Turn Your Back on Bush
# Turn Your Back on Bush is a great idea for protesting King Georgie without being relegated to a "free speech zone". They encourage people to attend his Inauguration on January 25, 2005, and, on signal, to turn their backs on Bush. From their about this action page: [memepool]
We who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.Turn Your Back on Bush is a new kind of event in an old tradition: direct nonviolent action. In the past four years, Bush has made it clear that dissent is unwelcome in his America, and his policies have created an atmosphere where demonstrators are corralled and their messages marginalized. Polls show that the majority of Americans disagree with Bush on numerous issues, but by refusing to talk to anyone but the most subservient press outlets and appearing only in highly staged events, he has cut himself off from all but his most ardent supporters.
-- Martin Luther King, Jr.
We want our audience with our President.
On inauguration day, we will gather as citizens for the public events of the day and join the rest of the crowd. At a given signal, we will turn our backs. Until the moment we turn around, there will be nothing to distinguish us from the rest of the crowd. By leaving our signs and buttons at home, we will avoid all of the obstacles that Bush and his supporters have used to keep anyone who disagrees with him out of sight.
For this one moment we will speak as one and show Bush that winning an election does not mean he has the support of all Americans.
# Kaptain Kanada a.k.a. Manuel Miles at The Libertarian Enterprise - Soviet Canada: Trotsky's Triumph - on the takeover of Kanada by Communists. [tle]
I recently went to the central telephone "boutique" to get answers to a couple of simple questions. I was first ignored, then rudely redirected to another department and, finally, curtly answered. It was obvious that I was an odious intrusion, but what I was interrupting, I'll never know. The one broad was simply doing nothing, while the other was chatting with a male co-employee (I won't use the term "co-worker", as I doubt that either one of them could work up a sweat in a pressure cooker). Their attitude resembles that of Air Canada's fat stewardesses, uh, I mean "flight attendant persons"; you need them, but they don't need you, and would you kindly bugger off. This is exactly the way people were treated in shops and restaurants in the Soviet Union.
# Kim du Toit - Police States - nonsense like the Brit in London being arrested for carrying a knife can't happen here, can it? Well, yes, it can, at the airport, and nearly to Mr. du Toit's son & heir, who got off only because he was underage and the knife in his carry-on bag had a blade under five inches long. I posted the following comment: [kimdutoit]
Nice knife. Too bad Son & Heir didn't use it to ventilate Mr. Brimley's throat. You can talk to Congress critters all you want. Until the Gestapo, er... Department of Homeland Security and the Taking Away Scissors folks experience the unintended consequences of their actions, and start having a hard time finding employees, it's only gonna get worse.
Mr. Huffman, nice essay. The only valid choice is to allow all passengers to carry whatever weapons they like aboard the airplane, unless they contract with the airline to not do so. That's what the Second Amendment guarantees. The market will then decide whether airlines that disarm their passengers survive.
# Publicola - Coming To Terms With Gun Control - some terms the hoplophobes have invented to help them convince the sheeple that victim disarmament is a good idea, plus correct definitions for those that aren't complete fabrications. [publicola]
These are not all the terms that the anti-gun lobby has used with devastating effect against us. But it should give you a good idea of how we're getting our ass kicked in the PR war we're fighting. To be fair the anti-gun lobby would include most of the mainstream press as well as the gun control groups themselves, since many articles in papers are little more than re-worded press releases from those groups. The mainstream media's understanding of firearms is largely based on information provided by the gun control groups. For whatever reason we have not been that effective in educating journalists as to the technical facts involved in the various issues concerning gun control & gun Rights. This is to our detriment, as a good portion of the public learns about firearms through the mainstream media. I admit at times I was misinformed by a new story over one issue or another. Looking back over those terms I think you'll recognize one or two that you or someone you know was mislead by at some point.
That's how effective their efforts have been: even gun owners have been known to accept their terms at face value.
The only suggestion I have is to thin about the words being used before you start your arguments. It's not always easy, but it'd be preferable to correct an inappropriate definition before moving to the substance of the argument. In some cases by citing the correct definition or pointing out the nonsensical definition being used, you can have the argument right there. After all, if a person is decrying the "point blank range" of a shooting with an "assault weapon" their argument falls apart when you explain what "point blank range" is, point out that most muzzleloaders have a "point blank range" of 100+ yards on a human sized target, & then proceed to show that "assault weapon" has no meaningful definition.
# Edgar J. Steele - Seven Dirty Words - in George Carlin's day, the seven dirty words were Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cocksucker, Motherfucker and Tits. Mr. Steele contends that today they are Nigger, Spic, Wetback, Chink, Jap, White, and Jew.
