Grabbing my tinfoil hat for a brief trip down memory lane...care to join me?

[Cerridwen]

The current media coverage of shootings prompts these memories and my question at the end.

I'm old enough to remember when car insurance was not mandated by law. I remember when the auto insurance industry started its campaign in State Congresses across the nation to make it legislation. During that same time, there was a noticeable increase in media reports of horror stories involving uninsured drivers and how they "devastated" entire families. Many people, including my father, had some choice words about the insurance industry and their influence in politics and legislation. I believe they are also the ones who wrote the legislation which ultimately became nationwide law.

The media reports of the horrors of uninsured motorists quickly died off. Apparently overnight, there were no more uninsured motorists on the road causing devastation wherever they drove.

Next came a time when the banking and security industries joined forces to install video surveillance at ATM locations. Privacy rights activists warned of the "edge of the wedge" and how allowing video cameras at ATM locations would be just the beginning of "one nation, under surveillance." They were of course ridiculed in the nightly "news" as more and more reports were broadcast in gory detail of muggings and murders at ATM locations across the nation. Fortunately, for those industries, there was also an uptick in horrific murders and shootings- appearing on the nightly news - at convenience stores across the nation. You know the rest. The cameras went into place and being surveilled for our safety and security is more and more common place.

The media reports of these atrocities, then as before, quickly died off. Apparently overnight, there were no longer muggings and horrific murders in convenience stores and at ATM locations across the land - at least as far as the "news" was concerned.

Around this same time came the multiple deaths of scores and hundreds of passengers on commercial commuter trains caused by engineers and deaths on the highways caused by truck drivers, all "under the influence" and became a regular feature of the "if it bleeds, it leads" nightly "news." Privacy rights activists again warned of the edge of the wedge in drug testing but were seen as callous and uncaring in the massive media coverage of all crashes "drug" related. Today, peeing in a cup is almost a new-hire ritual for everything from airline pilot, to bus driver, to the clerk at the automotive parts counter.

Again, overnight, according the the "news," people stopped dying in drug-haze-induced commuter and highway wrecks.

Am I saying these things did not happen? Of course not. But, have they stopped completely? Of course not. Yet we do not see the media coverage saturate the nightly "news" to the extent that we did when legislation was being fostered through the system around these distinct and specific issues which have gradually eroded our rights to privacy, sovereignty over our own bodies, or of making our own financial decisions, in the name of our "safety" and "security."

So I will reiterate, no, I am not saying these things did not happen. What I am saying is that anytime there is legislation in the works to enact some draconian laws which will further erode some Constitutionally guaranteed rights, the media exaggerates the number of events by focusing on those events to the exclusion of other horrific nightly "news."

For example, why do they not cover the number of uninsured or under-insured people who die each year due to claims denied or unavailable health care? Surely those deaths are at least as important. Why do they not cover the number of wounded and killed soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan? Again, aren't they important, too? Don't these stories fall under the aegis of "if it bleeds, it leads"?

Here's my tinfoil hat moment - what are we being prepared for with all this coverage of "lone gunmen" and multiple shooting deaths? I've already read of house-to-house searches in Massachusetts (I think it was MA) of students' homes in which the "authorities" have "reason to believe" there may be guns. I've also read lately that people applying for social services monies are being denied those same monies if they refuse to allow the "authorities" to search their homes.

So, fellow DU tinfoil hat wearers (and anyone else who cares to chime in as though I could stop you LOL), what say you? What are we being prepared for?


edit: typo

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

1. I think we're being prepared for the police state...

...They'd like to know which citizens have what in the way of weapons, and they'll probably compile and keep detailed records on it.

Also, I think under the police state they'd like people to get used to authorities just knocking on the door and being allowed to come in and poke around (never know where a terrorist might be hiding) anytime they please. This looks to me like the beginning of a "The Police State is Your Friend" campaign.

[Cerridwen]

2. Yeah, and I don't really think it's about guns. I think guns are going to be

the/a justification. Not that they don't want to know about those, too. But I think the guns issue will be a factor to allow the next "edge of the wedge."



That came to me after I had posted the OP.

edit to add: I just had another thought. What party is portrayed as the "take your guns" party and has the most vocal gun opponents (according to the media) and who might support such legislation in the name of the evils of guns; even if it might mean giving up a civil liberty or two in the name of safety? *sigh* Someone, please tell me I'm wrong. Bi-partisan support; repubs could use, "national security" and "terrorists" as justification and Democrats could use "for the safety of the children" and to "protect us from violence."

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

5. However they spin it...

...it'll be a difficult sell in the beginning. They'll need cooperation from MSM shills, which they'll get, to run stories with happy endings because someone cooperated with police intrusiveness (puppies were saved, whatever) and then a few stories about if she'd only let them in to search when they knocked she might still be alive...

It's coming.

[Cerridwen]

9. Good points. I'll watch for those versions.

Yeah, it's coming.

[MrMickeysMom]

3. My answer-

Zeitgeist! (oh no, not that again! :tinfoilhat: )

Seriously, though. I am not afraid to say this at all. In fact, I tried to talk in my own quasi paranoid avoiding way about this phenomena when trying to engage a DU group (why did I choose the atheists and agnostics? Because I believed, wrongly, that they would be familiar with how the myth of Christianity may have been used to control the masses. I got bupkiss as a result. However, I view this movie as another reminder about what we are headed for. I felt it very much related to your tin foil hat moment here. For figure, if you think I'm crazy, too. I'm okay with that...

What we have here is a society asleep at the switch, unable or unwilling to recognize various ways that the camel sneaks its head under the tent beginning with its nose. First, ordinary propaganda. Then, propaganda for control, the shock and awe business of showing the world that our God is better than their God. Then, the ultimate control moves.

I tried to discuss this, clearly there was no good place where I looked, which happened to be the DU threads. I've been around this earth long enough to follow your own story. I relate the same message coming from the movie, Zeitgeist, which is explored (in 3 parts). It's really easy to take previous notions and spin then to control the masses.

[Cerridwen]

6. I've seen that video.

I found it interesting, but unfortunately, not new information. As you can see from my OP, I've been watching these patterns for a lot of years. I think the car insurance industry writing legislation to benefit the car insurance industry, was my first real-time introduction into the "influence" (propaganda) of the media and the media's apparent collaboration with politicians.

I've written papers on the various Church hierarchies' roles in controlling the masses. Unfortunately, when you try to tell someone they presume you're bashing their faith rather than pointing out how their faith can be used against them by unscrupulous "leaders" with ideas having little to do with faith on their minds. It's why I try to stay away from using religion in my examples. It's too damned personal and I have too much respect for people of faith.

Propaganda comes packaged in many forms; I'm not sure how to get that through to people who are protecting their particular form.

[MrMickeysMom]

11. Agreed-

... and if you recall, the other part of that film wasn't directly at religion, as much as it morphed into the controlling entities who would then use a particular influence- mainly, attaining the selling out of the masses with a belief system that convinces them to war on what they FEAR. That's a repeating pattern.

Now what is ubiquitous to all this stuff is FEAR. Make someone scared enough so that the masses then allow, even look forward to a big daddy to take control of their lives and make them safe. There must not be much of a difference between the controlling interests of insurance and any other industrial complex.

[Cerridwen]

12. Yes, I remember that. At first I didn't follow the flow as it morphed from

religion to the rest. I guess that's more a critique of the editing than the topic, though. :D

Well, at the risk of alienating a few more people who might be poking in to view this thread, what you said in your second paragraph is similar to what Marx said about religion; but you have to read the infamous quote in context for it to make sense.

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. (emphasis added)

Reads differently in context, no? And, it fits in rather neatly with what you said about fear. But, perhaps more importantly, it say nothing against religion but in fact points to religion as a salve to the soul during "soulless conditions."

[MrMickeysMom]

13. And I guess this is why subject matter is so difficult to tread upon...

The atheists can be as unpleasant as the theists, too, when discussing how religion has been used to control an over-riding theme...

If left untouched, not only do I understand the original intent of religion, but I respect ANYONE's belief system. I've learned from the earliest of times, how original myth was used to somehow cope with the change of one's external environment, observing stars and seasons, later infused into religious pre-Christian beliefs and practices. It would appear what has taken place is the morphing of religion's "salve to the soul" into an control method to keep an oppressed people infused with fear (for some other entity to be in charge). I saw early mythology as a way for man cope with the change of light to dark, or earth nurturing to cold winters, it has now morphed from the personification of nature to separating man from a more natural state.

An opiate of the masses seems to relate to what our televisions might accomplish (new methods). So many reality shows, and no one seems to pay attention to themes within practically every show. It's either police action, car chases, people embarrassing themselves or poking fun of others, or forensic pathology from sick criminal behavior. News is not news, and what bleeds, leads?

Anyway, I don't mean to step on religious dogma. I'd prefer it stood to solidify man's ability to cope, not be used as a way to grow an untaxed business.

:-)

[Cerridwen]

14. Agreed.

A delicate and difficult matter. I generally choose to avoid it as the point can be made using other forms of packaging.

I'd add to your idea of myth used to "cope with the change of one's external environment" by noting that mythology can frequently be used to teach life lessons. They can be used to teach the ideals of right and wrong, or call it morality or ethics. There's a whole 'nother debate in there about the loss of the life lessons which can be learned from mythology. I'll leave that for another day.

Your comments about television remind me of a book "Amusing Ourselves to Death" by Neil Postman, 1985. It's been some years since I read it but I seem to remember something about comparing television to the, then fictional, pharmaceutical Soma from "Brave New World". Mythology, opium, Soma (no longer a fictional drug), television...mix, lather, rinse, repeat.

I'm less and less amazed at the number of people who don't see what's happening and more and more amazed that some few do see.


Well, MrMickeysMom, if you and I ruled the world, huh? There's a thought that ought to put the "fear of God" in a reader or two. :rofl:

[MrMickeysMom]

19. Oh, definitely! :-^D

Well, MrMickeysMom, if you and I ruled the world, huh? There's a thought that ought to put the "fear of God" in a reader or two.

Heaven Forbid!!!

[Froward69]

4. I could not find my hat so I made another one.

I think it is not just a police state we are being indoctrinated into. I think it is an "Assult on Religion" argument. living in Colorado and actually befriending some of those focus on the family wackos. They believe in mandatory (Christian) church attendance. as well as the gunman was shot and killed at the church today... who ever heard of an ARMED GUARD at Church???

I scared myself and took my hat off now. run with that...

[Cerridwen]

8. Good point.

A religious divide has already been manufactured in this country.

I gotta tell ya, your words reminded me of the insanity of manson committing crimes in order to set off a "race war." Taking the opportunity to exploit the actions of some individuals in order to justify a religious war fits under my tinfoil quite nicely, I'm sorry to say.

The role of religion in the public sphere these days appears to be the largest since the Third Great Awakening (Fourth or Fifth depending on how you count them) of the late 19th Century.

[Froward69]

20. ya know after watching the news

it occurred to me that the first sooting in Arvada would not have happened if the "Christians" had not turned away someone in a Blizzard. at this time the police believe the 2 shootings are related. of course no one will admit that the fundamentalists are Hypocrites. and if were truly following the doctrine of Christ, helped the shooter to keep warm and given him a place to stay. He never would have snapped. Four people would still be alive, and it never would have happened.

[Cerridwen]

24. Has that aspect of what happened been stressed or glossed over in the

reporting of the incident? I've not updated my reading yet this morning.

I'd so like the media to start pointing out the Jesus-as-logo crowd to differentiate them from Christians.

I'd also like the media to wonder why someone would think violence and murder would be a choice for revenge. And why revenge?

Oh, I'd like a lot of things. *sigh*

[Froward69]

34. Yes actually,

by 5pm the reporting of his 1) asking to stay as he did not have a place to be cept his car. and 2) that they were REMOVING him At about 12;30 the night before. both have been omitted.

[Cerridwen]

35. Figures, doesn't it? And further makes my point.

I've also seen where "an official" says he "hates Christians" rather than he hates THOSE "Christians".

The pattern continues.

[Name removed]

7. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Cerridwen]

10. Well, it looks like I'm in good company.

What size hat you figure he wears? :D

*sigh*

[K Gardner]

15. You are all such smart and insightful tinfoil hat wearers. Huge run-on paragraph to follow..

You make salient points, which make my own paranoia seem borderline schizophrenic and frightfully simplistic (and moronic). I can clearly follow your logic and have had many of the same thoughts on a variety of differing topics. However, our paths diverge at the point of causation. While you feel, and rationally so, that these events (the shootings in particular) are commonly occurring phenomenon which do not vary - only our knowledge of them varies - I went down the Mel Gibson Conspiracy Theory road of tinfoil hatting and have been wondering what has been assigned, by means internal or external, into the minds of ordinary citizens - like a switch that might someday, at any given moment and suiting the timing of the Controller, be flipped. Need a shooting? Turn on H246. Bomber in a campaign office? That'd be # 574G.

I'm scaring myself. I'm more paranoid than anyone here and don't sound NEARLY as smart!! Give me my hat back !

[Cerridwen]

16. Had to type it out fast before your nerve failed, did ya? :D

That's okay. I understood what you said but I'm pretty glad I didn't have to hear you try to say all that on one breath. Unless you've got great lungs I'd have been afraid you pass out. Now, all joshing and attempts to lighten the mood aside, perhaps you'd like to read up on "leaderless resistance". Warning: strap your tinfoil hat on tight.

What you say isn't too far removed from one possible scenario within a multitude of scenarios. An easily influenced mind mixed with just the right type and amount of "mental illness" and ...

And now I remember some dialog from "Star Wars" -

Obi-Wan: The Force can have a strong influence on the weak-minded.

Obi-Wan: These aren't the droids you're looking for.
Stormtrooper: These aren't the droids we're looking for.
Obi-Wan: He can go about his business.
Stormtrooper: You can go about your business.
Obi-Wan: Move along.
Stormtrooper: Move along... move along.

[K Gardner]

17. OMG.. I just watched that again last week and stopped it at that part..

and thought :::fingertapping chin::: Hmmmmm...

But you're right, I had to get it out in one breath or lose my nerve. How did you know that? Do you know what I'm thinking??? ::taptap on the screen:: Are you in there??

Going to read about leaderless resistance now...

Obi-Wan, over and out.

[Cerridwen]

18. LOL - relax.

I'm not a mind reader. But I have been reading people's words on the page (virtual and hard copy) for close to 5 decades. I'm pretty good at reading the tone of the words in print combined with the words themselves. Your secrets are safe with you. :D

I'm also fully aware of how what has been written in this thread, by myself and those who dared respond, appears to the silent audience of lurkers and readers who aren't responding but who are reading. We are all "certifiable", "nutso", and downright "whacked" in our minds; to use the "technical" terms. :D

If what we've written here gets one or two more people to think a little beyond the "they're nuts!" point, then perhaps it's worth being thought insane.

Some things, are worth the risk.

Besides, just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they're not after me. :rofl:

[HamdenRice]

21. I don't think the insurance industry foisted car liability on us

I like the overall argument you're making, but I don't think that the auto industry foisted insurance on an unwilling public.

There was a huge public policy struggle over many decades over how to help people who were the victims of accidents -- all kinds of accidents -- while also reducing the costs and unfair outcomes of litigation.

The single person perhaps most responsible for intellectually solving this morass was a liberal Yale Law Professor named Guido Calabresi. His groundbreaking work on tort law and insurance introduced economic analysis into the problem of accidents. Calabresi is now I believe a federal appeals court judge in New York.

From Workers Comp to auto liability, the solution was the idea of "no fault" -- namely, that law wouldn't try to assign moral blame when an accident happened (negligence, fault, liability, etc.) but simply insure people and compensate them ("no fault") -- a concept we could definitely use in health care. A requirement of a no fault system is that everyone be insured.

That was back in the good old days when policy makers, politicians and experts actually tried to solve social problems, rather than provide opportunities for corporate looting.

[Cerridwen]

22. Hi, HamdenRice. Thank you. You bring good information and knowledge to

this thread. I much appreciate it.

The key phrase in your first sentence is "unwilling public" which "we" were not (my father's choice words aside :D ). It is part and parcel of what I tried to convey. It was not that "we" had anything "forced" on us so much as it was that we were "primed" for legislation which gave the appearance of solving serious issues to the benefit of the auto insurance industry at the expense of "we" the no longer "unwilling public;" think "manufactured consent." That was why I presented the "pattern" of media involvement in creating consent and fear of dire consequences.

Then, when writing the laws, why legislate the people rather than the industry who were the ones assigning blame as justification for denial of claims; much as our current health insurance industry does? In short, if the system is broke, why legislate the people who are the "victims" of the broken system?

As you noted, there were high "costs and unfair outcomes of litigation" during that time frame. Weren't those usually brought about by an insurance industry who refused to honor their policies with their customers? Why then make their customers pay rather than legislate that the industry stop suing their clients into bankruptcy and honor their contracts? You noted that "a requirement of a no fault system is that everyone be insured;" whose argument is that? Why is that a requirement? I'm not trying to be difficult here, but I view any argument, made by an industry to support its bottom-line with a jaundiced eye; especially the insurance industry. So many of us willingly and unquestioningly accept the justifications from the insurance industry for why they can't do or can't provide or must pay the premiums we pay or what we pay our policies for, that they are still the bane of many people's existence. Anyone who has ever tried to get an insurance company to pay up, knows what I mean. It may still be necessary to take our provider to court. They still, are free to cancel our policy for "excessive" use; anything from one accident to ... Only now, we're all required by law to have insurance and face punitive measures should we be caught without. And the auto insurance industry? Canceling claims, denying claims, raising rates and using the same damned justifications; and we are required by law to pay for the "privilege."

Though its frequently glossed over, I suggest reading about Justice Brandeis and his showdown with the, then, fledgling insurance industry which was nothing more than an elaborate shell game; he lost, btw. I don't see the insurance industry, auto or health, has changed much. If anything, they're now excessively worse as they have the benefit of years of convincing us that their justifications for their business practices are fact; without question; and we, literally, buy it.

Once again, the broken/rigged system was "fixed" on the backs of the people rather than holding business or the broken/rigged system, accountable.

[HamdenRice]

26. The insurance industry was a completely different creature back then

I certainly agree that when universal insurance was proposed -- or for that matter when any other major public policy initiative that our political and economic and academic elites have decided was good for us was proposed -- part of the process is a public relations campaign that includes the media being manipulated into telling "horror stories."

That can be manipulative of public opinion; or it could just be publicizing a problem that the public hasn't focused on. For example, the same thing could be said about the horror stories in health care that were presented by Michael Moore in Sicko. That's just how an elite group or a scruffy activist can push the public to address a problem.

In the mid 20th century, the insurance industry was one of the most heavily regulated sectors of the economy. You are correct that some parts of the insurance industry started out as a scam and pyramid scheme to prey on people's fears -- especially their fear that they would not have enough money for a nice funeral. But because of that, the state governments began to regulate insurance almost like a utility. By mid century, the insurance companies were told what premiums they could charge, what investments they could make, what they could pay executives. It was a sleepy financial business run by modestly paid, extremely conservative businessmen and mathematicians (called "actuaries").

Each state had an insurance commissioner who was much more powerful than any insurance executive, more powerful in fact than all the insurance executives put together. Many insurance companies were a cross between a cooperative owned by its customers and a utility. (In fact a large number of insurance companies had the word "mutual" or "mutual insurance" in their company names, which meant that they were actually mutually owned by the customers as a kind of co-op.)

So when no fault auto and no fault workmen's comp were proposed, the idea of the insurance industry handling it was a pretty good idea. They were the most trustworthy and conservative financial business around.

The problem that the "experts" were trying to address was not people injured and their insurance companies not paying. A more typical example would be a bunch of teenagers in a 40s roadster hotrod colliding with a family of four. No one was wearing seatbelts of course, and no one was insured. So who pays for whose horrible injuries? The teens are judgement proof (ie they have no money), and the family of four could end up having their life savings taken away. And in litigation, it would all depend on weird, unimportant details like who had the last split second opportunity to turn, or whether the kids beer drinking was worse than the father's scotch. And worst of all, the lawyers would walk away with most of the money anyway after the conflict dragged on for five or six years. Or another big problem was a family getting stuck on a railroad crossing and being hit by a railroad. The railroad obviously was wrong, but had powerful lawyers and would almost always win.

The alternative as the experts saw it was that we all collectively looked out for each other. We all "saved" together through the insurance industry. If someone was hurt, we didn't care which driver was at fault, each insurer just paid up, with no trial, no inquiry about fault, no delay and no expensive court case. That's the essence of no fault. But this only works if every driver is insured. That's the "mandate" in no fault. The government (commissioner of insurance) set premiums by looking at how many accidents and payouts were needed statewide each year and sharing that roughly among all premium payors with a very modest extra allowed as profit to the company.

This was the idea pioneered by the brilliant, progressive Guido Calabresi. Rather than look at the law of accidents (tort law) as a way of assigning individual guilt and fault in individual accidents, he said, let's look at collective economic activity as producing a collective number of accidents. People are going to drive; there are going to be accidents. Add up the total number of accidents, throw in the cost of helping people drive more safely, divide by the number of drivers, and that's basically what each driver should pay as an insurance premium. It's a very collective, almost socialist approach to accidents.

Unfortunately, during the Reagan revolution, the insurance industry was unleashed through deregulation. The "mutual" cooperatives were sold off and privatized. They were allowed to pay exhorbitant salaries to management, to make risky investments, lose money and recap their losses and vast executive compensation by charging whatever they wanted as premiums. They were allowed to spend resources to try to avoid paying.

That's the mess were are in now.

[Cerridwen]

27. Wonderful perspective and history, again. Thank you...again.

:D

I'll not state some of the obvious points I see in what you wrote. I don't want to appear as though I'm arguing against what you're saying. I'm not. Your information has provided some important lessons to those who would care to see them. I'll leave others to find them for themselves.

Again, I thank you.

[HamdenRice]

28. It's just sad what we lost

Highly regulated capitalism worked much better than the organized looting that passes for our economy today.

You're welcome!

[Thothmes]

23. Not sure of your age

But when I first stated to drive, Washington State required liability insurance. That was 1962.

[Cerridwen]

25. This was in Nevada, and I don't remember the year so I don't know how

old I was at the time. Perhaps my family talked about it after the fact or Nevada was one of the later states to adopt the legislation or it was additional legislation. I couldn't really say. I mostly have memories of my dad ranting and raving (he was very accomplished at that :D ) and many reports on the nightly "news" which were the impetus for his rants and raves.

Ya like how I danced around that age business? :D

[roseBudd]

29. AS I told my dad who regrets voting for Bush in 2000 over guns, impossible...

Think about it. Just as it is impossible (would cost many many billions) to forcibly expel all illegal immigrants, it is impossible to seize guns. Do you really think they would have the time and manpower to search all the homes and DIG UP all the places a gun wrapped in plastic might be buried?

[Cerridwen]

32. So, I take it you think what we're being prepared for is the seizure of guns?

That was my question - what is it we're being prepared for? Or, for that matter, are we being prepared for anything?

They don't have to seize "all" the guns; hell, they don't have to seize any guns. Up thread we talk a bit about getting us ready for the "Hello, officer. Yes, please, feel free to search my home without warrant" scenario.

There's also an idea of just using guns as a way to create a nationwide database; though I don't know if there isn't one already in place. "About 59.1 million adults in the United States personally own a gun. In 1993-4, roughly 93 million adults, or 49% of the adult U.S. population, lived in households with guns." That's a whole lotta people to track.

Mostly, though, my OP is about how I see patterns in reporting from the media which have a goofy way of coinciding with some law "We, the People" wouldn't accept without all the preparation.

[benEzra]

37. That's part of it...not all of it...

look at all the stories about how those evil terrorists are using the Internet to concoct their eee-villl plans, and therefore all Internet traffic needs to be under surveillance, and anonymity outlawed...or how authorities need to be able to search homes/businesses/financial records without a warrant...or how anyone on the administration's secret blacklists should be denied the right to fly, to own a gun, etc. etc. etc. for our safety...or how authorities should be allowed to torture and/or hold without trial anyone "detained" in the name of terrorism...

BTW, on the gun issue, it seems to me that the guns the MSM most wants to ban aren't the ones most used in crimes, but rather those that would pose the most threat to an oppressive government. Long-range target rifles (from the .50's down to the fast .30's), and autoloading carbines with detachable magazines.

2006 data:
http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2006/data/table_20.html
Total murders............................14,990.....100.00%
Handguns..................................7,795......52.00%
Other weapons (non firearm, non edged)....2,158......14.40%
Edged weapons.............................1,822......12.15%
Firearms (type unknown)...................1,465.......9.77%
Shotguns....................................481.......3.21%
Hands, fists, feet, etc.....................833.......5.56%
Rifles......................................436.......2.91%

Rifles aren't a crime problem and never have been, and .50 caliber rifles can't shoot down planes and blow up ships, but you'd never know it from listening to the MSM.

It has been my observation that many on the Right are willing to sacrifice civil liberties if the excuse is drugs or national security, and many on the Left are willing to sacrifice civil liberties if the excuse is guns.

"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."

--H. L. Mencken

[BuyingThyme]

30. This thread belongs in the 9/11 Forum.

And that's a good thing.

[Cerridwen]

31. Thanks, I think. Though it's not about 9/11 as much as it's about

"manufacturing consent" and the media's role in catapulting the propaganda.

But, I think I get your point - maybe. LOL

:D

[Cleita]

33. You are so right and in hindsight, those of us who

are old enough to remember realize how we have been manipulated into giving up our rights.

As far as the insurance industry goes, if I were Queen, I would outlaw most of it. I would only except those Lloyds of London type of insurance to be privatized for the ultra rich who can afford yachts and baubles like the Hope diamond.

I would nationalize the rest into government run disaster funds that would take care of those accidents and unavoidable disasters as they come up.

[Cerridwen]

36. Well, Your Majesty, get to it.

:D

You, me, and MrMickeysMom (see upthread) would make a hell of an impressive Triumvirate; and scare the begeezus out of a whole lotta people.