Great comment.

I can say with authority that my local tea party had not received any outside funding as of March of this year, when I left the group.

I can also point out that there has never been a violent crime committed with a gun during a tea party event, despite their obvious and apparent presence.

The first local tea party I attended - and helped organize - was in December 2007. It was a fundraiser for Ron Paul's campaign, and the one in Boston got the majority of the press: http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2007/12/ron_pauls_tea_p.html

Before you go off on me for being a "Paulbot", I'm not a huge fan of Ron Paul. I'm an extreme libertarian - a fiscal conservative and a social liberal. My goal is to move the GOP towards libertarianism at the local level. That's neither here nor there, though - you asked for a link about the tea party prior to Obama's election, and I have provided it.

Locally, we started protesting regularly and calling them "tea parties" after TARP was passed. That was a month prior to the elections, and it was entirely because of the bailouts. Our group at the time was probably 60% GOP, 20% Democrat, and 20% minor parties - Constitution, Libertarian, etc.

I don't recall armed people at Tea Party events. It may have have happened, but I don't recall a specific instance. I know *I* was at a tea party, and I was armed, but it was concealed and there's no way you could have known about that, is there? :)

As for OWS... You *do* realize there are Neo-Nazis with "assault weapons" in Phoenix with OWS right now, right?

I wouldn't want to live in your village, but I'd love to buy your products.

I would be wholly in favor of the legislation you speak of, and I can assure you, the GOP is not.

"Look at what capitalism has done to China."

Did I seriously just read that?

I'm okay with that, though.

Love the sig. Trurth, even if you disagree with the nation for which he was patriotic.

I was ecstatic to upgrade recently to 8Mbps/2Mbps for $95 / month. It's the first time it was available in my area.

Prior to that, I have 256Kbps/128kbps up. ISDN was a competitive service.

I'd love to see them.

Not doubting you, I just like information :)

The problem that I had in Arch was that the 'pacman -Syu' was usually followed by three hours of figuring out why the hell my mouse wasn't working, or something similar.

I eventually learned to upgrade one package at a time, as they became available. So long as it was my primary system, it was great. Boot it after letting it sit for a month, and you had a full day of maintenance ahead of you.

The instability is part of the system - it's not a bug.

Because you can't kill anyone without a machinegun, right?

If you want to go there, I shall. Automatic weapons are not well suited to crime, particularly without training. A semi-automatic is far more controllable, and your ammunition will go a lot farther. If some thug with a gun is going to hold up a bank, I'd far rather him have a MAC-10 than, say, a 9mm Glock. With the MAC, he's likely to hold the trigger down and let the muzzle rise, putting the majority of rounds over head level and into the ceiling.

While hunting has *nothing* to do with the gun rights argument - at all - even this assertion of yours is false. I most certainly do use an M16 for deer hunting - or more typically, its semi-automatic brother, the AR-15. The thing is, the M16 and AR-15 fire a .223 Remington (a/k/a, 5.56mm NATO). This round isn't even legal to hunt deer with in many states, due to its lack of power. If you're hunting something larger or more thick-skinned, like mountain goat or bear, then the minimum caliber you're going to consider is .270 Winchester.

Machineguns were invented for military service, and that is what they are for - suppression. Modern warfighting doctrine uses automatic weapons to pin down the enemy, allowing other soldiers to move into fighting range without coming under direct fire. Warfighting *is* the purpose of the second amendment, period. From a constitutional standpoint, banning hunting would probably not even be an issue; banning machineguns and other implements of the individual soldier is clearly and explicitly prohibited.

I don't know what to think of the guy, to be honest. I work as a business analyst, and the types of quality systems he discusses in Part 2 or the series are what I am responsible for. The issues he speaks of - users gaming the system - are what I deal with day-to-day.