, Richardson was still rated better on 2nd Amendment issues than any of the Republican candidates.

/100% by the NRA, suck it conservatives.

BritneysSpeculum: but if you want to credit one person for the demise of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, thank Harry Truman Lenin.

He could build a hell of a revolution, but not an economy which could compete with capitalism.

DirtyDeadGhostofEbenezerCooke: He could build a hell of a revolution, but not an economy which could compete with capitalism.

True dat. The system was destined to fail, but it was Truman who stopped the expansion that would have continued to extend its viability.

BritneysSpeculum: Reagan just happened to be there near the end.

That's some nice revisionism. At the beginning of Reagan's presidency there were MANY liberal voices saying that the U.S.S.R. was doing just fine... and they liked it that way. They tried to one-up each other in their defense of the U.S.S.R. in the wake of Reagan's "diplomatic incivility" towards them. It was a disgusting display of totalitarian appeasement.

Reagan could have played along with the appeasement crowd and been more popular with the press, with liberals, etc. He didn't. He stood his ground, and did all he could to make sure the government stood it's ground. We could have capitulated, stopped the arms race, appeased the commies and they could still be in power today. Reagan said no to that, and even if he didn't start the process that lead to the end of the U.S.S.R. he gave it a power boost that certainly sped up the (some would say inevitable) demise of the U.S.S.R.

colovion: They tried to one-up each other in their defense of the U.S.S.R. in the wake of Reagan's "diplomatic incivility" towards them. It was a disgusting display of totalitarian appeasement.

so are people who support Bush "totalitarian appeasers" also?

Afternoon_Delight: Then how come liberals like yourself keep fighting for a communist USA?

What exactly have I advocated on this site that leads you to conclude that I am fighting for a communist USA? Please cite just one position that I have taken that is consistent with a collective economy or any other aspect of communism or socialism for that matter.

Remember, just because I note that your positions are ridiculous, does not preclude the possibility that I am a Rockefeller Republican saddened that my party is now run largely by know-nothings like yourself.

colovion: Your comment is too weak to even warrant a response. It stands in lonely eminence as a testament to your intelligence

I've always understood the Second Amendment to mean what it says -- it guarantees a citizen the right to "keep and bear" firearms,

I'm no lawyer, but isn't there (potentially) a vast world of difference between "a citizen" and "the people," which is actually what it says.

Afternoon_Delight: yet Nancy Pelosi's age is just fine

Thank god she's running for president...

As for gun rights, I support gun rights, I own guns and I would like sensible limitations on the right to bear arms.

All rights have limitations and that's OK.

What's really odd to me is how so many "conservatives" pick and choose which rights should have limitations and which ones shouldn't. Take torture for example: A_D is a huge proponent of torture, unconstitutional wiretapping, indefinite imprisonment, and the abandoning of Habeous.

Which makes me wonder... Why do so many conservatives want to take away some rights and make others so absolute? I think it's fear. Something all authoritarians have in common (left or right). Liberal authoritarians fear guns and want to limit them., they also fear a totalitarian state and want to limit police/military powers. Conservative authoritarians fear crime/terrorism and so they are very willing to give up personal liberties to a police state but they want to keep gun laws for "personal protection" from criminals.

Either way, they are both authoritarians. The constitution is a whole document. Let's keep it that way, eh folks? So I can keep ALL you authoritarians at bay.

Like the Berlin Wall coming down?

If stupid was rape you would be a Tori Amos boxed set.

timmy_the_tooth: so are people who support Bush "totalitarian appeasers" also?

No, we don't live in a totalitarian dictatorship (obviously.)

BritneysSpeculum: Your comment is too weak to even warrant a response. It stands in lonely eminence as a testament to your intelligence

Egads, a Liberal disagrees with me! Whatever shall I do?

/Thanks for the compliment!

colovion: No, we don't live in a totalitarian dictatorship (obviously.)

huh, that's exactly what an appeaser would say (obviously.)

i guess you're right, the US would never have secret prisons, indefinite internment, torture, and spying on its own citizens. nor would we have people who call people who disagree with that "traitors" and demonize disagreement. nor would we have a government that secretively controls and concentrates police and military power in the hands of the executive.

not like the USSR... we'd never go there. never.

after all "they hate our freedom."

Are you really that historically naive to think that his yelling at the wall made it come down?

It still thinks Saddam's WMDs were found and that Jebus created the world in 6 days and that the earth is 6000 years old and that Hillary is a Marxist (proving that it has never read Marx or Hillary) and that Kerry never deserved his purple hearts and that Bush still cares about finding Osama and that Valerie Plame was never covert and that the reason nobody was charged for her "outing" was because no crime was committed and that world opinion doesn't matter and that the UN is useless and that Saddam represented a threat and that Israel must be supported uber-alles and......

"Historically Naive"...hell, I'll go further and say "Outright Historical Ignorant" is the cloak of the right wing. Without that they are truly naked.

Afternoon_Delight: I'm pro-defense. Both self-defense and national defense

nope, you're pro-big government as specifically outlawed by the constitution.

you're pro-fear.

My number one problem with gun control laws:

The D.C. handgun ban, like all handgun bans is necessarily ineffectual. It takes the guns that would be used for self protection out of the hands of law-abiding citizens, while doing practically nothing to prevent criminals from obtaining guns to use to commit crimes.

I am also pro-free market: which means 100% open borders.

As far as I can tell, you and the "commies" you so decry have more in common (police state, huge military, anti-market economy) than not.

good work Afternoon_Delight. You're a commie.

KaponoFor3: My number one problem with gun control laws:

The D.C. handgun ban, like all handgun bans is necessarily ineffectual. It takes the guns that would be used for self protection out of the hands of law-abiding citizens, while doing practically nothing to prevent criminals from obtaining guns to use to commit crimes.

any limits to the right to bear arms must be done at the federal level, for certain.

timmy_the_tooth: not like the USSR... we'd never go there. never.

Stretching it a little bit to call the US a "totalitarian dictatorship", don't you think?

timmy_the_tooth: any limits to the right to bear arms must be done at the federal level, for certain.

My problem with any of the limits or restraints on gun ownership is that only law abiding citizens will abide by them. Criminals aren't going to go "well gosh, X gun bill just got passed, looks like I'll have to throw my piece away". It just doesn't work like that. I'd prefer the gov't focus more on taking guns out of the hands of those who will do wrong with them than those citizens who want to exercise their Second Amendment rights.

KaponoFor3: Stretching it a little bit to call the US a "totalitarian dictatorship", don't you think?

yeah, a little.

Afternoon_Delight: Well, since you own guns for self-defense, I guess you're pro-fear too

nope, i'm anti-fear. i'm not in every single political thread using fear bating, hackneyed, phrases to try to "argue" my point. after seeing you around now for a while I can state, fairly certainly, that you support the "fear everything" platform.

I own guns because I can. That's all you need to know about that.

I have never said "I own guns for self defense." Which is the fear-monger's platform.

timmy_the_tooth: huh, that's exactly what an appeaser would say (obviously.)

i guess you're right, the US would never have secret prisons, indefinite internment, torture, and spying on its own citizens. nor would we have people who call people who disagree with that "traitors" and demonize disagreement. nor would we have a government that secretively controls and concentrates police and military power in the hands of the executive.

not like the USSR... we'd never go there. never.

after all "they hate our freedom."

LOL! Yeah, the CIA is the KGB, Gitmo is the gulag and military tribunals are the same as the show trials with immediate executions afterwards. You might as well compare the Death Penalty to the Holocaust!

Let's just take the wiretap issue. All we hear is "B-b-b-but the Fourth Amendment!" It makes you wonder if any of these people have READ the Fourth Amendment. Notice the word "unreasonable" in there? Hey, that might just mean that there are cases where it IS reasonable to do warrentless searches and seizures! Courts have held countless times that it is reasonable to do a warrentless search when there are exigent circumstances. I'd say that a terrorist planning an attack that could kill thousands of Americans in an instant is an exigent circumstance... certainly more dire than a pothead flushing his stash down the toilet (which court have upheld as a situation where cops can use probable cause and the exigent circumstance rule to do a warrentless search.)

In other words, this "violation of our rights!" is anything but. Blanket gun bans, however, ARE clear violations of our rights. See the difference?

/If you don't, it doesn't matter. The SCOTUS does and will, THAT is what matters.

KaponoFor3: My problem with any of the limits or restraints on gun ownership is that only law abiding citizens will abide by them.

The feds have done a pretty good job limiting gun rights. For example, it's pretty darned hard to get grenades, rocket launchers, machine guns, etc.

The reason we have criminals with so many guns are manifold. If America really wants to deal with the issue we'd have to tackle it in many many ways.

Maybe a manufacturer's tax on handguns and making it harder to get guns (like outlawing gun shows)? I don't know, because I don't really care that much. But if we want to tackle the issue it has to be a huge effort.

Frankly, D.C. has problems that are not handgun related and handguns are being used as a scapegoat there.

I know, I lived there.

colovion: LOL! Yeah, the CIA is the KGB, Gitmo is the gulag and military tribunals are the same as the show trials with immediate executions afterwards. You might as well compare the Death Penalty to the Holocaust!

Anytime I hear people refer to the US as being on the same level of the Nazis or the Soviets, it just makes me laugh and realize how that person is either extremely short sighted, naive, or just plain misinformed.

timmy_the_tooth: Maybe a manufacturer's tax on handguns and making it harder to get guns (like outlawing gun shows)? I don't know, because I don't really care that much. But if we want to tackle the issue it has to be a huge effort.

I agree, it would have to be a huge effort. But the only huge effort I would support is one that would rightfully target those non-law abiding citizens who would use their guns for nefarious means. For the gun owner who wants to buy a gun to defend his home, I don't think that person should suffer from the same sort of scrutiny or problem getting his gun as it would be to get one illegally by a criminal.

A manufacturer's tax would make it harder for EVERYONE to get guns, not just criminals.

timmy_the_tooth: Frankly, D.C. has problems that are not handgun related and handguns are being used as a scapegoat there.

I know, I lived there.

Well I have to definitely agree with you there. Guns are, in large part, a symptom of the problem and not necessarily the cause of the problem itself

colovion: timmy_the_tooth: huh, that's exactly what an appeaser would say (obviously.)

i guess you're right, the US would never have secret prisons, indefinite internment, torture, and spying on its own citizens. nor would we have people who call people who disagree with that "traitors" and demonize disagreement. nor would we have a government that secretively controls and concentrates police and military power in the hands of the executive.

not like the USSR... we'd never go there. never.

after all "they hate our freedom."

LOL! Yeah, the CIA is the KGB, Gitmo is the gulag and military tribunals are the same as the show trials with immediate executions afterwards. You might as well compare the Death Penalty to the Holocaust!

Let's just take the wiretap issue. All we hear is "B-b-b-but the Fourth Amendment!" It makes you wonder if any of these people have READ the Fourth Amendment. Notice the word "unreasonable" in there? Hey, that might just mean that there are cases where it IS reasonable to do warrentless searches and seizures! Courts have held countless times that it is reasonable to do a warrentless search when there are exigent circumstances. I'd say that a terrorist planning an attack that could kill thousands of Americans in an instant is an exigent circumstance... certainly more dire than a pothead flushing his stash down the toilet (which court have upheld as a situation where cops can use probable cause and the exigent circumstance rule to do a warrentless search.)

In other words, this "violation of our rights!" is anything but. Blanket gun bans, however, ARE clear violations of our rights. See the difference?

/If you don't, it doesn't matter. The SCOTUS does and will, THAT is what matters.

If the Supreme Court reaffirms the Miller case will you accept their conclusion that the 2d amendment is a collective right? If not, then shut the fark up with regard to your interpretations of the 4th amendment. What Bush did was in violation of FISA and as such is a per se unreasonable search.

And I told you before, I am not a liberal, I am a Rockefeller Republican.

colovion: Hey, that might just mean that there are cases where it IS reasonable to do warrentless searches and seizures!

yep, and the supreme court has ruled that blanket searches and the like are unconstitutional.

like I said, it's always odd to me that conservatives are absolute about one right (2nd amendment) and flip-floppers on all the rest.

it's because you're terrified and want big government to "protect" you even if that means stripping away your rights.

it's odd. sometimes I feel like the last conservative left in America.

timmy_the_tooth: like I said, it's always odd to me that conservatives are absolute about one right (2nd amendment) and flip-floppers on all the rest.

You understand that the same charge can be levied against liberals (fiercely absolute about the fourth amendment) while being extremely soft on the interpretation of the 2nd and 10th, right?

Ok he's right about this one but what about the rest of them

timmy_the_tooth: Maybe a manufacturer's tax on handguns and making it harder to get guns (like outlawing gun shows)? I don't know, because I don't really care that much. But if we want to tackle the issue it has to be a huge effort.

Ahh, now this we can have a civil discussion about!

The problem with making guns more expensive is that such a move is a backdoor ban for many people. Guns aren't all that cheap to begin with, at least not those you buy legally. A handgun can EASILY cost $500 or more when all is said and done (for a decent one at least) if you buy it legally. I'd love to buy a certain handgun I've had my eye on for some time... but I can't justify the expense right now. I live in a pretty secure area (Ann Arbor) that isn't exactly cheap or crime ridden and I make more than the average Michigan resident... yet the current price of a legal gun is still somewhat of a hurdle for me. If you drive up the price even more, you'd all but guarantee that those who live in areas where owning a gun is a VERY important decision (say, inner city Detroit) will be utterly unable to buy them legally. It's akin to a poll tax to exercise your right to vote IMHO... the government would basically be saying "You can have your gun, if you can afford the extra costs we force you to incur to exercise that particular right."

This would give them more incentive to buy a gun illegally, which isn't good news for anyone. At the gun store or from a FFL dealer at a gun show you go through a background check... the drug dealing thug who sells stolen guns on the side doesn't run those checks. Gun stores and gun shows sell gun locks and safes, as well as provide gun safety information, training information, etc. Not so with the illegal gun markets.

As for gun shows, gang-bangers aren't getting their guns at gun shows. They aren't significant vectors for guns used in crimes. They ARE significant vectors for legal gun owners to obtain guns, ammo and information on gun safety and training. I've been to gun shows; the aren't back room black market affairs at all. Many people who are interested in buying a gun but afraid to walk into a store and admit they know nothing about guns can go to a gun show and learn about them with no pressure. They lead to more legal and responsible gun owners, which is exactly why so many anti-gun politicians want to ban them based on any pretext they can find.

We have plenty of good laws on the books (and some bad ones) when it comes to guns... we don't need more knee-jerk laws (which invariably end up being the bad ones) to be added. Enforcing the laws on the books would be nice. Often the first charges tossed out in plea bargains are the gun charges... that has to stop. You do a crime with a gun, you do the FULL TIME for that gun crime! You do that extra nickle for armed robbery vs. unarmed robbery, none of this "We need to get rid of guns but not punish those who misuse them" bull-hockey!

He is just saying what his focus groups have told him you want to hear. If you believe a word that he says you are an idiot.

Failing_Junk: He is just saying what his focus groups have told him you want to hear. If you believe a word that he says you are an idiot.

Agreed.

Hillary on the (d) side and Thompson and Rudy on the (r) side strike me as particularly focused on what their focus groups and their "people" tell them to think. Thompson's "red pickup truck" is the perfect symbol for this syndrome.

As much as I may dislike Huckabee, I can at least see that the opinions he speaks are largely reflective of the opinions he holds.