On Fri, Nov 5, 2010 at 9:30 AM, Jeff Garza <j...@garzasixpack.com> wrote: > > Sam, they're not going to get it. Government has a monopoly on violent > enforcement in America. If you don't do what the government wants you will > eventually find yourself staring down the barrel of a gun...
Listen, Jeff, please. Governments can be very bad. They can be violent. They can be oppressive. I had an acquaintance of mine pulled from his bed by a SWAT team, leaving his family cowering under pointed guns, all on the order of John Ashcroft, because he sold glass pipes. I have a good friend who is missing part of a finger and who had to flee his home country of Communist Czechoslovakia because he had the temerity to stand up as a judge to those who had power. It is serious business. However, we aren't under a genuinely Facist government. We don't have the Stasi who routinely go around disappearing people for saying the wrong thing to the wrong person. This is not a police state. Talk to anyone that's actually lived under one and perhaps they can help you understand the huge, enormous difference. We are talking about a municipal law, aimed at a particular marketing tactic, by a type of business. This is not the sort of thing that leads to guns being pointed at anyone. You do a huge disservice to a very serious situation when you blithely just go around saying things like "you will eventually find yourself staring down the barrel of a gun". We've got serious problems in this country. Warrantless wiretapping, extraordinary rendition...serious, serious stuff. Take a page from the Rally to Restore Sanity though. Let's have a sense of perspective. Try and measure your outrage and language to the actual seriousness of the situation. When we get all nuts and bombastic about every little thing, all we do is make people totally dismiss us. People who want more extraordinary power will use that to their benefit. Freak out and start going off about the government taking people at gunpoint when we are talking about Happy Meals and it gives more power to people who are engaging in genuinely fascist behavior. Jud ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:331225 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
