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Propaganda
11 December 2013 07:35 pmThe byline in The Cowboy Chronicle is by General US Grant but the text is a plagiaristic reprint of an item circulated anonymously in April decrying a vote on the UN Small Arms Treaty:
“. . . In a 53-46 vote, the senate narrowly passed a measure that will stop the United States from entering into the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty.
The Statement of Purpose from the bill read:
To uphold Second Amendment rights and prevent the United States from entering into the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty.
The U.N. Small Arms Treaty, which has been championed by the Obama Administration, would have effectively placed a global ban on the import and export of small firearms. The ban would have affected all private gun owners in the U.S., and had language that would have implemented an international gun registry on all private guns and ammo.
Astonishingly, 46 of our United States Senators were willing to give away our Constitutional rights to a foreign power.
Here are the 46 senators that voted to give your rights to the U.N.”
There were several other editorials, letters and, of course, the full support of the editorial staff that repeats this call to action.
Except, that’s not what actually happened. According to Snopes and other primary sources (such as the Congressional Record itself) the measure voted upon was not the treaty itself, but a non-binding test amendment expressing opposition to the ATT which was tacked onto an unrelated congressional budget resolution. And, in light of that, it shouldn’t be surprising that the hype over the UN treaty ignores the text of the actual treaty itself.
“The Arms Trade Treaty obligates member states to monitor arms exports and ensure that weapons don't cross existing arms embargoes or end up being used for human-rights abuses, including terrorism. Member states, with the assistance of the U.N., will put into place enforceable, standardized arms import and export regulations (much like those that already exist in the U.S.) and be expected to track the destination of exports to ensure they don't end up in the wrong hands. Ideally, that means limiting the inflow of deadly weapons into places like Syria.”
To use their own words, “The just don’t get it.” For as much as I support a strong Second Amendment, I would do no service to the cause if I were to continuously spread false information. And, with just a few clicks of a mouse, the actual information is readily available to anyone who looks. Either the SASS is spreading ignorant propaganda based on false flyers distributed anonymously or they actually checked their sources and decided to go with the misinformation anyway. That colloquially known as lying.
You cannot support the truth with a lie.
In another editorial letter, Dick Heller opened with “The forceful taking of another’s productivity is called slavery. . . That 'takings' process remains alive and well today but given the political barely-palatable but acceptable label of . . . TAXES.”
No. Slavery is the possession of people by other people. Not just their labor but everything. Slaves are property. They don’t have rights. They don’t have homes. They don’t get paid. And they certainly don’t pay taxes on the wages they never received. You, sir, have misconstrued chattel slavery with being an underpaid employee in a capitalist society.
Doesn’t it bother you that when you use words like “statism” and talk about slavery in terms of production and labor that you are using exactly the same language that Karl Marx used to describe the development of societies. Do you really mean to use the foundational communist arguments just so you can avoid paying taxes?
Taxes are the price we pay for living in a large, distributed society. You could never build a road to allow you to drive your SUV to and from work, and no employer is going to build it for you or their other employees. We saw that in the late 19th century when mining companies built town near their mines to house their employees. They provided company stores for the employees to buy their necessities, including requiring that they pay for the tools they needed to do their jobs. The employers even paid them in script instead of with money so they could ONLY spend what they earned at the company store. It was a vicious cycle of usury and poverty.
Do you like living in the suburbs? The government gave you that with taxes. And, what’s more, at the time those roads were buing built, those taxes weren’t some onerous burden on the working and middle class. It was on the backs of those corporations that would otherwise be keeping its employees on company land, in company homes, being paid in company script which they would give back to the company at the company store.
That’s more like slavery than the piddling little 5.3% federal tax rate you and your middle income neighbors pay.
And what do you get for those taxes? Well, roads, of course. Snow plows that clear those roads. Police to keep big rigs from going to fast and running your SUV off those roads. Firemen. Ambulances. Hospitals that will treat your injuries even if you don’t have insurance. (But that becomes moot now that you have the Affordable Care Act subsidizing your actually getting insurance.) You have health inspectors checking up on restaurants so you don’t have rats shitting in your Big Macs. How about funding those bailouts that kept the automobile companies from going out of business so you can have that shiny new SUV to buy. Schools that will educate the generation that will be running the government when you retire, because you don’t want morons running things when you are trying to cash in on Medicare and Social Security.
Like you, I don’t like the act of paying taxes and I would like to keep more of that money for myself. But I recognize that it is not even remotely close to being slavery and I kind of like all those things that those taxes give me. Like national parks and free flu shots and air traffic controller keeping planes from falling out of the sky. And even though you are a selfish jerk that thinks you could be just fine on your own in the wilderness fending for yourself in the libertarian utopia that parallels modern Somalia, I don’t mind sharing what I have with you because the postal service and milk under $7 a gallon and the Internet keeps you just comfortable enough not to try to overthrow my government with the god and guns that you cling to out of fear and ignorance.
“. . . In a 53-46 vote, the senate narrowly passed a measure that will stop the United States from entering into the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty.
The Statement of Purpose from the bill read:
To uphold Second Amendment rights and prevent the United States from entering into the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty.
The U.N. Small Arms Treaty, which has been championed by the Obama Administration, would have effectively placed a global ban on the import and export of small firearms. The ban would have affected all private gun owners in the U.S., and had language that would have implemented an international gun registry on all private guns and ammo.
Astonishingly, 46 of our United States Senators were willing to give away our Constitutional rights to a foreign power.
Here are the 46 senators that voted to give your rights to the U.N.”
There were several other editorials, letters and, of course, the full support of the editorial staff that repeats this call to action.
Except, that’s not what actually happened. According to Snopes and other primary sources (such as the Congressional Record itself) the measure voted upon was not the treaty itself, but a non-binding test amendment expressing opposition to the ATT which was tacked onto an unrelated congressional budget resolution. And, in light of that, it shouldn’t be surprising that the hype over the UN treaty ignores the text of the actual treaty itself.
“The Arms Trade Treaty obligates member states to monitor arms exports and ensure that weapons don't cross existing arms embargoes or end up being used for human-rights abuses, including terrorism. Member states, with the assistance of the U.N., will put into place enforceable, standardized arms import and export regulations (much like those that already exist in the U.S.) and be expected to track the destination of exports to ensure they don't end up in the wrong hands. Ideally, that means limiting the inflow of deadly weapons into places like Syria.”
To use their own words, “The just don’t get it.” For as much as I support a strong Second Amendment, I would do no service to the cause if I were to continuously spread false information. And, with just a few clicks of a mouse, the actual information is readily available to anyone who looks. Either the SASS is spreading ignorant propaganda based on false flyers distributed anonymously or they actually checked their sources and decided to go with the misinformation anyway. That colloquially known as lying.
You cannot support the truth with a lie.
In another editorial letter, Dick Heller opened with “The forceful taking of another’s productivity is called slavery. . . That 'takings' process remains alive and well today but given the political barely-palatable but acceptable label of . . . TAXES.”
No. Slavery is the possession of people by other people. Not just their labor but everything. Slaves are property. They don’t have rights. They don’t have homes. They don’t get paid. And they certainly don’t pay taxes on the wages they never received. You, sir, have misconstrued chattel slavery with being an underpaid employee in a capitalist society.
Doesn’t it bother you that when you use words like “statism” and talk about slavery in terms of production and labor that you are using exactly the same language that Karl Marx used to describe the development of societies. Do you really mean to use the foundational communist arguments just so you can avoid paying taxes?
Taxes are the price we pay for living in a large, distributed society. You could never build a road to allow you to drive your SUV to and from work, and no employer is going to build it for you or their other employees. We saw that in the late 19th century when mining companies built town near their mines to house their employees. They provided company stores for the employees to buy their necessities, including requiring that they pay for the tools they needed to do their jobs. The employers even paid them in script instead of with money so they could ONLY spend what they earned at the company store. It was a vicious cycle of usury and poverty.
Do you like living in the suburbs? The government gave you that with taxes. And, what’s more, at the time those roads were buing built, those taxes weren’t some onerous burden on the working and middle class. It was on the backs of those corporations that would otherwise be keeping its employees on company land, in company homes, being paid in company script which they would give back to the company at the company store.
That’s more like slavery than the piddling little 5.3% federal tax rate you and your middle income neighbors pay.
And what do you get for those taxes? Well, roads, of course. Snow plows that clear those roads. Police to keep big rigs from going to fast and running your SUV off those roads. Firemen. Ambulances. Hospitals that will treat your injuries even if you don’t have insurance. (But that becomes moot now that you have the Affordable Care Act subsidizing your actually getting insurance.) You have health inspectors checking up on restaurants so you don’t have rats shitting in your Big Macs. How about funding those bailouts that kept the automobile companies from going out of business so you can have that shiny new SUV to buy. Schools that will educate the generation that will be running the government when you retire, because you don’t want morons running things when you are trying to cash in on Medicare and Social Security.
Like you, I don’t like the act of paying taxes and I would like to keep more of that money for myself. But I recognize that it is not even remotely close to being slavery and I kind of like all those things that those taxes give me. Like national parks and free flu shots and air traffic controller keeping planes from falling out of the sky. And even though you are a selfish jerk that thinks you could be just fine on your own in the wilderness fending for yourself in the libertarian utopia that parallels modern Somalia, I don’t mind sharing what I have with you because the postal service and milk under $7 a gallon and the Internet keeps you just comfortable enough not to try to overthrow my government with the god and guns that you cling to out of fear and ignorance.
