Global warming whiners have ABSOLUTELY NO solution to the problem, no actual thing we can do that will SOLVE the problem. They have ways of making life more miserable, like skateboards with Thimble Dromes instead of cars, but no real solution. The FACT is that we HAVE to burn fossil fuels in the developed countries because their populations are so large that to not do so would kill a significant portion of their people from starvation when the food is not delivered by trucks that are no longer burning fossil fuels.

I think they should stop whining and WORK ON A REAL SOLUTION, and cease doing things that impede progress and create poverty, like carbon taxes and the like. Create as much prosperity in society as possible, even tho it involves a little more carbon fuel use, and maybe the money will be available for the right person to make the discovery that enables the magic battery that will enable the use of electricity for transportation.

Transportation is the key. We burn something like 13.02 million barrels of petroleum a day in the USA. If we could stop doing that entirely, and use electricity, that would make a dent. If we could make it cheap enough for the rest of the world, that would likely be the solution. But it isn't going to happen with the current whining about CO2 causing widespread poverty that consumes billions of dollars to deal with, which are billions of dollars that could otherwise be used on research for the magic battery, solar energy conversion efficiency, and so forth.

My favorite, not-the-cheapest hotel is Comfort Inns, where I've found that the Internet "always works." Nothing else seems to be as reliable. The last event I went to with SCCA's Road Rally championship was using Staybridge, and people were complaining about that not working. It was $114 a nite, which is why I was 12 blocks away at the Comfort Inn, $80 a nite, and the internet was fairly flawless. It would sometimes "go away" for 20 seconds or so with respect to responding, but other than that, it was perfect.

...I've seen today. Or can remember for a long time. Bastids! Marriot is definitely off my list.

You can get mostly "decent and current" but it happens on cable's premium channels and its a lot more that $25. Still, you don't get _all_ the "decent and current" as a lot of what goes thru theaters (I see almost everything except the stuff too stupid for words - Transformers, for instance) still never comes out on even the premium channels. For instance, 2 similar movies, "Olympus has Fallen" and "White House Down" seem to be very different, with "White House Down" all over the premiums, easily obtainable, but I've never see "Olympus Has Fallen" on them. There's some great stuff that I've never seen on the premiums, too. HBO, Showtime, Cinemax, Starz, etc. just don't have 'em. Don't know why.

Short search found the Jefferson quote:

Letter to Wm. S. Smith, 1787: God forbid we should ever be twenty years
without such a rebellion. . . . We have had thirteen States independent for
eleven years. There has been one rebellion. That comes to one rebellion in a
century and a half, for each State. . . . And what country can preserve its
liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people
preserve the spirit of resistance? . . . The tree of liberty must be
refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is
its natural manure.

Y'know, I'm not really interested in one website that claims to have debunked so many founding father quotes, who says THEY are not lying?

The pro-gun movement arose from liberal Democrat attacks against the right to keep and bear arms that occurred since the Kennedy assassination. I myself joined the NRA when a small suburb of Chicago completely banned handguns. That was enough to scare me, and convince me that the democrats are out to, step by step, collect up all the guns, one particular type of gun at a time.

Since then, many judges have looked at the 2nd Amendment from a historical point of view and concluded that yes, the FF's had just fought a war and won it with the help of a lot of privately owned arms, and wanted to preserve the nation's ability to do that again.

And history aside, the NRA now has 5 million members, and for every member they have, there are probably 50 - 100 that believe the same way, but have simply not joined. There are over 300 million guns in American society, so good luck trying to collect them all up. Do know that if you try, it will not be bloodless.

There are those that think the English Bobbies who are unarmed are the way to go. No, they never made it to a legislature anywhere in the US.

The reason that the law people hadn't thought of the 2nd protecting the individual right to keep and bear arms is that they hadn't much considered it. When they were forced to by court cases, they came to the conclusion that "the people" in the 2nd Amendment were the same people as in the other parts of the constitution, and meant US as the people, not a state or governmental entity.

The founding fathers were quite clear in their rhetoric that they meant "the people" when they wrote the constitution. Here's a few samples:

ALEXANDER HAMILTON:

      "The Constitution shall never be construed....to prevent the
people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from
keeping their own arms."

      "Let us recollect that peace or war will not always be left to
our option; that however moderate or unambitious we may be, we
cannot count upon the moderation, or hope to extinguish the
ambition of others."

RICHARD HENRY LEE:

      "To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of
the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially
when young, how to use them."

      "No free government was ever founded, or ever preserved its
liberty, without uniting the characters of the citizen and sol-
dier in those destined for the defense of the state...Such are a
well regulated militia, composed of the freeholders, citizen and
husbandman, who take up arms to preserve their property, as
individuals, and their rights as freemen."

TENCH COXE:

      "The power of the sword, say the minority of Pennsylvania, is
in the hands of Congress. My friends and countrymen, it is not
so, for THE POWERS OF THE SWORD ARE IN THE HANDS OF THE YEOMANRY
OF AMERICA FROM SIXTEEN TO SIXTY. The militia of these free
commonwealths, entitled and accustomed to their arms, when com-
pared with any possible army, must be tremendous and irresisti-
ble. Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves? Is it
feared, then, that we shall turn our arms each man against his
own bosom? Congress have no power to disarm the militia. Their
swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are
the birth-right of an American...[T]he unlimited power of the
sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state govern-
ments, but, where I trust in God it ever will remain, in the
hands of the people."

JOHN DEWITT:

      "It is asserted by the most respectable writers upon govern-
ment, that a well regulated militia, composed of the yeomanry of
the country, have ever been considered as the bulwark of a free
people. Tyrants have never placed any confidence on a militia
composed of freemen."

JAMES MADISON:

      "Americans have the right and advantage of being armed ...the
Americans possess over the people of all other nations...Notwith-
standing the military establishments in the several Kingdoms of
Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will
bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms."

      "Congress shall never disarm any citizen unless such as are or
have been in Actual Rebellion."

PATRICK HENRY:

      "The great object is that every man be armed. Everyone who is
able may have a gun."

      "Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect
everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will
preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that
force, you are ruined."

      "Have we the means of resisting disciplined armies, when our
only defense, the militia, is put in the hands of Congress? Of
what service would militia be to you when, most probably, you
will not have a single musket in the state? For, as arms are to
be provided by Congress, they may or may not provide them."

      "Are we at last brought to such a humiliating and debasing
degradation, that we cannot be trusted with arms for our own
defense? Where is the difference between having our arms in our
own possession and under our own direction, and having them under
the management of Congress? If our defense be the real object of
having those arms, in whose hands can they be trusted with more
propriety, or equal safety to us, as in our own hands?

ZACHRIAH JOHNSON:

      "...[T]he people are not to be disarmed of their weapons.
They are left in full possession of them."

SAMUEL ADAMS:

      "That the said Constitution shall never be construed to au-
thorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press or the
rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United
States who are peaceful citizens from keeping their own arms...."

GEORGE WASHINGTON:

    "Firearms stand next in importance to the Constitution itself.
They are the American people's liberty teeth and keystone under
independence...From the hour the Pilgrims landed to the present
day, events, occurrences, and tendencies prove that to ensure
peace, security, and happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally
indispensable...The very atmosphere of firearms everywhere re-
strains evil interference--they deserve a place of honor with all
that's good."

      "A free people ought...to be armed."

      "There is nothing so likely to produce peace as to be well
prepared to meet the enemy."

      "To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of
preserving peace."

THOMAS JEFFERSON:

      "And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers
are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the
right of resistance? Let them take arms...The tree of liberty
must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots
and tyrants. It is its natural manure."

      "No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms."

GEORGE MASON:

      "I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people,
except for a few public officials."

      "To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to
enslave them."

The apocalypse has indeed occurred, you are living on pre-purchased freeze-dried foods of which you have a 2 year supply until all others have staved to death or eaten each other, and hopeful that the 500,000 or so remaining people that haven't can get together with you and restore the USA. But you need your gun for defense as raids are attempted daily, and the battery in the gun has died. There haven't been batteries available for months.

Your attacker kills you.

There is nothing invalid about using defensive uses of guns by police and against animals, since if there were no gun available, the subject might have been attacked. The idea here is an argument against the prohibition of weapons. There are those that would even like to prohibit the police from having them. You are wrong about the number of phone calls, there were over 4000 in the study by Kleck, and were made to, if I remember right, every county in the USA.

Hmmm, I thought that was Gary Kleck's number, and was instead pulled out of a very scientific telephone survey of all the counties in the USA with specific questions about the defensive uses of guns. Remember, a defensive use of a gun does NOT require that the gun be fired, only that its presence, or credible presence is used to deter an attack. You simply infer you have a gun and the bad guy goes away, that's a defensive use of a gun. Its valid, because if guns were outlawed, the bad guy would not believe you when you infer you have a gun.

Your attacker has entered your house and is hunting for you. You hide in the closet. He opens the door and you shoot him, except with this gun that will probably fail to fire. Plus, your attacker may not even have a weapon. Yes, you still shoot him anyway, he's in your house...

Your attacker has broken into your house, you're hiding in the closet, he opens the closet. "Bang" and you win, if you don't have one of these defective guns. And some attackers aren't even armed anyway and yes, you still shoot them.

1) You pull the gun and pull the trigger, and nothing happens. Dead battery. Your attacker kills you.

2) You get wounded. Your own blood runs onto the sensor. It stops working. So does the gun. Your attacker kills you.

3) You have gloves on. The gun can't see your fingerprint. Your attacker kills you.

4) You take the gloves off, and its so cold you get frostbite and can't pull the trigger. Your attacker kills you.

5) A strong radio field interferes with the electronics in the gun. It won't fire. Your attacker kills you.

6) The gun gets wet, the waterproofing fails on your now 80 year old gun, it doesn't fire. Your attacker kills you.

7) You leave your gun in the car, its temperature reaches 190 degrees. The electronics won't work at 190 degrees. Your attacker kills you.

8) The electronics simply fails for any number of reasons. Your attacker kills you.

9) You're wounded. You throw the gun to your wife / friend / lover to continue the defense. It doesn't recognize their fingerprints. Your attacker kills you, rapes her.

10) The electronics fails. You get it repaired. Now it works sometimes, doesn't sometimes. The tech can't find the problem. Your attacker kills you.

Yeah, cool - California is too dangerous. Just bring it here to Virginia, and its jobs with it. We're not all a bunch of cowardly environmental alarmists hiding under the bed from the dust and such. If there's a hurricane, we'll rebuild it. If there's an earthquake, we'll rebuild it. If it leaks something, we'll clean it up. And we will relax, 'cuz we know in the end everything will be alright.

We can kill people with environomental contamination, or we can kill people by casting them into poverty because there are no jobs, said jobs being overseas, or in another state, or simply not existing anywhere. What's worse? I mean, people die, either way. People in poverty die about 6.5 years before they otherwise would. We have about 47 million in poverty, so that's a lot of "death" out there and a lot of the reason for the poverty is the environmental obstructions to industry.

The environmental extremists need to realize that they're not saving anyone, really.