Re: Biden calls for gun ban

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lurker wrote: Fri Sep 25, 2020 4:30 pm personally, for me, it was the realization that if i vote one way i'll almost certainly get to vote again in 2022, 2024,... but if i vote the other way, there's a substantial probability that i may never have the opportunity to vote again.
OOF. Full dark, no stars. I hear you though! Just, yikes...

Re: Biden calls for gun ban

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Outpost716 wrote: Fri Sep 25, 2020 5:54 pm
sikacz wrote: Fri Sep 25, 2020 4:40 pm I don’t recall reading someone was voting for trump....
IF there's a chance this was addressed to me, my comment wasn't addressing anyone specifically voting for Trump, but rather, not voting at all.
Not voting at all is not the same as voting for trump. It's just not voting or no confidence. We've been through this in previous discussions. If you're concerned about the reasons someone is not casting a vote you should have listened to the voices now dismissed earlier. It's too late now. The candidates are set and the only thing left is counting the votes. So far I'm not hearing anything from the democratic pair that I want to hear, so in all likelihood all I have to say is good luck. Reading test coming. I'm not rejecting the candidates for a single reason, I have many. Not voting is a political choice and inherent to the concept of voting. Voting is not binary, no matter how some people would like it to be.
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"Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated!" Loquacious of many. Texas Chapter Chief Cat Herder.

Re: Biden calls for gun ban

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sikacz wrote: Fri Sep 25, 2020 6:11 pm
Outpost716 wrote: Fri Sep 25, 2020 5:54 pm
sikacz wrote: Fri Sep 25, 2020 4:40 pm I don’t recall reading someone was voting for trump....
IF there's a chance this was addressed to me, my comment wasn't addressing anyone specifically voting for Trump, but rather, not voting at all.
Not voting at all is not the same as voting for trump. It's just not voting or no confidence. We've been through this in previous discussions. If you're concerned about the reasons someone is not casting a vote you should have listened to the voices now dismissed earlier. It's too late now. The candidates are set and the only thing left is counting the votes. So far I'm not hearing anything from the democratic pair that I want to hear, so in all likelihood all I have to say is good luck. Reading test coming. I'm not rejecting the candidates for a single reason, I have many. Not voting is a political choice and inherent to the concept of voting. Voting is not binary, no matter how some people would like it to be.
Precisely. I wouldn't contest a single word of this. Well said.

Re: Biden calls for gun ban

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Outpost716 wrote: Fri Sep 25, 2020 2:41 pm I came to this thread because I wanted a better understanding of my own position on what it means to be liberal and a gun owner, particularly during this election cycle; and, I want a better understanding of the spectrum of opinions left-of-center.

One of the things that drew me to become an LGC member was the promise of being among like-minded, politically similar people -no matter their exact position on the spectrum of ideologies that define us as left-of-center liberals. We are all (I think we can agree) some shade or other of blue and no two are going to think exactly alike.

Each of us (to one degree or other) has a stake in this country, its viability, its stability, its successes, and its shortcomings and outright failures; or, at the very least, a stake in how those things affect our own individual lives. Each of us sees the myriad problems we collectively face as a community, as a nation, as an entire globe of people -whether inequity, inequality, injustice, climate catastrophe, or a pandemic run amok (to name a small fraction of the issues!), we can see and understand the dangers of these things.

And we have guns. (That's my 'best-of-both-worlds' -take that I have on being both a liberal and a gun owner.) 😉 🧐

Each of us has felt the temperature rising, politically. We've all seen gun owners on the right and the left play their part in the chaos of the past few months (and arguably longer). And we all have a stake in this election to one degree or another.

So, if you'll grant me these things, I want to ask each of you the following:
  • If you can see all the problems we all face and are capable of understanding the ramifications of leaving them unaddressed, uncorrected, where do you draw the line, politically, as gun owners?
  • At what point do you say, "I'm going to vote on a single issue and it's going to be guns this time"?
  • At what point do you aim to do the least harm to the greatest number of people -your family, your friends, your community, or your nation -while risking potentially 'taking one on the proverbial chin'?
  • Is their any merit in throwing away a vote -any vote!- that could steer us away from another 4 years of this relentlessly toxic, shameful hellscape of an administration all because one man (who could potentially be steered out of this proposed gun ban threat)?
  • Where is your line for doing the least harm?
These are the questions I ask myself and from where I'm standing right now, it would seem that the least harm would be to vote ourselves away from the looming churn, while preparing to challenge and redress the Constitutional inconsistency.
Thanks for the thoughtful comments. The issue for me, is that the "least harm" isn't necessarily Biden here. I am basically a 3 issue voter: health care, guns, and climate change. The real issue for me is that Biden is arguably worse on 2 of the 3 issues than Trump. That's not to say that I'm at all a Trump supporter, but I'm feeling like I'm really left without a horse in this race.

I don't want to vote against my own interests, and I know for a fact that the ACA will get expanded rather than replaced with a single-payer system under Biden. The fact that Biden can't recognize that the time to promote single payer at a time when people are dying in great part due to it (Covid), means that the tone deafness can't be overstated.

Trump has a huge responsibility for the Covid mess, but so does the fact that the ACA doesnt' work for the public at large, and that's been shown extremely clearly over the past few months. It's pay-to-play and it's literally the 90s Republican solution to health care. Corporate ownership of our bodies should be rejected harshly by the allegedly "marxist/liberal/leftist" party... Obviously, most of us know that the Democrats aren't actually left, but rather center-right.

So that brings me to guns: Joe Biden has said that he'll take away a lot of guns and infringe upon our right to bear arms. That's a huge issue. He is bought and paid for by Michael Bloomberg, who is a racist right wing Republican in Democrat clothing.

Now, on climate change, I think that a Biden presidency would probably see us re-installed in the Paris Climate Accord, which would be a good start, but seeing as Biden isn't willing to stand up to corporate overlords on healthcare, I doubt that he would on climate change in any sort of substantive form.

Trump is a dumpster fire... there's no doubt about that, but Biden is business as usual at a time when that is literally killing people.

There are no good options here. That's not my fault.

Re: Biden calls for gun ban

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UnderNoPretext wrote: Mon Sep 28, 2020 4:44 am I held my nose and voted for Clinton in 2016 and swore 'never again.' Now I will be voting for Biden and swearing 'never again' yet again. I'm sick of being held hostage by this center right party.
I did the same and have done so in a number of elections. How long you keep doing it is also up to you.
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"Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated!" Loquacious of many. Texas Chapter Chief Cat Herder.

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I'm still waiting for Obama to come take my guns, I think he was going door to door, oh and also waiting for the UN to take over the country.
My Avatar, "The Eagles Nest". The Southern states are cracked, rotten; the eagle says "Annihilation to traitors." A response to the confederate flag and the Gadsden flag waivers.

Re: Biden calls for gun ban

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UnderNoPretext wrote: Mon Sep 28, 2020 4:44 am I held my nose and voted for Clinton in 2016 and swore 'never again.' Now I will be voting for Biden and swearing 'never again' yet again. I'm sick of being held hostage by this center right party.
This is the issue with the two-party system, you're always picking the lesser of two evils, rather than a party that actually supports your views. And, honestly, (even besides the fact that voting 3rd party this election is largely a throwaway) the Greens and Libertarians don't have platforms that I really can throw my unwavering support behind either.

I would like nothing more than the kind of diversity of belief a lot of countries with the parliamentary seem to have. It, at the very least, allows more niche groups a real seat at the table under their own banner rather than having to form "wings" of existing big-tent parties.

That said, from where I sit, another four years of Trump could easily lead to end of the republic as it's currently constituted, and I'll take four years of milquetoast corporatist Biden over that.

Re: Biden calls for gun ban

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Denvertaco07 wrote: Mon Oct 05, 2020 11:39 am I'm still waiting for Obama to come take my guns, I think he was going door to door, oh and also waiting for the UN to take over the country.
I mean Obama's not Santa Claus. He can't make it to everyone's house in one night. He was at my place the other day and I traded him a cheeseburger so I could keep my guns. Maybe you should try that when he finally comes for yours. :sorry: :newhere:

Re: Biden calls for gun ban

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DadgumTree wrote: Tue Oct 06, 2020 5:06 am
Denvertaco07 wrote: Mon Oct 05, 2020 11:39 am I'm still waiting for Obama to come take my guns, I think he was going door to door, oh and also waiting for the UN to take over the country.
I mean Obama's not Santa Claus. He can't make it to everyone's house in one night. He was at my place the other day and I traded him a cheeseburger so I could keep my guns. Maybe you should try that when he finally comes for yours. :sorry: :newhere:
You got off easy. Cost me two beers.

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