Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JohnM who wrote (211720)	12/15/2012 8:09:32 PM
From: JohnM	2 Recommendations Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 541099

Krugman again. With which I agree. Strongly. --------------------------------------------------------- December 15, 2012, 4:40 pm Whistling Past the Gun Lobby Almost five years ago Thomas Schaller published an important book titled Whistling Past Dixie, which basically argued that it was time for Democrats to stop running scared of the views of Southern whites — they weren’t going to get those votes anyway, and demographic change had proceeded to the point where they could win national elections without the South. Indeed, so it has come to pass: while Obama did win Virginia, he did it by appealing to the new Virginia of the DC suburbs, not the rural whites, and otherwise he had a totally non-Dixie victory. So Nate Cohn argues that this same logic applies to gun control: the voters who care passionately about their semi-automatic weapons are rural whites who ain’t gonna vote Democratic in any case — and the new Democratic coalition doesn’t need them. David Atkins takes it further, saying the awful truth: the pro-gun fanatics are basically the kind of people who think that Obama is a Kenyan socialist atheistic Islamist, and the urban hordes are coming for their property any day now. People, in other words, who already vote 100 percent Republican — and lose elections. As Cohn says, it’s not clear whether Democrats realize how things have changed. But maybe yesterday’s horror will provoke some fresh thought, and they’ll realize that this does not have to go on. krugman.blogs.nytimes.com

To: JohnM who wrote (211720)	12/15/2012 9:05:08 PM
From: cnyndwllr	2 Recommendations Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 541099

Hi John, re: "I'm more than a little surprised that your argument is that nothing can be done. That's the way the NRA wins these arguments, you know. Everyone gives up." I don't think that "nothing" can be done; as I wrote: "Better enforced and more restrictive gun laws might make a slight statistical difference on the margins, but not much." I am not persuaded otherwise by your view that; "At a minimum, the assault weapon ban that expired, I think in 2004, thanks to the Reps, could be reinstated. At a minimum, more care could be taken with the sale of guns--background checks required, and so on." I think the way the NRA wins these arguments is that while no one can articulate any effective legislation to curb the use of guns in wanton slaughter of innocent and unprotected Americans, there is always a threat of legislation that would severely limit gun ownership. It would be smarter to focus more attention on diverting more funds to mental health as Epicure suggests, and less to threatening gun ownership. There are a great many people who feel more secure having a gun in their homes. Many of them know how to use a gun, understand that they're not physically capable of defending themselves from aggressive intruders and react viscerally to any legislation that could lead down a "slippery slope" of limiting their access to guns. The sooner those of us who tend to the liberal side recognize that we're tilting at windmills and damaging ourselves in the process, the better. Ed