Stupid, Insane, AND Evil
Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Mon, 06 Dec 2004 13:00:00 GMT
#
The
Coalition to Prevent Assault Weapon Violence bought a Colt AR-15
style rifle, and set up a webcam to monitor it for violent
behavior. It hasn't misbehaved yet, but they're still watching.
Hehe. Don't miss the
FAQ page. [smith2004]
Hehe. Don't miss the
FAQ page. [smith2004]
# Ryan Sager at Tech Central Station - The Killing of Peter McWilliams - Peter McWilliams was killed by democracy, a democracy that allows a handful of so-called representatives to criminalize anything they want, thus holding a gun to the head of anyone who doesn't follow their edicts. Damn them all. Damn them to hell. [progressivenews]
As the Supreme Court considers the constitutionality of state medical-marijuana laws, Americans might want to pause to remember a man named Peter McWilliams. McWilliams was killed by the federal government on June 14, 2000.
No federal agent put a gun to McWilliams' head or beat him up or threw him into the line of fire, but he died at the government's hands, nonetheless, as sure as if he had been locked in a cell and denied food and water.
...
While out on bail and awaiting sentencing, prohibited from using medical marijuana, McWilliams died. He was found dead in his bathroom in Los Angeles at age 50. He choked to death on his own vomit -- unable to keep down his medication.
...
While various groups with various agendas argue their various points in the debate over medical marijuana, there's one group whose interests are simple to understand: those suffering from AIDS, cancer, glaucoma, muscular dystrophy and other ailments that can find some relief from marijuana.
These people are not hippies trying to get around our federal drug laws to get high (hippies and all other Americans already get high whenever they want to), and they're not political activists trying to roll back the powers of the federal government (they'd send checks to the libertarian Cato Institute if they wanted to do that). They're just people who have been subjected to terrible suffering but have also found something that helps them.
Marijuana is not a traditional drug, and therefore the prohibitionists have demanded proof of its medical properties. At the same time, of course, the federal government has made it all but impossible to study it.
The burden of proof, however, should be on those who seek to prohibit sick people from putting a substance known to be relatively harmless into their bodies. Patients who rely on medical marijuana -- and I've talked to some -- by and large would rather not. These are often elderly people, even veterans, who would greatly prefer more conventional means of treatment. But what works, works, and they're not willing to suffer needlessly.
# Paul Craig Roberts at LewRockwell.com - Is the Bush Administration Certifiable? - stupid, insane, or evil. Maybe all three. [lew]
Has President Bush lost his grip on reality?
In his December 1 speech in Halifax, Nova Scotia, President Bush again declared his intention to pre-emptively attack "enemies who plot in secret and set out to murder the innocent and the unsuspecting." Freedom from terrorism, Bush declared, will come only through pre-emptive war against enemies of democracy.
How does Bush know who and where these secret enemies are? How many more times will his guesses be wrong like he was about Iraq?
# Steve Coll at The Washington Post via MSNBC - Mistakes marked Tillman's 'friendly fire' death - Pat Tillman, the former Arizona Cardinals safety who "heroically" volunteered to fight in Afghanistan, was killed on April 22 by friendly fire. [root]
The Ranger beside Tillman had been lying flat as Tillman initially called out for a cease-fire, yelling out his name. Then Tillman went silent as the firing continued. Now the young Ranger saw a "river of blood" coming from Tillman's position. He got up, looked at Tillman, and saw that "his head was gone."
