HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: andy@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (Andy Freeman)
Subject: Re: Defined: National Police Force
Followup-To: talk.politics.guns
Organization: Computer Science Department,  Stanford University.
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 15:53:30 GMT

In article <1992Aug16.153754.13445@hasler.ascom.ch> kevinh@hslrswi.hasler.ascom.ch writes:
>In article <16AUG199209163165@gergo.tamu.edu>, dave@gergo.tamu.edu (Dave Martin) writes:
>> I don't deny you the right to own a gun for your own safety (though an M-16
>> would be a bit much)
>
>Surely in a civilised country one shouldn't need this avenue of defence,
>that's what the police are for. Why do you need guns unless you have illegal
>intentions? 

Actually, police are not all that useful for protecting individuals;
there are too few of them.  All they can do is patrol and investigate,
which is a very different thing.  In low-crime areas, the fact that
police can't protect individuals isn't all that relevant because that
failing doesn't have any consequences.  Things are different in
high-crime areas.

In a civilized country, the "need" question doesn't come up until
AFTER those supporting restrictions have shown that the benefit of
their proposals exceeds the costs.  Since gun control doesn't have any
benefits because it doesn't disarm people who cause problems with
guns, it can't meet that standard.

If you can't figure out legal and socially beneficial guns uses, then
maybe you shouldn't have one, but that doesn't say anything about the
rest of us.

-andy
--
UUCP:    {arpa gateways, sun, decwrl, uunet, rutgers}!cs.stanford.edu!andy
ARPA:    andy@cs.stanford.edu
Xref: sparky alt.politics.clinton:2520 alt.politics.bush:2430 talk.politics.misc:41139
Organization: Penn State University
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 16:53:26 EDT
From: <DGS4@psuvm.psu.edu>
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.bush,talk.politics.misc
Subject: Re: National Health Care
 <92234.104630DGS4@psuvm.psu.edu> <bBg-YC+@engin.umich.edu>

In article <bBg-YC+@engin.umich.edu>, jwh@citi.umich.edu (Jim Howe) says:
>
>In article <92234.104630DGS4@psuvm.psu.edu>, <DGS4@psuvm.psu.edu> writes:
>|>
>|> [...]
>|> From the NMES:
>|> The number of people who were without insurance for all 12 months of
>|> 1987 is 24.5 million people.
>|>
>|> The number of people who were without insurance for any length of time
>|> in 1987 is 47.8 million people
>|>
>|> From the SIPP:
>|> The number of people who were without insurance continuously from
>|> Feb. 1985 to Aug. 1987 was 10 million people.
>|>
>|> The number of people who were without insurance for at least one month
>|> during this period from Feb. 1985 to Aug. 1987 is 68.1 million people
>|>
>|> FACTS
>|>
>
>Why do you suppose people have 'gaps' in their insurance coverage.  It
>couldn't be because insurance is tied to employment, now could it?
>We need to reform the system so that people buy their own catestrophic
>health insurance plans which they own, independent of whether or
>not they are employed.  However the solution is not a 'one size fits
>all' insurance package offered by the government.
>
And how do you propose to pool risks in the above individual insurance
plans.  Individual underwriting is very expensive, lots of administrative
costs, you know.  As most other nations have discovered, government
involvement resutls in enormous cost savings because of risk pooling.
Dennis G. Shea, Penn State
<<DISCLAIMER>>
Ain't nobody's bizness but my own. I'll be happy to accept all
the credit for anything I've written.  It's funny, however, how
employers only acknowledge the profitable ideas.
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,talk.politics.guns
From: sybok@athena.mit.edu (The Rifleman)
Subject: Re: Gun control (was Re: democratic platform)
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 04:01:29 GMT

In article <1992Aug21.033033.379@u.washington.edu> iho@cac.washington.edu writes:
>Are we to assume by this thread, that a population armed with "legal"
>guns will be able to overthrow a despotic government backed by an army
>quipped with tanks, bombers, and the rest of the military goodies we're
>always buying for them?

Bombers, stealth fighters, H-bombs, and the like are not useful for
subduing a domestic resistance force, which is scattered amongst cities
which have important economic value.  (A country can't affort to bomb its
own cities!)  Tanks might be used against domestic resistors, but tank
crews can't live 24 hours a day inside a tank, and are vulnerable when
they come out the tank.  Molatov cocktails or other explosives can be used
on the tank to get the crew to come out, where they can be nailed.


Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.bush,talk.politics.misc,soc.culture.usa,talk.politics.guns
From: andy@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (Andy Freeman)
Subject: Re: Defined: National Police Force
Followup-To: talk.politics.guns
Organization: Computer Science Department,  Stanford University.
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 15:46:02 GMT

In article <cl0nbzqh@cck.coventry.ac.uk> csi056@cch.coventry.ac.uk (WEG) writes:
>In article <1992Aug17.225312.4046@igor.tamri.com> donb@igor.tamri.com (Don Baldwin) writes:
>>Guns have several purposes:  they enable you to protect yourself from
>>deadly danger
>>....
>>Surely, life is not now so safe and secure that we don't need to defend
>>ourselves!  
>>
>But if there were less guns in circulation then wouldn't there be less risk
>of "deadly danger"?

It depends on who still has guns, now doesn't it?  Taking guns away from
"the rest of us" need not disarm criminals, but if it doesn't, there's
no benefits (and significant costs) to disarming us.

-andy
--
UUCP:    {arpa gateways, sun, decwrl, uunet, rutgers}!cs.stanford.edu!andy
ARPA:    andy@cs.stanford.edu
Xref: sparky alt.politics.clinton:1922 alt.politics.bush:1552 talk.politics.misc:39657
From: mpolen@gelato.mips.com (Michael Polen)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.bush,talk.politics.misc
Subject: Re: NPC (was Re: National Health Care)
Date: 14 Aug 92 15:47:21 GMT
Organization: MIPS Computer Systems, Inc.
NNTP-Posting-Host: gelato.mips.com

In article <19294@drutx.ATT.COM>, dlo@druwa.ATT.COM (OlsonDL) writes:
|> 
|> 
|> In article <1992Aug11.180605.9290@interlan.Interlan.COM> urbin@interlan.Interlan.COM (Mark Urbin) writes:
|> }   Don't count on any savings on the 100,000 jobs he wants to cut from the
|> } federal government.
|> 
|> In fact in his "plan" he calls for the creation of a "National Police Corps"
|> with 100,000 new police officers.  Just a coincidence, I suppose.

He said we'd use that money to get more police back on the streets.
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.bush,talk.politics.misc
From: pat@fitz.uucp (Patrick Fitzgerald)
Subject: Re: National Police Force (was Re: National Health Care)
Organization: Intergraph Corporation, Huntsville, AL.
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 15:52:04 GMT

nelson_p@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:

>donb@igor.tamri.com (Don Baldwin) writes:
>>pat@fitz.uucp
>>>Here's what Clinton said about his National Police Corps, in his
>>>economics speech: [...]
>>>

>  I guess the first thing we should do is verify that this is 
>  Clinton's precise proposal, and not some GOP reinterpretation
>  of it.   Is the above a direct quote?

Yes.  If you are interested in the entire article, ftp to world.std.com,
get the file 'obi/USElection/President/Clinton/econ.txt'.


>  [...]
>  research at MIT(??).   Among the ones I liked were preference
>  voting and weighted voting.

Sounds like these would favor the established parties.  For example, since
most voters don't even know about the third-party candidates, they would
probably just put them at the bottom of the list.  Would this just have the
effect of cancelling out any votes for them?


>  I thought I would vote
>  for Andre Marrou as a sort of US equivalent of Lord Such, only
>  without the funny hat.  But that doesn't significantly hurt the
>  Bush or Clinton campaigns.

Go back and read the "lizard" post (or email to me, and I'll send it to
you).  "I'd vote for a human, but then I wouldn't be hurting the
lizards..."  Vote your conscience.


>>>We will create a Police Corps [...]

>  A nutty idea.  Although I must confess I haven't heard any really
>  good ideas about violent crime.  The 3:1, 1:3 figures above are
>  for violent crime and were in the 1991 FBI stats.  Nobody knows
>  why Americans are so violent or how to reduce it.  We already
>  have 800K people in prison and a lot more who should be there.  

Take a lesson from history: repeal prohibition.  However, the propaganda
machine is so entrenched in drug war rhetoric, this will probably never
even be discussed.  I wish they would at least _talk_ about it!
-- 
   ______   |o| Patrick Fitzgerald     |o| pat@fitz.b30.ingr.com
  / ___  )  |o| Sr. Software Analyst,  |o| (205) 730-3741
 / __)/ /__ |o| Intergraph Corporation |o| Mailstop GD3002
(_/it(_____)|o| TIM Documentation      |o| Huntsville, AL 35894-0001
-- 
   ______   |o| Patrick Fitzgerald     |o| pat@fitz.b30.ingr.com
  / ___  )  |o| Sr. Software Analyst,  |o| (205) 730-3741
 / __)/ /__ |o| Intergraph Corporation |o| Mailstop GD3002
(_/it(_____)|o| TIM Documentation      |o| Huntsville, AL 35894-0001
Xref: sparky alt.politics.clinton:2435 alt.politics.bush:2350 alt.politics.elections:11147
From: donb@igor.tamri.com (Don Baldwin)
Subject: Re: National Health Care
Organization: TOSHIBA America MRI, South San Francisco, CA
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 92 23:35:29 GMT

In article <1992Aug11.180605.9290@interlan.Interlan.COM>
urbin@interlan.Interlan.COM (Mark Urbin) writes:
>  Don't count on any savings on the 100,000 jobs he wants to cut from the
>federal government.  That money is needed to pay for the 100,000 officer
>National Police Corps that is part of the Putting People First plan.

What is this "National Police FOrce" you're talking about and how is it
supposed to work?  How will it be different from the FBI?  How do we
prevent it from abusing its power, as the FBI has been wont tp do?

   don
Xref: sparky alt.politics.clinton:2624 talk.politics.guns:19902
From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,talk.politics.guns
Subject: Re: Defined: National Police Force
Date: 22 Aug 92 23:14:01 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <183141@pyramid.pyramid.com> glambert@pyramid.com (George Lambert) writes:
>In article <1992Aug18.154422.6971@bluemoon.rn.com> grant@bluemoon.rn.com (Grant DeLorean) writes:
>>Norman St. John Polevaulter <MBS110@psuvm.psu.edu> writes:
>>
>>>...And I suppose all you conservatives will point your legally obtained
>>>firearms at the tanks, fire them, watch the bullets bounce off, and then
>>>be squished yourselves?
>>
>> Nope. We would point them at the tank crews, fire them and watch the
>>tank crews drop. Then the tank won't be a problem anymore.
>
>Gee, now we didn't we try that during WWII?  We wouldn't have had a problem
>with those Panzers then! 
>
>Hold on, there, I think them thar tank crews stay in the tank, lotsa armor,
>and your lil ol' pea shooters operated by them thar lil' ol' pea brains are
>gonna find out what a REAL "well regulated militia" is all about, bubba.

Funny thing about tanks, crews don't stay in them 24 hours a day. They
have to get out to eat, sleep, and take care of bodily functions. They
also have to get out to refuel and rearm. We couldn't just shoot the
Panzer crews because they pulled back behind their lines to do those
things. But among a hostile armed civilian population, there *are* no
lines to pull behind. *Everywhere* is indian country.

The greatest weapon of the irregular is terror. Troops never know
when or where they will be attacked. They never know who will attack.
The irregular's best arms are pistols and scope sighted rifles. Near
and far, the enemy is everywhere. There is no safe place to rest. 
Momma-san will hand you a baby with a grenade. The waiter at the cafe
will pull a pistol and shoot you. Sniper fire comes from every building
and hillside. There's no mass of troops that you can call the enemy to 
crush and ease your frustration. All you can do is strike out blindly 
at civilians, alienating them further against you. Your big weapons are 
useless because there are no big targets to attack. Fighting armed
civilian irregulars is something no army wants to do. It's the most
difficult, frustrating job imaginable. The only way to win is to
kill *everybody*. "We had to destroy the village to save it, sir."

Gary
Xref: sparky alt.politics.clinton:2638 alt.politics.bush:2552 talk.politics.misc:41371
From: rats@cbnewsc.cb.att.com (Morris the Cat)
Subject: Re: Defined: National Police Force
Organization: AT&T
Distribution: usa
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 14:44:01 GMT
Followup-To: alt.politics.clinton,talk.politics.guns


|...And I suppose all you conservatives will point your legally obtained
|firearms at the tanks, fire them, watch the bullets bounce off, and then
|be squished yourselves?

|If you really take this "we have to be ready to fight off a military
|takeover" argument seriously you have to argue for private posession of
|everything up to and including fully armed jet fighters. Are you?

Hmm, take this argument from the resources availible argument; can
several thousand tanks and APCs cope with a simulataneous insurrection
across the nation? How many sorties can the military fly without their
aircraft eventualling being taken off-line for servicing? And once
the armored vehicles enter an urban area, can they cope with 5-gallon
pails of gasoline dropped on them? Can APCs withstand attacks made
with acetylene on their non-turbine engines? What good are soldiers
within an APC in attempting to engage in house-to-house combat? How
will jet fighter pilots identify insurgent forces within buildings,
as compared to government soldiers within buildings? Say you had a
exchange ration of 2 to 1 for civilian militia casualties to military
casualties; the war of attrition is easily on the civilian militia
side. And an urban battle environment makes for easy placement of
booby traps, command detonated mines and "L-shaped" ambushes. Buildings
will allow for cover of insurgent forces, whereas armored vehicles
will be restricted to streets and alleys. Would YOU want to be in an
armored vehicle with insurgent forces ready to drop 5-gallon pails
of gasoline, ANFO-command detonated explosives, and trip-wire
inititated satchel charges? Would you want to be a soldier walking
around a city with an M16A2, whereas the opposing forces had 30-06
sniper rifles? HK-91s? Remember what U.S. soldiers feared most in
Panama: the Panamanians with sniper rifles. And guess what those
sniper rifles were? FN-FAL 7.62 NATO rifles. This rifle was adopted
by the British in English-scale (non-metric) as the SLR (Self Loading-
Rifle), in SEMI-AUTOMATIC ONLY, for the standard trooper. [The heavy
barrel model was kept selective-fire as a squad automatic weapon. This
SAW was adopted by Australia and Canada.]

Is it any wonder that the anti-gunners have chosen the FN-FAL for
their Evil Assault Weapon lists, even though it is not known if
ANY has been used in a criminal act? Fear. Fear of the Armed Citizen.
Fear of the Citizen with the Power to Resist. As Neal Knox observed
in Maryland, one legislator came out and said he feared Vietnam veterans
knew how to use these weapons...
Xref: sparky alt.politics.clinton:2309 talk.politics.guns:19668
From: fcrary@ocf.berkeley.edu (Frank Crary)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,talk.politics.guns
Subject: Re: Defined: National Police Force
Date: 20 Aug 1992 16:04:39 GMT
Organization: U.C. Berkeley Open Computing Facility
NNTP-Posting-Host: locusts.berkeley.edu

In article <183141@pyramid.pyramid.com> glambert@pyramid.com (George Lambert) writes:
>> Nope. We would point them at the tank crews, fire them and watch the
>>tank crews drop. Then the tank won't be a problem anymore.
>Gee, now we didn't we try that during WWII?  We wouldn't have had a problem
>with those Panzers then! 
>Hold on, there, I think them thar tank crews stay in the tank, lotsa armor,

Do the tank crews also eat, sleep, go to the bathroom, repair, maintain
and refuel their tanks all from inside? Also, tanks are quite vunerable
and hard to opperate "buttoned up" (e.g. with everyone inside and the
hatches closed.) It isn't uncommon for a tank commander to sit in an
open hatch, with his head outside, so he can see what is going on.

By the way, this _way_ tried in the Second World War: The Germans never
managed to defeat the partisans (militias) in Yugoslavia. Essentially
because the partisans fought using unorthidox tactics like the above.

                                             Frank Crary
					     CU Boulder
					     (even though I'm
					     still using my
					     Berkeley account.)

Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.bush,talk.politics.misc
From: ceb@dbrus.Unify.Com (Caroline E. Bryan)
Subject: Re: Defined: National Police Force
Organization: /usr/lib/news/organization
Distribution: usa
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 92 16:33:50 GMT

In article <1992Aug18.202117.17253@sequent.com> bills@sequent.com (Bill Sears) writes:
>In article <1992Aug18.180110.11083@ulowell.ulowell.edu> jrutledg@cs.ulowell.edu (John Lawrence Rutledge) writes:
>> If you read the whole second amendment you would have found ... I don't
>> remember the exact wording but it is something close to "Being a well
>> regulated militia is required to protect democracy, the right of the
>> people to keep and bear arms shall not be abridged."  This mention of a
>> "well regulated militia" in the same context of the "right to bear arms"
>> has been interpreted to mean that people have the right to bear arms in a
>> well regulated militia, e.g., a state militia.  
>
> ... accoring to Webster's NewWorld Dictionary (second edition), a militia
> is 
> 2.  In the U.S., all able-bodied male citizens between 18 and 45 years
>old who are _NOT_ (emphasis mine) already members of the regular armed
>forces.  Members of the National Guard and of the Reserves (of the various
>branches) constitute the ORGANIZED MILITIA; all others, the UNORGANIZED
>MILITIA (emphasis Webster's).
>
>Therefore, the fact that the term militia is used in the second amendment
>in this context, does not invalidate the "right of the people", it affirms
>it (at least for men between 18 and 45).

An unorganized militia is NOT a well-regulated militia, by definition.  Note
Webster's New World Dictionary (2nd ed.), page 1555:
	unorganized ... 2. having no regular order, system, or organi-
	zation  3. not behaving, thinking, etc. in an orderly way ...
and page 1197:
	regulate ... 1. to control, direct, or govern according to a
	rule, principle, or system ... 4. to make uniform, methodical,
	orderly, etc.
If you're going to use Webster as a justification for OR against people not
in an organized militia owning guns, you ought, to be accurate, to use the
book for ALL the words, not just a few isolated ones.  According to your own
dictionary, no one outside the National Guard and the Reserves is in a well-
regulated militia; therefore no one outside the National Guard and the
Reserves has a constitutional right to bear arms.  The suppression of incon-
venient words (like the adjective "well-regulated" modifying the noun "mi-
litia") is an ancient propaganda tool, but has no place in rational discus-
sion.

Which brings me back to a question I asked a long time ago and which pro-
duced heated responses but no answers:  how does the registration of guns
owned by people NOT in the National Guard (or the Reserves) endanger the
continued existence of the National Guard?


Carrie		ceb@rechenau.unify.com	x6244		--------------------+
| "Other sports exist only to keep you occupied until baseball season comes |
| around again."					- Dave Barry	    |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Xref: sparky alt.politics.clinton:2510 talk.politics.guns:19815
From: cdt@sw.stratus.com (C. D. Tavares)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,talk.politics.guns
Subject: Re: Gun control (was Re: democratic platform)
Date: 21 Aug 92 20:18:19 GMT
Followup-To: alt.politics.clinton
Organization: Stratus Computer, Inc.

In article <BD.92Aug21085251@fluent.UUCP>, bd@fluent@dartmouth.EDU (Brice Dowaliby) writes:
> >OK, let's be rigorous about this.  I don't need an excuse, since it's
> >a Constitutionally guaranteed _Right_.  I don't need to make arguments
> >in support of *Rights*.
> 
> Yes, you do. 
>
> There are reasons why the 2nd amendment was put into the 
> Constitution - those arguments are the ones you should be using 
> to support your right to keep and bear arms.  To fall back on "it's 
> in the Constitution" is essentially to admit that you don't have any 
> rational arguments.  It's nothing more than an appeal to
> authority.  Why is it in the Constitution?  

The Constitution doesn't grant the right, it just documents that the
RKBA is a "basic human right."  If I asked you to justify ANY "basic
human right," you would have to retreat to a very axiomatic level of
your beliefs, and anyone who didn't share your beliefs would simply
pooh-pooh your "logic."  For the most part, almost any argument you
could make for ANY "basic human right" would also be applicable to
the RKBA.

Quoting the authority of the Second in connection with the RKBA is
nothing more than saying, "Sure I know how to drive -- see, I have
a license."  It's not ironclad proof, but it IS documentation that
says that for all LEGAL purposes, your argument is irrefutable.
-- 

cdt@pdp.sw.stratus.com      --If you believe that I speak for my company,
OR cdt@vos.stratus.com        write today for my special Investors' Packet...
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.perot,talk.politics.guns
From: hes@unity.ncsu.edu (Henry E. Schaffer)
Subject: Re: "Demo Gun Control" (Was: democratic platform)
Organization: NCSU Computing Center
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1992 22:15:35 GMT

> ...
>lee@uhunix.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu (Greg Lee) writes:
>>You pro-gun people are something else.  You'd argue that down was
>>up ...

Greg Lee not only fails to understand economics, he apparently
is unaware that the price of goose feathers has risen.

--henry schaffer
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.bush,talk.politics.misc
From: PA146008@utkvm1.utk.edu (David Veal)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.bush,talk.politics.misc,soc.culture.usa
Subject: Re: Militia weapons, was (Defined: National Police Force)
Date: 19 Aug 92 17:54:40 GMT
Article-I.D.: utkvm1.PA146008.248.714246880
Organization: University of Tennessee Division of Continuing Education

In article <vb!n4wa.crisp@netcom.com> crisp@netcom.com (Richard Crisp) writes:

>>>Until the Supreme Court changes its
>>>desicion, or a constitution amendment is passed, this is how the Second
>>>Amendment is interpreted.
>>
>>     Some appeals courts have said this.  (But you can find an appeals
>>court decision to support just about anything.)  The Supreme Court *has*
>>said (in 1939, the last time it was addressed) that a sawed-off shotgun
>>was not covered by the Second Amendment because it was not a militia
>>weapon.  The Supreme Court has never stated that the Second Amendment
>
>By golly a machine gun, a rocket launcher and a crate of grenades surely
>must be militia weapons. I want them all!

     In point of fact, there is no possible way to suggest they aren't
militia weapons.  Militia means "citizen army."  I am a citizen, and 
mechine guns, rocket launchers, and grandes are the tools of armies
in modern times, like pistols, muskets, and cannon were in the 18th
century.
     By claiming that the second amendment only protects "the militia"
guarantees most especially those weapons that are the first to be banned.


>Richard Crisp           Cupertino, Ca.        crisp@netcom.com
>(415) 903-3832 wk        let's do it        (408) 253 4541 fax

===========================================================================
|David Veal  PA146008@utkvm1.utk.edu  University of Tennessee             |  
|                                     Division of Continuing Education    |
===========================================================================
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,talk.politics.guns