Guns, Guns Guns

PeterZ wrote:This isn't about having a say in how the country is run. It is about the source of authority within a country's government. European countries do not recognize that the legal source of authority for their government's actions come from its citizens. That legal source of authority comes from the governments themselves, not their citizenry.

Oh, really. Let's see:

German Basic Law:

Article 20
[Constitutional principles – Right of resistance]

(1) The Federal Republic of Germany is a democratic and social federal state.

(2) All state authority is derived from the people. It shall be exercised by the people through elections and other votes and through specific legislative, executive and judicial bodies.

(3) The legislature shall be bound by the constitutional order, the executive and the judiciary by law and justice.

(4) All Germans shall have the right to resist any person seeking to abolish this constitutional order, if no other remedy is available.

French Constitution, Title 1:

ON SOVEREIGNTY

Article 3.

National sovereignty shall vest in the people, who shall exercise it through their representatives and by means of referendum.

No section of the people nor any individual may arrogate to itself, or to himself, the exercise thereof.

Suffrage may be direct or indirect as provided for by the Constitution. It shall always be universal, equal and secret.

All French citizens of either sex who have reached their majority and are in possession of their civil and political rights may vote as provided for by statute.

Spanish Constitution, Article 1:

[State Principles, Sovereignty, Form]
(1) Spain constitutes itself into a social and democratic state of law which advocates liberty, justice, equality, and political pluralism as the superior values of its legal order.
(2) National sovereignty belongs to the Spanish people from whom emanate the powers of the state.
(3) The political form of the Spanish State is the parliamentary Monarchy.

Greek Constitution, Article 1:

1. The form of government of Greece is that of a parliamentary republic.
2. Popular sovereignty is the foundation of government.
3. All powers derive from the People and exist for the People and the Nation; they shall be
exercised as specified by the Constitution.

Irish Constitution, Article 3:

It is the firm will of the Irish Nation, in harmony
and friendship, to unite all the people who share
the territory of the island of Ireland, in all the
diversity of their identities and traditions, recognising that a united Ireland shall be brought about only
by peaceful means with the consent of a majority
of the people, democratically expressed, in both
jurisdictions in the island. Until then, the laws
enacted by the Parliament established by this
Constitution shall have the like area and extent of
application as the laws enacted by the Parliament
that existed immediately before the coming into
operation of this Constitution.

Italian Constitution, Article 1:

Italy is a democratic Republic founded on labour.
Sovereignty belongs to the people and is exercised by the people in the forms
and within the limits of the Constitution.

Do you get the point yet, PeterZ? With very few exceptions, most EU nations have explicit language in their constitutions that states that the power derives from the people. Yes, there are exceptions (Belgium and Denmark, for example), but they are just exceptions, not the rule as you seem to believe.

Well thank you for those The E.

Though the problem may be what people actually think/act.

Heck many people here are unable to separate what each new law is. Or the intended or unintended consequences of them. [edit] Or who the actual cost (in rights) bears on. The rest are just right wing wing nuts. (He says as he screws the nut down. )

Starting with our federal Representatives. "After you pass it, you get to read it."

Thanks again,
T2M

pokermind wrote:@ Tenshinai, socialism has very negative meanings to the average citizen of the United States, two of our worst enemies have been socialists: the National Socialist Worker's Party (NSPD or the Nazis), and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (CCCP or Russia)

To call the nazis "socialists" is about as smart and realistic as calling either mainline democrats or republicans in USA either of those.
Nazis belong to the extreme RIGHTwing.
Socialists were proclaimed as their second biggest enemy. Socialists ended up with jews in death camps, that´s how much "socialists" nazis were.
And the nazis ended up in power for the sole reason that the established parties were willing to work with anyone to keep the socialists out of government.

Calling the nazis socialists is at the very least an ignorant insult and at worst outright disgusting.

Hundreds of thousands of people were killed by the nazis for the sole reason of "they´re socialists" and for millions of people killed it was part of the reason.


And in regards to USSR, even the official "Soviet communism" has very little to do with socialism beyond claimed links.

So no, that kind of excuse only shows ignorance and a wish for easy to identify villains.
And of course 50 years of hardcore US propaganda to make sure all US citizens are properly indoctrinated and inline with what the people in charge want them to be.

And USA made USSR its enemy far more than the other way around, WWII wasn´t even over when talk about continueing it against USSR was shouted around, followed by USA sitting on nukes and then forming NATO, obviously aimed at USSR, a USSR that had been devastated to a degree that people in USA cant even imagine...
Well guess what, they got scared(rightfully so), and acted upon that.
US politics made USSR an enemy, socialism never had anything at all to do with it.


I most strongly suggest you to never again call the nazis by the names of one of the groups of people who were the VICTIMS of nazis. Because that´s really utterly disgusting and quite sick.

I know it´s somewhat trendy in USA, but that does not make it any better, it just means more people are sickos.

pokermind wrote:To you socialism is a benign representative government, to us it is a repressive dictatorship. It is a different world view and not right wing extremism, or the use of mind altering substances. It is just you looking at a nice apple and us looking at a sour lemon.

By the by many socialists call themselves progressives due to this negative cogitation in the USA.

Poker

Only morons consider "progressive" to be a bad word by itself. The opposite of progression is stagnation.

And no, it is definitely not merely "point of view". USA is probably the ONLY country in the world that is so far rightwing that centrism is considered communist subversion.

The simple labelling of things, to make sure the people of USA has a convenient and easy to spot enemy, decades of that kind of shit for brains propaganda has skewed views so badly that objectivity is mostly nonexistant.

There is one distinction between the US and what France recognizes as the sovereignty of its citizens. I suspect the French view is consistent with other EU nations.

The French constitution specifically rejects individual sovereignty of its citizens. No section of the citizenry or individual shall arrogate unto himself the exercise of sovereignty. The US specifically asserts the sovereignty of the individual citizen. We the people both individually and as a corporate body exercise our sovereignty.

We see verbiage in the Irish constitution as the consent of the governed. Similar language exists in your constitution describing how sovereignty is exercised. Sovereignty is exercised through elections by the corporate body of the citizenry. Once elected you governments grant individual rights to your citizens.

The US Federal government is granted specific powers and whatever it is not given to it is in the province of the individual citizen or the sovereign States. Any expansion of power and authority by the feds mean a loss of liberty for the individual US citizen.

PeterZ wrote:Yes, I believe I said as much up thread. As I recall Israelis tend to be armed, no?

Not for the most part, no; private weapon ownership is pretty restricted here.

Eyal wrote:

PeterZ wrote:Yes, I believe I said as much up thread. As I recall Israelis tend to be armed, no?

Not for the most part, no; private weapon ownership is pretty restricted here.

I had thought the opposite. My mistake.

PeterZ wrote:

Daryl wrote:Some functions are best done by private enterprise and some by government. All modern developed countries have goverment provided services that are efficient.
I've come to realise that my personal issue with the whole citizen topic is that some here from the US are essentially claiming that they are free people who control their government, and I'm just a slave whose government has authority over me. The short answer is bullshit. Our situations are identical, with the same balance of power.

Not the balance of power, the flow of authority. All this started when I responded to Pokermind. I asserted that in the US increased government authority in an area means the sovereign US citizen gave up his liberty in that area. In those nations that do not recognize their citizen's sovereignty, government grants of privilege means those citizens have something they didn't have before.

How does this translate that you, Daryl, are a slave to your government? If Australia does not revognize your sovereignty, you are a subject. So what? If Americans enjoy not being subjects, so what? Those are just differences in our cultures and governments. These are just facts.

But that's the whole point. There is no difference, that is the fact. I reread our constitution before responding, and it doesn't address this at all, certainly doesn't call me a subject or imply in any way that I am not a completly free citizen. Actually it is nearly all "Thou shalt not", most clauses restricting the power of the government.
When you look at the real world situation, you see that we have much lower levels of incarceration, more laws supporting individual freedom, more protection from goverment excesses (no McCarthys), and stronger protection for workers. I loathe our current PM and have had articles published in national newspapers explaining why. No danger in doing that, totally free.
I'd like to visit the US to see your natural landscape beauty, but my wife wouldn't come, as she is frightened by your having the death penalty, no universal health care, gun crime, and generally higher crime rates.

Daryl,

I didn't call you a subject, because I am not familiar with your constitution. I posed a conditional statement that it seems does not apply to you.

As for the rest all your laws that protect freedoms, they are government defining freedom. I would prefer the government to be silent and powerless so that the individual may define their vision of freedom.

Daryl I have a bone to pick with your comments.

I'd like to visit the US to see your natural landscape beauty, but my wife wouldn't come, as she is frightened by your having the death penalty, no universal health care, gun crime, and generally higher crime rates.

Now, have you ever been outside Australia? If so, please list the countries because I bet you have been to countries that are more dangerous than the US. Ever been to China? Need I go on.

Personally, I do not care that you choose not to come to the US but be honest with yourself and others in the forum. By the way, my grandmother toured this country in a rented RV for a year with no problems and she was a citizen of Australia (Shellharbor and then Surf city or Surfer's Paradise.)

Then we have the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, where it's complicated!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parliamentary_sovereignty_in_the_United_Kingdom

The E wrote: ---SNIP---