Political Carry

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Mon, 01 Oct 2001 13:07:50 GMT

We Have Not Come to Take Prisoners

We have not come here to take prisoners,
But to surrender ever more deeply
To freedom and joy.

We have not come into this exquisite world
To hold ourselves hostage from love.

Run my dear,
From anything
That may not strengthen
Your precious budding wings.

Run like hell my dear,
From anyone likely
To put a sharp knife
Into the sacred, tender vision
Of your beautiful heart.

We have a duty to befriend
Those aspects of obedience
That stand outside of our house
And shout to our reason
"O please, O please,
Come out and play."

For we have not come here to take prisoners
Or to confine our wondrous spirits,

But to experience ever and ever more deeply
Our divine courage, freedom and
Light!

(The Gift: Poems by Hafiz, translations by Daniel Ladinsky)

Political Carry is a full expression of the idea I mentioned in yesterday's title. To practice what I preach, I went to the closest gun store. They had a wall full of holsters. The lowest price was $46, a bit rich for my blood. Google's Gun Leather and Cases page has lots of links. gungear.com (D&S Enterprises) has a variety of reasonably priced holsters. Their Belt & Clip and Fobus holsters cost around $20. I ordered the 104W Belt & Clip holster sized for a Glock 36.

Dan Gardner at The Ottowa Citizen via MAPInc - Terrorists Get Cash From Drug Trade - If the U.S. is serious about attacking organizations that support terrorists, we're going to have to eradicate our own d.e.a. and o.n.d.c.p. The war on some drugs is a primary source of terrorist financing. [grabbe]

There's little question that the drive against terrorism will be sweeping, taking in all the "roots and branches," including financing. But Mr. Thompson doesn't expect world governments to seriously consider whether they might cut off much of the money flowing into terrorist hands by abolishing drug prohibition.

"This is a sacred cow. It's going to be hard to kill."

Ron Paul's Texas Straight Talk - Statement on the Congressional Authorization of the Use of Force - Get the bad guys, but don't embroil ourselves in a war with innocents or further erode our civil liberties.

To declare war against a group that is not a country makes the clear declaration of war more complex.

The best tool the framers of the Constitution provided under these circumstances was the power of Congress to grant letters of marque and reprisals, in order to narrow the retaliation to only the guilty parties. The complexity of the issue, the vagueness of the enemy, and the political pressure to respond immediately limits our choices. The proposed resolution is the only option we're offered and doing nothing is unthinkable.

...

Although we now must fight to preserve our national security we should not forget that the founders of this great nation advised that for our own sake we should stay out of entangling alliances and the affairs of other nations.

We are placing tremendous trust in our president to pursue our enemies as our commander-in-chief but Congress must remain vigilant as to not allow our civil liberties here at home to be eroded. The temptation will be great to sacrifice our freedoms for what may seem to be more security. We must resist this temptation.

E.G. Ross, The Objective American - Wartime Economics: Get Out of the Way! - This story is on the front page today, but it will move to "Last Three Days" tomorrow, and to the archive (currently broken) after that. Mr. Ross thinks that the government won't get much in the way of a free-market war-time economy. He also pontificates on the reason for the attacks. I'm one of those Americans who has a hard time believing this thesis. [ken]

The reason that the U.S. is the prime target of so many in the barbaric parts of the world today is because it is not barbaric. We are the most powerful nation because we have come the greatest distance from barbarism--in both civil and economic freedom. The militant barbarians do not understand civilization. Because they do not understand it, they fear it. Because they fear it, they see it as the enemy--as the Luddites feared and attacked machines decades ago. Among those very few who do understand civilization, the good ones emigrate and the bad ones let their knowledge feed their hatred because that knowledge tells them that their barbaric ways are inexorably losing the battle for the hearts and minds of mankind. This is what the writings of Osama bin Laden and others like him reveal. Their orientation is what Ayn Rand once called, "The hatred of the good for being the good."

This is a difficult thing for most Americans to see because their pro-civilization values are ingrained in their lives from first breath.

Dave Winer's DaveNet - News sources in Central Asia - Dave's perspective has been changed by reading some central Asian news sources. He's maintaining a list here.

Guy Macon via Jerry Pournelle - The Flame to End All Flames - a doozy. May be offensive to some. It appears to have been designed with that intention. Here's the first paragraph of many. [pournelle]

You swine. You vulgar little maggot. You worthless bag of filth. As we say in Texas. I'll bet you couldn't pour piss out of a boot with instructions on the heel. You are a canker. A sore that won't go away. I would rather kiss a lawyer than be seen with you.

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