I posted this response as I was musing on this article here. I decided to repost my response here for later musings.
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I love the post and I want to comment at length, but it has been a tremendously long day and I just don’t have it in me. That said, one thing I want to jot down now before my tired mind lets it slip through the cracks, is the idea that Americans are allowed to carry guns because it is the carrot in front of the stick.
The genesis of this idea comes from the last 4 years or so of nearly constant wailing about the government coming for our guns. One law and treaty after another, one more vote in support of the current administration, one more manifesto on the Internet; all these things point to the culmination of a decades long conspiracy in which our government will come and seize our guns. And yet, they haven’t done so. The NRA, bless its heart!, is certainly trying to convince us they will, one donation at a time, but nothing has happened so far…
And why should the government come for our guns? The government is far more well armed than its citizens, has less manpower, and very little incentive to fight a pitched battle on its own turf. More importantly, I suspect that the government realizes it doesn’t need to fight that battle at all. We already allow more known surveillance now than at any time in our past. We’re stripped, searched, ramrodded, accused, persecuted, cajoled, lied to, defrauded, taxed and otherwise treated as voting cattle more now than anytime since the founding or our country. But hey, we’re armed, and as we all know, as long as we’re armed then the government has no real power over us… as long as good men do nothing, indeed.
Cognitive dissonance, Egyptian Book of the Dead Edition.
Aug 16, 2013 A despicable popular sharia government has been overthrown by a despicable military junta. [If I may use ‘junta’ for an Arabic speaking country.] The military with jets, cannon, machine guns, supply depots, and organization is barely putting down the majority of the population which had at the beginning only fanaticism, anger and clubs. It seems that small arms would be a credible deterrent to a police state.
Now if only either side showed toleration, wisdom, or discretion.
I won’t argue with that, though I would say the Egyptian military is a far cry from ours in overall capability and organization(at least as a strike force) As I pointed out, the .gov has very little incentive to fight a battle with its citizens if it does not have to, but push come to shove, it would be incredibly messy, with losses at 50 to 1 or greater for our citizens, I expect.