The Smallest Minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities. – Ayn Rand
Via Hell in a Handbasket by way of The Zeray Gazette (and note the spelling errors in the text and transcript):
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pwghabw4N80&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0&w=480&h=385]James put his link in the category “funnies,” but when you think about it, it’s not. It’s not funny at all. UPDATE: Bummer. Justin reports it’s a fake. Explains the misspellings.
I’ve quoted Sir Robert Peel’s Nine Principles of Policing that he developed when creating London’s first official police force in 1822 several times in the past. Time to repeat them again:
1. The basic mission for which the police exist is to prevent crime and disorder.
2. The ability of the police to perform their duties is dependent upon public approval of police actions.
3. Police must secure the willing co-operation of the public in voluntary observance of the law to be able to secure and maintain the respect of the public.
4. The degree of co-operation of the public that can be secured diminishes proportionately to the necessity of the use of physical force.
5 Police seek and preserve public favour not by catering to public opinion but by constantly demonstrating absolute impartial service to the law.
6. Police use physical force to the extent necessary to secure observance of the law or to restore order only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient.
7. Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
8. Police should always direct their action strictly towards their functions and never appear to usurp the powers of the judiciary.
9. The test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with it.
I’ve also posted repeatedly on the decay of the UK’s culture, and its performance as a laboratory petri dish for what the Left wants to implement here.
This story (h/t: Ironhand) pissed me off:
Mark of madness: Police refuse to show suspect’s birthmark in ID parade… because of his human rights
When Tracy Ryan spotted a suspected burglar emerging from the dog sanctuary where she works, she thought she would have little problem pointing him out to police.
After all, he had a large port-wine stain on his face.
But when police set up an identity parade, they refused to take the man’s distinctive birthmark into account – in case it infringed his human rights.
An officer from the Nottinghamshire force explained that the mark was too rare to be included in a profile of the burglar when it was entered into a computer database.
It would leave only a small pool of potential suspects in the electronic ID parade, he said, breaking police rules.
Under laws designed to take into account ‘the rights and freedoms of the public’, witnesses must be shown a minimum of 12 photographs before they are allowed to identify a suspect.
These are selected from a database of people who have passed through custody in Nottinghamshire, in the hope that the burglar is already known to police.
Because only a handful of people on a database had a birthmark or port-wine stain, the characteristic gave fewer than 12 results.
The characteristic was subsequently removed and the search was broadened.
This forced Mrs Ryan, 39, to examine the faces of 93 suspects, none of which she recognised.
It was on August 25 that £300 in charity donations was stolen from the Crossing Cottage Greyhound Sanctuary in Sutton on Trent, Nottinghamshire.
Mrs Ryan noted that, apart from his birthmark, the suspected culprit was tall and wore a white tracksuit. She also took his car registration number.
Police have subsequently made an arrest and Mrs Ryan is due to attend a second identification parade which will include the suspect, who is on bail.
He will be pictured alongside 11 people of a similar appearance. But if he has a birthmark, it will still be kept secret.
The suspected thief and the other participants will be made to cover one side of their face.
Mrs Ryan said: ‘Surely an unusual characteristic like a big birthmark should help a police investigation?
‘If there were just four or five people on the database with such marks, all the better.
‘I understand police have to follow procedures, but to me the rules are flawed and amount to a pretty lame excuse.’
It goes well beyond “lame.”
Her boss John Morton, who manages the home for 30 former racing dogs as part of the Retired Greyhound Trust, said: ‘The police are saying they can’t infringe human rights. But what about our human rights?
You don’t have any. You’re not a member of a protected class.
‘We are law-abiding people who have been victims of crime, and the police have a responsibility to maximise their chances of solving that crime. If this is the law, it has to be changed.’
Yes, but it won’t be.
But this story (also via Ironhand) inspired a RCOBTM reaction:
Police tell mother attacked by yobs at home: ‘We won’t send anyone… it may escalate the problem’
A mother who was punched to the floor in her own home by yobs was stunned when police advised her not to call officers to her house – because it would ‘escalate’ the problem.
Nikki Collen, 39, begged officers for help after a thug kicked in her front door and punched her to the floor in her hallway.
After her attacker fled, Nikki rang Warwickshire Police who promised to send an officer to her home in Kenilworth.
But an hour later she received a phone call from a woman police officer who told her it would be better if police did not attend because it might inflame the situation.
Mother-of-two Nikki, who is studying an Open University degree in nursing, said: ‘I couldn’t believe it.
‘I was attacked and wanted to report it but the officer was persuading me not to press charges.
‘She even told me that if the bullies saw a police officer at my home it could escalate the problem further.
Remember, this is in the same nation that produced Sir Robert Peel.
Sweet bleeding jeebus.
‘I was so scared I asked what I should do and she told me to try and sort it out on my own. I was really upset and felt really alone.
‘It’s a horrendous way to live and has got to the stage where I fear going out because of the abuse I will get.
‘I can’t cope with it and need some help from authorities. I’ve just had enough and need to move. Why should I put up with this?’
Because your betters tell you you should. For “social justice.”
Nikki, who lives with her son Josh, 17, and daughter Demi, 13, have been subjected to a terrifying campaign of harassment after a minor dispute over a bottle of hair conditioner last December.
Since then the family have been sworn at, had used condoms hurled at their house, had their windows smashed and graffiti scrawled on their home.
Nikki said the police had been called on numerous occasions but no charges had ever been brought against the bullies.
Of course not! That might violate their rights!
She added: ‘I am on anti-depressants, my nerves are shot to pieces and I’m terrified of walking out my front door.
‘This is no way to live. When it’s got really bad, I have to admit I have thought about ending it but I’m determined not to be beaten by the bullies who are acting like they are above the law.
‘All I want is a bit of support from the police.’
You and the rest of your countrymen.
Don’t hold your breath waiting.
The family’s problems have haunting comparisons to the case of Fiona Pilkington and her disabled daughter Francecca Hardwick, who were driven to their deaths after an 11-year bully campaign.
Nikki said: ‘I’ve read in the papers about Mrs Pilkington and just think the police simply don’t care.
‘If they can ignore that family for 11 years what hope have I got?’
A Warwickshire Police spokeswoman confirmed a female officer had spoken to Nikki about the attack on Saturday, September 19.
She said: ‘The policing team have had some involvement in ongoing issues in the street.
‘We have also been working closely with the local authority regarding tenancy agreements and ongoing neighbour disputes.
“Working closely.”
They’re engaging in dialog, no doubt. Surely that will solve everything!
If you live in the UK and are an upstanding, law-abiding citizen, GET THE HELL OUT. It’s too late to save your culture.
Isn’t that N.I.C.E?
From “Primary Source” commenter “Grumpy Student”:
By the way, anyone who wants to read all about the body set up to ration healthcare in the UK only needs to look up the Wikipedia entry for “NICE”, the National Institute of Clinical Excellence (good name) whose job it is to determine which treatments the NHS will offer based on a cost effectiveness metric. The good thing about this policy (from their point of view) is that patients denied treatment usually die before any court case completes.
It’s important to understand that money the individual has paid in taxes towards healthcare becomes “public money” and therefore they have no right to expect it to be used for their treatment. Therefore the decision becomes “is this treatment in the public interest or could we spend this money doing something else?” not “what are the patient’s needs/is this patient entitled to the treatment?”.
The reason they strike you off if you pay for the treatment yourself is that doing so is seen as using financial wealth to obtain a better standard of care than generally available which is contrary to the philosophy of the NHS (I kid you not).
In the NHS, maintaining socialist dogma is more important than patient care.
Now, go read Neo-neocon’s story of her experience dealing with chronic pain, and what the National Health Service’s National Institute of Clinical Excellence is now, for economic reasons, recommending for people in its system with similar problems.
Then tell me again why nationalized health care is such a rush?
“Single-Payer” Health Care from a “Primary Source“
Commenter “Grumpy Student” left the following comment to the post On Health Care. Around these parts, Grumpy Student is what’s known as a “Primary Source.” His comment is today’s Quote of the Day:
Living as (I currently do) in the UK, I find the debate about socialised healthcare in America pretty funny. Especially when the NHS (our nationalised healthcare system) is so appallingly bad. Even funnier is when the NHS is held up as some great example of how things should be done.
Some truths about the NHS:
1) If your treatment is considered “not an emergency” (by which I mean you are not gushing blood or whatever) you will go onto a very long waiting list.
2) Because of 1) the government got snappy and decided to set targets for waiting list times. Hospital managers came up with a novel solution: Secret waiting lists to get onto waiting lists. This meant they didn’t have to improve care, but the governments figures improve. Everyone who matters is happy. In the NHS, patients don’t matter.
3) Killer hospital acquired infections like MRSA are endemic in NHS hospitals.
4) NHS accountants make decisions about what treatments are worth spending money on. If the accountants decide your treatment isn’t financially worth it, tough luck. You can always go private.
5) Which brings us to private healthcare in Britain. In order to make up for their horrifyingly low salaries, most doctors also are involved in private practice. If you choose to go private, you still have to pay for the NHS. Not only are you paying for your care, but also for care other people are not really getting. It’s a fantastic system!
6) If you are struck by 4) and decide to pay for the treatment, then you are struck off the NHS with immediate effect and expected to pay for all your healthcare for issues related to the one you are paying for. You are still charged for the NHS through your taxes – you just can’t use it. If the condition you have is terminal then it’s likely that all the health issues you have will be related and you will have to pay for all of them.
These last two points conspire against the middle classes. Because taxes are so high, they can’t afford to also pay for private healthcare and so get worse healthcare than they would in the US. The poor get some healthcare which is better (I guess) and the rich can happily pay for private healthcare and the NHS at the same time. If they pay taxes in the UK at all.
7) Healthcare is not even free. I still have to pay for prescriptions, dental care, eye care and many other things that the NHS accountants have deemed non-essential.
You don’t want socialised healthcare in the US. Trust us. We live in Britain.
Of course, this wouldn’t happen here. We’d have the Right People in charge!
During the Apollo 13 “event” when an oxygen tank in the Service Module exploded, the microphones in the capsule were on VOX – they were voice-activated, and every word spoken in the capsule went out live over the air. The language got a little bit salty, as the crew attempted to determine what the problem was, how badly they were damaged, and how they should respond to the situation.
It was 1970. Some people complained.
Once the astronauts were returned safely to the Earth, they received a reprimand for their language. As I recall, during a speech the mission commander, James Lovell, told the crowd about this and dismissed the complaint with the explanation, “It was not a ‘gosh darn’ situation.”
Unix-Jedi sent me an email this evening of a story out of (formerly) Great Britain. It could only have come from there:
A man who threatened to stab four police officers in the heart and held a two-hour stand-off is launching legal action because a police sergeant swore at him.
The sergeant has been sent to a Management Advice course and Northumbria Police face the threat of a civil action from the 35-year-old thug, who had to be subdued with a Taser gun.
When officers arrived at Glen Francis’ home to arrest his girlfriend, he erupted in rage and targeted a female officer who was standing guard in his hallway.
He hurled a bowl of pasta at her before officers claim he held her captive in his house and threatened to shoot her with a handgun he hid in a cupboard.
She escaped, but when back-up arrived, Francis lunged at the officers with a six-inch knife, before the 35-year-old was shot twice with a Taser gun.
But he simply pulled the metal barbs from his skin and continued his savage attack.
Then he barricaded himself into a room at the address in Ambassador’s Way, North Shields, where he used a hammer to smash the walls, and screamed: ‘The first copper in here is getting f****** killed, come on, I only want one of you.’
After a two-hour stand-off with trained negotiators, armed officers stormed his kitchen and Tasered him a further three times before he was eventually arrested and taken into custody.
Un-fucking-believable. (Sue me.)
But that’s not the best part!
Francis claimed he was stripped of his clothes and handcuffed on a cell floor.
Those allegations have been thrown-out following an investigation by the Northumbria Police Professional Standards Department (PSD).
But they substantiated his claim a sergeant was guilty of misconduct because he swore at Francis, and he was ordered to undergo a Management Advice course.
Why do people want to be police officers in the UK? I can’t think of a more thankless job. But wait! There’s more!
Francis, now of Wallsend, North Tyneside, said he was discussing legal action with his solicitor and planned to lodge a complaint with the European Court of Human Rights.
He said: ‘I was a toe-rag when I was younger, but I’m trying to go straight.
Aren’t they always?
‘I’m really scared of the police now – I’m like a bag of nerves.
You should have been afraid of them before you threatened to stab them, but given the restrictions they operate under, I can understand why you weren’t. Don’t try to convince us now that just because they tasered you, bro, that they frighten you now.
‘I want to take legal action because they just get a telling off for what they did.
‘It was an insult when I heard how the officer who swore at me got off – it upset me to hear someone say that.
No, you want to sue them because you think it will get you some free money you can use to buy more drugs and another knife, or maybe this time you’ll actually move up to a gun.
‘I’ve got a hole in my heart and they used a Taser, which could have killed me.’
Awwww. Too bad it didn’t.
Documents from the PSD state the sergeant was pushed into making an ‘inappropriate comment’ following Francis’ tirade of abuse.
It states: ‘The police officer openly admits he made the inappropriate comment about Mr Francis after the strip search had been conducted.
‘He admits this was unprofessional, although it was never his intention for Mr Francis to hear this comment.
‘He stipulates this comment was a result of the violence and abuse from Mr Francis.’
Gee, ya THINK? I’m actually surprised that Mr Francis was the recipient of only harsh language, myself.
Following the incident in February 2008, Francis was charged with offences of false imprisonment, threats to kill and affray.
During a trial at Newcastle Crown Court in September he was found guilty of affray and received a 12-month prison sentence, suspended for two years.
In other words, he walked.
Way to go Crown Prosecution Service. Let me re-quote Theodore Dalrymple:
(British police are) a nearly defeated occupying colonial force that, while mayhem reigns everywhere else, has retreated to safe enclaves, there to shuffle paper and produce bogus information to propitiate its political masters. Their first line of defense is to refuse to record half the crime that comes to their attention, which itself is less than half the crime committed. Then they refuse to investigate recorded crime, or to arrest the culprits even when it is easy to do so and the evidence against them is overwhelming, because the prosecuting authorities will either decline to prosecute, or else the resultant sentence will be so trivial as to make the whole procedure (at least nineteen forms to fill in after a single arrest) pointless.
And here you have a classic example.
Francis underwent an operation in January to repair his heart, which was defective since birth.
So he waited 35 years for heart surgery in England’s much-vaunted “free” healthcare system?
A Northumbria Police spokesman said: ‘Francis was convicted of affray in court. If any civil action is received it will be considered in the usual manner.’
Read: “Ignored.”
Simon Reed, of the Police Federation of England and Wales, said the case ‘typifies the bureaucratic nonsense police officers have to contend with.’
Which may be the understatement of the Century, but the Century is yet young.
AND, linked in that story, comes this heartwarmer:
I was just trying to protect my family: Man arrested after yobs attack stepson speaks out
A businessman arrested for attempted murder after confronting yobs who were attacking his stepson yesterday said he had to act to protect his family.
Colin Philpott, 58, said he reacted instinctively when he allegedly stabbed one of the youths with a letter opener.
He had picked up the opener as he raced outside to help Alex Lee, 25, who was being kicked on the ground.
Uh-oh – that’s premeditation!
Speaking to the Daily Mail yesterday, just hours after he was released by police, Mr Philpott said: ‘I don’t think I had any option but to do what I did. I was trying to protect my family.’
You didn’t even have that option. The society you live in cannot differentiate between “violent and predatory” and “violent but protective,” so they make you an unwilling, unarmed victim and punish you for transgressing.
Teenager Josh Hasler ended up in hospital after suffering five stab wounds – one of which punctured his lung. He will spend his 17th birthday in hospital today after having surgery on Saturday night.
Mr Philpott, who runs a contract cleaning company, was released on bail pending inquiries and will have to return to police in September to learn his fate.
Well, if he gets Judge Shirley Anwyl he’s in deep trouble. She’s the one who sentenced Brett Osborne to five years for a similar stabbing, only the drug-crazed intruder in that incident died. Barrister Harry Potter (who I’m sure regrets the popularity of the books with that hero as the leading character) explained the law back in 2004:
“The law,” explains Harry Potter, the barrister who, with Charles Bott, would defend Osborn, “does not require the intention to kill for a prosecution for murder to succeed. All that is required is an intention to cause serious bodily harm. That intention can be fleeting and momentary. But if it is there in any form at all for just a second – that is, if the blow you struck was deliberate rather than accidental – you can be guilty of murder and spend the rest of your life in prison.
“Moreover,” Mr Potter continues, “while self-defence is a complete defence to a charge of murder, the Court of Appeal has ruled that if the force you use is not judged to have been reasonable – if a jury, that is, decides it was disproportionate – then you are guilty of murder. A conviction for murder automatically triggers the mandatory life sentence. There are no exceptions.”
Mr. Philpott deliberately picked up that letter-opener and deliberately stabbed “Teenager Josh Hasler” at least five times.
Mr. Philpott is fooked.
If he is charged with attempted murder he could face a lengthy jail term.
Like five years, if he fears the jury would find him guilty and his lawyer convinces him to cop a plea.
Last night Mr Philpott and his wife Susanne, 51, told how his upmarket neighbourhood in Crowthorne, Berkshire, had been plagued by gangs of drunk teenagers.
He said that in the last few months both he and his neighbours had had to call police several times to make complaints.
Mr Philpott said: ‘There has been a number of incidents in the street with drunk groups of teenagers being noisy and generally a nuisance. They have caused some acts of minor vandalism too. Two years ago my stepdaughter had her car window smashed.
‘I and some other neighbours have called the police before to report problems. I assume the police reacted to those complaints although they never got back in touch.’
See the Theodore Dalrymple quote above.
Late on Friday night, while in bed, his stepson Mr Lee heard a disturbance outside in the cul-de-sac.
Along with his mother, he opened the front door to discover a gang of five 16 and 17-year-old males kicking his stepfather’s work van on the road.
‘He had gone out to confront them,’ said Mr Philpott. ‘He tried to speak to them and they attacked him, punching and kicking him to the ground.
He suffered a broken nose and concussion. I was asleep in bed but I was woken up by the noise. I came downstairs and went outside.
‘When I appeared on the scene they set about me and I reacted. One of the youths suffered stab wounds.
Note the passive voice. Not “I stabbed one of the youths” but “it just magically happened.”
I asked my wife to call the police and ambulance. The group continued being abusive towards me and making threats.
But after one of them got stabbed they stopped assaulting him and his stepson.
‘As soon as the police arrived I was arrested. I was treated very well by the police, I have no complaints. It was very traumatic at the time but I am calmer now.’
And facing jail time.
Mother-of-two Mrs Philpott, a training consultant, spoke of the horror she had witnessed outside her £500,000 five-bedroom home.
Envy, anyone?
‘One of them said that he would kill me and burn down my house,’ she said. ‘I was terrified and when Alex tried to calm him down, the other four got worked up and they all attacked him.
‘Alex ended up on the ground with all five of them on him, kicking him in the head and stomach. I was so frightened for him I screamed for Colin, who was in bed.
‘He came running out – still barefoot and half asleep – and saw the mess Alex was in so ran back into the house. He grabbed the first thing he saw, which was a letter-opener, and confronted the boys.
There was the mistake – nobody should confront criminals. It might encourage them.
Anthony Burgess was a prophet.
I was in such a state of panic that I couldn’t do anything to help. I was glued to the spot in terror.
In the blink of an eye, the lads attacked Colin and I saw one stumble into the road as Colin screamed for me to call the police and ambulance. It was all so surreal.
‘When the police arrived and arrested Colin, I was gobsmacked. It was heartbreaking to see him handcuffed and carted off like a common criminal.
Why? He’d violated the social contract by resisting! What else would you expect?
‘He is a hardworking, honest family man and was only trying to protect us.’
He’s not qualified! And he’ll submit to punishment!
Five local youths, aged 16 and 17, were arrested on suspicion of assault and criminal damage. All have been released on bail.
And face, at best, the dreaded ASBO. (Again, see the Dalrymple quote.)
Yesterday at Josh Hasler’s home on an estate in nearby Ascot, a female relative said the teenager was ‘doing OK’ in hospital.
‘His worst injury was a punctured lung but that has been repaired,’ she added.
It is not clear whether the teenager has been in trouble with police before but on his Bebo social networking webpage, he admits being involved in an array of anti-social behaviours.
In a question and answer section it states:
* Ever beaten someone up? Answer: Yep
* Ever shoplifted? Yep
* Do you drink: Always
But he’s trying to get straight!
Thames Valley Police Superintendent Steve Kirk said: ‘We believe there was some kind of assault and criminal damage offences before the incident took place involving a group of youths which left a 25-year-old man with a broken nose.’
He appealed for anyone with information to contact police.
Yeah, like that’ll happen. Especially when any potential witnesses know that their homes might unfortunately burn down in the middle of the night under suspicious circumstances that won’t be solved.
Math Test Updated
I told an older version of this joke in The George Orwell Daycare Center essay, but Nicki Fellenzer has an updated version:
Subject: A History of teaching maths
1. Teaching maths in 1970
A logger sells a truckload of timber for £100. His cost of production is 4/5 of the price. What is his profit?
2. Teaching Maths In 1980
A logger sells a truckload of timber for £100. His cost of production is 80% of the price. What is his profit?
3. Teaching Maths In 1990
A logger sells a truckload of timber for £100. His cost of production is £80. How much was his profit?
4. Teaching Maths In 2000
A logger sells a truckload of timber for £100. His cost of production is £80 and his profit is £20. Your assignment: Underline the number 20.
5. Teaching Maths In 2005
A logger cuts down a beautiful forest because he is selfish and inconsiderate and cares nothing for the habit of animals or the preservation of our woodlands. Your assignment: Discuss how the birds and squirrels might fee l as the logger cut down their homes just for a measly profit of £20.
6. Teaching Maths In 2009
A logger is arrested for trying to cut down a tree in case it may be offensive to Muslims or other religious groups not consulted in the felling license. He is also fined a £100 as his chainsaw is in breach of Health and Safety legislation as it deemed too dangerous and could cut something. He has used the chainsaw for over 20 years without incident however he does not have the correct certificate of competence and is therefore considered to be a recidivist and habitual criminal. His DNA is sampled and his details circulated throughout all government agencies. He protests and is taken to court and fined another £100 because he is such an easy target. When he is released he returns to find Gypsies have cut down half his wood to build a camp on his land. He tries to throw them off but is arrested, prosecuted for harassing an ethnic minority, imprisoned and fined a further £100. While he is in jail the Gypsies cut down the rest of his wood and sell it on the black market for £100 cash. They also have a leaving BBQ of squirrel and pheasant and depart leaving behind several tonnes of rubbish and asbestos sheeting. The forester on release is warned that failure to clear the fly tipped rubbish immediately at his own cost is an offence. He complains and is arrested for environmental pollution, breach of the peace and invoiced £12,000 plus VAT for safe disposal costs by a regulated government contractor.
Your assignment: How many times is the logger going to have to be arrested and fined before he realises that he is never going to make £20 profit by hard work, give up, sign onto the dole and live off the state for the rest of his life?
7. Teaching Maths In 2010
A logger doesn’t sell a lorry load of timber because he can’t get a loan to buy a new lorry because his bank has spent all his and their money on a derivative of securitised debt related to sub-prime mortgages in Alabama and lost the lot with only some government money left to pay a few million pound bonuses to their senior directors and the traders who made the biggest losses. The logger struggles to pay the £1,200 road tax on his old lorry however, as it was built in the 1970s it no longer meets the emissions regulations and he is forced to scrap it. Some Bulgarian loggers buy the lorry from the scrap merchant and put it back on the road. They undercut everyone on price for haulage and send their cash back home, while claiming unemployment for themselves and their relatives. If questioned they speak no English and it is easier to deport them at the government’s expense. Following their holiday back home they return to the UK with different names and fresh girls and start again. The logger protests, is accused of being a bigoted racist and as his name is on the side of his old lorry he is forced to pay £1,500 registration fees as a gang master. The Government borrows more money to pay more to the bankers as bonuses are not cheap. The parliamentarians feel they are missing out and claim the difference on expenses and allowances. You do the maths.
8. Teaching Maths 2017
أ المسجل تبيع حموله شاحنة من
الخشب من اجل 100 دولار. صاحب تكلفة
الانت=D
8ج من
الثمن. ما هو الربح له؟
It would be funnier if it was less true.
Quote of the Day
In 1920, England was the safest industrialized society on Earth. In fact, it was by far the safest society of any sort on Earth. Through a series of gun control laws, England has become by far the most violent society on Earth.
Australia’s politicians were so eager to follow England’s lead that they let a certifiably insane man loose – and gave him his guns back. When the shots stopped, 35 people were dead and 21 were wounded. Today, Oz is clearly the second most violent industrialized society on Earth.
Now, New Zealand wants to get in on the fun. Their politicians are changing the rules for firearms possession, making it harder to keep and bear arms. That will make criminals feel safer, with the inevitable increase in violent crime. Which will result in a demand for more “gun controls.” And finally New Zealand will most likely be in the same situation England and Australia were in before it.
— Extranos Alley – Defining Insanity
It’s not just the gun control laws. In the case of the Anglosphere, gun control is just one of the symptoms of a flawed philosophy that forces its people to spiral down an ever-more-dangerous path of compelled helplessness.
This philosophy was perhaps best expressed recently by James Bowman (author, I believe, of Honor: A History) in a Weekly Standard piece from April, Harm’s Way: The roads in Britain are paved with good intention, itself a review of Theodore Dalrymple’s (pen name of Anthony Daniels) latest book Not with a Bang but a Whimper: The Politics and Culture of Decline. In it, Bowman excerpts a bit from the book, and then expands:
The many hypocrisies and deceptions on which the New Labour coalition was built are typified by the system of criminal justice with which, in his prison job, Daniels had an intimate acquaintance. Citing the work of a whistle-blowing policeman named David Fraser, he compares the British police to
a nearly defeated occupying colonial force that, while mayhem reigns everywhere else, has retreated to safe enclaves, there to shuffle paper and produce bogus information to propitiate its political masters. Their first line of defense is to refuse to record half the crime that comes to their attention, which itself is less than half the crime committed. Then they refuse to investigate recorded crime, or to arrest the culprits even when it is easy to do so and the evidence against them is overwhelming, because the prosecuting authorities will either decline to prosecute, or else the resultant sentence will be so trivial as to make the whole procedure (at least nineteen forms to fill in after a single arrest) pointless.
The real question is, why isn’t this clearly appalling state of affairs a scandal in Britain? I think the answer is that the media consensus there–and to a large extent here–includes certain core principles, such as that crime is caused by something other than criminals and that imprisonment is society’s shame, rather than that of the incarcerated, which can only be protected by maintaining these hypocrisies and deceptions, and with them, the illusion that nothing can be done about most crime. Therefore, the media are complicit in pretending that these problems don’t exist–because they shouldn’t exist.
(My emphasis.) And along with that comes the inability to differentiate between “violent and predatory” and “violent but protective.”
And that’s insanity.
How Can People Still Believe This?
The levels of delusion that people are able to achieve still astound me. The piece I wrote a bit back, How’s that Gun Control Working Out for You? got linked at an online gamer’s forum. Apparently one member there is virulently anti-gun. Well, someone found another thread at the site, and linked to the piece again – but here’s the part of that thread – written by said anti-gunner – that inspired this post:
The UK has strict gun control and our last schoolyard shooting was Dunblane in 1996.
Australia has strict gun control and their last spree shooting was Port Arthur – also in 1996. Both of those incidents were followed by the introduction of draconian legislation to stop such incidents completely. It would be absurd to claim that there will never be another such incident. But 23 years without a repeat indicates quite a high barrier to the aspirations of would-be spree killers.I think it works like this:
(1) Make it very hard to buy unnecessary firearms.
(2) Offer amnesties to get the existing toxic pool of unnecessary firearms out of drawers and cupboards throughout the nation
(3) Now it is very hard for low-level housebreakers to pick up an untraceable gun
(4) Now there are very few gun-dealers, so the police can take time to investigate ‘break-ins’ by which their guns are passed to criminals.
(5) Now, there is a very restricted market for bullets – it’s possible to trace the bullets used in a crime back to the shop and back to the purchaser. Arms dealers get more cautious about who they sell bullets to.
(6) Now its hard to shoot someone dead on impulse – so your murder rate is dropping
(7) and the chaotic, unstable criminals at the bottom of your society can’t get a gun at all.
(8) You drop the insane, vindictive multi-lifetime jail sentences for crimes against property – so it makes logical sense for a thief to surrender instead of trying to kill all witnesses or die attempting to get away.
(9) So the more ‘professional’ criminals don’t need guns for self-defense. And they don’t want the extra jail time they get for carrying a lethal weapon.Result: A low level of guns in your society and a low level of gun crime. It’s not a zero crime rate. But about 8,000 fewer Americans will be shot dead each year.
Why do I think this would work ? Because, if you look at the top 25 developed nations, you’ll see that it is the US of A which has an unhealthy love affair with hand guns. And a demonization of ‘the criminals’ who are given 99 year sentences which they don’t have the life-span to serve.
And the US of A has three times the murder rate of those other developed nations. Doesn’t look that mysterious an issue to me.
So . . . draconian gun control has prevented another Dunblane or Port Arthur. OK, I can understand that reasoning, even if I disagree with it. It’s the same logic that says the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq have prevented any more 9/11-like suicide attacks on U.S. soil.
Correlation ≠ Causation, but I understand the idea.
Now, let’s look at the rest of “Grungekitty’s” assertions.
(1) Make it very hard to buy unnecessary firearms.
Hard for whom? For the law-abiding, obviously, since pretty much anything you want is available on the streets in the UK for the right price.
(2) Offer amnesties to get the existing toxic pool of unnecessary firearms out of drawers and cupboards throughout the nation
Yes, they’ve been doing that for quite a while now in the UK – a place where all legally possessed firearms have been registered with the government. However, a 2003 amnesty brought in a lot of weapons, but most everyone asked said that “it appears to have had little effect in the communities where it really matters.” Another in 2004 brought in few firearms. In 2007 after a boy died after being shot with an air rifle, an amnesty in Wales brought in:
10 air rifles
4 air pistols
2 BB guns
1 blanks firing pistol and ammunition
1 hunting knife
1 imitation handgun
3 boxes of air gun pellets
1 crossbow
Wow.
And after each amnesty, gun crime increased.
(3) Now it is very hard for low-level housebreakers to pick up an untraceable gun
Too right. Now they have to fence the stuff they steal and buy an untraceable gun! Or just rent one. There’s apparently an active rent-a-gun business in the UK these days, for the down-on-his-luck criminal who can’t afford the fifty quid necessary to purchase one.
No one knows how many guns are in circulation across Britain. Senior police sources confirm that they are ‘easy and quick’ to obtain. Whether they rent, borrow or buy, young men have no difficulty getting ‘tooled up’. Semi-automatic pistols remain the weapon of choice, although Trident officers admit ‘military hardware’ has found its way onto the streets.
That quote comes from a September, 2006 piece.
(4) Now there are very few gun-dealers, so the police can take time to investigate ‘break-ins’ by which their guns are passed to criminals.
Oooh! “Break-ins” with scare quotes! From that same September report:
Elsewhere, thousands of AK-47s from east Europe are reported to have ‘gone missing’ in Britain. One senior police source admits halting the supply of weaponry into Britain remains a thankless task: ‘We suspect a number enter the UK via lorry drivers using secret compartments. The issue is that we’re concentrating on drug and human imports and yet bringing in a handful of guns is, relatively, dead easy.
Who needs to break in to a gun shop? It’s easier to smuggle in the stuff that legal gun dealers can’t even handle – handguns, submachine guns, hand grenades, and assault rifles. The kind that actually have select-fire switches.
(5) Now, there is a very restricted market for bullets – it’s possible to trace the bullets used in a crime back to the shop and back to the purchaser. Arms dealers get more cautious about who they sell bullets to.
Really? And where do you get that idea? If it’s easy to smuggle in weapons, ammunition is a snap. Your ignorance is showing, grungekitty!
(6) Now its hard to shoot someone dead on impulse – so your murder rate is dropping
And THIS is the one that leaves my jaw on the ground. The UK has done everything on this list, and their murder rate continues to INCREASE. I’ve done this comparison before, but here it is again – the ratio of homicide rates between the U.S. and Scotland, and the U.S. and England & Wales since 1946:
So the U.S. without all that “draconian gun control” has been experiencing a decline in homicide rates, while Scotland and England & Wales have had a slow but steady increase in their rates. If you project the slopes on out, you’re looking at a 1:1 ratio about what, 2012?
But we’re not done yet!
(7) and the chaotic, unstable criminals at the bottom of your society can’t get a gun at all.
Riiiiight! Just like in the UK, WHICH IS AN ISLAND. I believe I’ve already addressed this bit of cranial flatulence.
(8) You drop the insane, vindictive multi-lifetime jail sentences for crimes against property – so it makes logical sense for a thief to surrender instead of trying to kill all witnesses or die attempting to get away.
Words fail me.
(9) So the more ‘professional’ criminals don’t need guns for self-defense. And they don’t want the extra jail time they get for carrying a lethal weapon.
Words fail me still.
Result: A low level of guns in your society and a low level of gun crime. It’s not a zero crime rate. But about 8,000 fewer Americans will be shot dead each year.
Give her credit, she’s wrong about everything, and she finishes BIG!
Sorry, grungekitty, but we’ve seen the petri dish of the UK. We know what actually happens. The government succeeds in disarming the victim pool, and the criminals are emboldened. So not only does the homicide rate increase, but all other forms of violent crime go up too. After all, they’re not afraid of the police, who – as crime victim Nikki Goeser explained, can’t be everywhere all the time. No, the cops show up just in time to put out the crime scene tape and take photos of your loved ones. Not their fault. Protecting you and yours isn’t really their job.
Sweet bleeding Shiva, the things people can convince themselves of in the face of all the evidence.
The BBC Takes an Interest in Tennessee Gun Laws
I guess since the UK has enacted “the toughest gun laws in the world”, designed to “put a firm brake on the development of a dangerous gun culture in the UK,” they have to find their jollies vicariously:
Tennessee gun law divides opinion
By James Coomarasamy
BBC News, Nashville, Tennessee
Just an aside, but I’d really be interested in Mr. Coomarasamy’s personal take on being in Tennessee. Since Knoxville seems to be Blogger Central, perhaps one of the many bloggers there could put on their pajamas and interview him?
Following a recent series of high-profile shooting incidents in the United States, the southern state of Tennessee is changing its gun laws this week.
It is relaxing them.
If a last-minute legal challenge fails, from Tuesday, gun owners in the state will be allowed to carry their weapons in a lot more public places – including bars and restaurants.
I went to Nashville to find out what local residents thought about the proposed law change.
‘Seconds count’
Nikki Goeser takes her Second Amendment right to bear arms very seriously.
One of Tennessee’s 250,000 registered gun owners, she saw her husband, Ben, shot dead in front of her in April.
She believes her right was denied when she needed it most.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/player/emp/external/player.swf
(Hooray for the BBC!)
I don’t believe Tennessee actually registers its gun owners – just the ones who have concealed carry licenses. Somehow I doubt Mr. Coomarasamy (or at least his editors) understands the difference.
Soon, Tennessee’s bars and restaurants will no longer be off-limits for registered weapons.
State legislators – a quarter of whom own firearms – have passed a law allowing guns into bars and restaurants, but preventing their owners from buying alcohol.
For the bill’s Democratic sponsor – State Senator Doug Jackson – it is a case of preserving the rights of individuals and those of individual states.
“People are fearful about tomorrow. They feel insecure. And the Second Amendment right is something that they cherish and it’s a means of protecting themselves and their family and defending what they have. It provides security in troubled times.”
But on the streets of Nashville, even some staunch defenders of Second Amendment rights fear that the Music City is about to become Dodge City. And that mixing guns and alcohol is a recipe for disaster.
Even though it’s not in any of the other states where it’s legal to do what Tennessee just enacted. Odd that Mr. Coomarasamy (or his editors) didn’t mention that.
Nashville restaurateur Randy Rayburn is anything but cool about the idea of his customers having guns.
He is leading a last-minute legal challenge to the law – to protect his barmen.
“Yes they’re scared, I’m scared, my wife is scared for our personal safety.”
He has done what restaurant owners are permitted to do – placed a sign in his window, saying “no guns allowed”.
But he is worried that the sign will not be enough to prevent people taking the new law into their own hands.
Er, what? Protect his barmen from what exactly? He expects CCW carriers to break the law, get drunk, and shoot the place up?
“We don’t need vigilantism inside my business,” he says. “I’m a gun owner, I have a gun at my home, but I keep it there, not at a public place where many people’s lives can be threatened.
Oh, right – vigilantism – he expects his patrons to pull out their gats and shoot bad guys for NO REASON. AND his barmen.
I think Nikki Goeser might want a word with Mr. Rayburn.
But Rayburn isn’t alone:
And he has support from the city’s police chief, Ronal Serpas, who does not believe that people who walk into bars with guns will steer clear of the shot glasses.
“If you think about how alchohol influences the choices people make… I don’t believe people are not going to drink and have guns, because I know they drink and drive,” he says.
“What process is going through their mind as it’s clouded by alcohol? [They’re] trying to do a good thing, but they have NO training, NO experience, NO time for reflective thought, and their minds are consumed by alcohol – it doesn’t make sense.”
So it’s Chief Serpas who believes that licensed CCW holders will violate the law and get drunk while armed, although up till now they’ve obeyed the law and not carried into establishments that serve alcohol. Always good to know what Law Enforcement thinks of the people it works for. In this case the Chief thinks that alcohol must give off the brain-altering waves that force people to drink.
Nikki gets the last word in the piece, though:
But for Nikki – and other law-abiding gun owners – what does not make sense is being allowed to have a gun, but being prevented from using it when it counts
“I hear people say all the time, guns are made specifically to kill,” she tells me.
“My answer to that is: ‘yes a gun can kill, but in the correct hands, it can be used to save innocent lives’. I don’t care so much about a bad guy’s life. I’m sorry, I don’t. They make the choice to be evil, that’s their choice. If they choose that, and I am armed I know what I’m doing, I will try to stop them.”
And soon she will be allowed to – in a lot more places.
Boy, it’s a good thing the UK has the toughest gun laws in the world, and doesn’t have to worry about people carrying handguns into restaurants anymore . . .
Gunman opens fire in restaurant
A man and a 15-year-old boy are recovering from bullet wounds after a gunman opened fire in a packed restaurant in west London.
Both suffered non-life threatening injuries during the shooting in Harry Morgan’s restaurant in St John’s Wood High Street, at 2110 BST on Friday.
The attacker, carrying two guns, chased the 31-year-old man into the diner and opened fire, hitting him in the leg.
But that’s UNPOSSIBLE!! The UK has the TOUGHEST GUN LAWS IN THE WORLD!!
The Metropolitan Police said no arrests have yet been made.
Because they arrived just in time to put up crime scene tape and take reports.
Several shots were fired in the venue which was filled with people.
Pop star Rachel Stevens was dining at the venue at the time.
A spokeswoman for the former S Club 7 member said: “Rachel and her family were in a restaurant where there was gunfire. It was very frightening for everyone there but none of the diners were hurt.”
An eyewitness said diners threw themselves to the floor screaming and bullet-holes could now be seen.
And, being unarmed, all they could to was huddle there waiting to die.
BBC chief economics correspondent Hugh Pym was also in the restaurant at the time.
He said: “I immediately went to ground and pulled my 15-year-old son under the table.
“We were aware of a guy running through.
“He didn’t appear as if he had a weapon – it felt like he was the victim.”
Pym continued: “We were under the table and everyone was shouting ‘stay down, stay down’.
“Obviously there was a lot of broken glass and people gradually emerged from the tables.
“People were pretty shaken up and were wailing in shock more than anything else.”
Billy Osbourne was also in the restaurant and saw the first man run in.
“Then all of a sudden a guy in a motorbike helmet came in – he had two automatic pistols and he starts firing at the guy.
UNPOSSIBLE! Handguns have been banned in the UK since 1997!!
“As soon as I smelled the cordite I was under the table.
“Everyone was screaming and hitting the deck.
“It was unbelievable – it was a packed restaurant and it does not appear anybody [among the diners] was hurt.”
The shooter was probably a lousy shot.
Harry Morgan’s was established in 1948 by a London butcher and has been shortlisted in the Evening Standard Restaurant Awards.
I bet they counted on a “Gun Free Zone” sign to protect their patrons, too.
Oh, right. The entire country is a “Gun Free Zone.” How’s that working out for you?
(h/t AR15.com for these two stories.)
Happy Independence Day
The Unanimous Declaration
of the Thirteen United States of America
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. –Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands.
He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.
He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislature.
He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states:
For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing taxes on us without our consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury:
For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offenses:
For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in these colonies:
For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments:
For suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection and waging war against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow citizens taken captive on the high seas to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare, is undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.
We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.
New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts: John Hancock, Samual Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut: Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York: William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey: Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark
Pennsylvania: Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware: Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean
Maryland: Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
North Carolina: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton
Snopes details the fates of many of the signers.
I’m going to the range.