cgriff

Yes, and in Miller they stated that what can be restricted is NON-military hardware... Funny how words change their meaning based on who's on the Court...

Wondered how long it would be until someone decided this discussion was entirely too logical and needed some American political blinders bullshit thrown in... It IS possible to understand the concept of "Public Accomodations" and disagree with it without belonging to the Republican party. It's even possible for some people who DO belong to the Republican party or the Democrat party to discuss their ideas civilly and honestly (although I will grant you, it's rare). Now, to return to the point, yes, it is unfortunate that if left to their own devices, some people are racist assholes. Sadly, when we look to the government and the law to "fix" that problem, you get new problems. Either we have freedom of association, or we don't. This half-way crap quite clearly doesn't work. There is no legitimate authority to prohibit people from associating (doing business, marrying, whatever) with whomever they want. The corollary is there's no legitimate authority to require people to associate (doing business, marrying, whatever) with whomever they don't want. Will racist assholes still be racist assholes? Yes, sadly, they will. There's no cure for that but time and constant pressure from the rest of society...

Still astounds me how nearly everyone in the country can agree this is a good plan for a household, and yet, nearly no one in the country can agree this is a good plan for a country...

Nonsense! It's working perfectly... It gives the perfect excuse for nearly any ludicrous law they want to pass, and at the same time funnels ludicrous amounts of money to those in power. "We know prohibition failed; we just want to give it one more shot..."

And just to be clear, that (and this) wasn't aimed at you so much as the entire country... Yes, I am aware of many cases that our system uses as a basis for the many rampant abuses of power. I just like periodically pointing out to people that they are irrelevant. If this actually were a free country, our government would abide by the document that created it, and not pretend that a long series of bad court decisions actually changed the rules. If the Federal government really needs a power that it does not LEGITIMATELY have, amazingly enough, there's a way to change the rules actually written into the rules themselves.

Not by any reasonable interpretation. I know reason has nothing to do with this discussion, but can anyone honestly defend the pretense that something grown and sold strictly within one state is interstate commerce? It really doesn't take a SC Justice or even a lawyer to read the Constitution and see that this is not legitimately a Federal issue.

Should or shouldn't doesn't enter into the equation. According to the "supreme law of the land" they cannot do so legally. Asset forfeiture = robbery and extortion on the part of our legislators.

OK, now I'm confused. Weren't you just arguing that ALL of us should be unarmed and guilty of nothing? I can't quite figure out where you're standing on this one.

Definitely true. I'd lump that in with the whole 'choosing a dz' process. If that fuel is more important than your customers, we'll find someplace else to jump. Dead jumpers don't buy many jump tix anyway

Isn't that rather the point? They ARENT charged, let alone convicted. Now, had you asked how many are guilty of such a thing, I could see the point. It's a pretty low number. However, it's not non-zero.

We had this last weekend with a full load on the Otter, and we sat right there on the tarmac until all the jokers had sorted their shit out. It's not rocket science...

Voting Republican and Democrat

That, to me, suggests the opposite. The resolution to the confusion is not to use the term less, but to use it more. Everyone, consistently, using the same term and initially using it with an explanation, until it becomes as embedded as the rest of our terms.

I'm with wolfriverjoe here, and I would say he understated the "more than slavery" bit. The Civil War changed us from the United States (plural) to the THE United States (singular); a lamentable change that some of us are still fighting today. Slavery would have died anyway, but the gross expansion of federal power is a direct result of the Civil War and still going.

IMHO, those will be your stumbling blocks just about anywhere... How much corruption is gross? How competent is competent? What % of the rules? Depending on how lenient you are there, Florida might be in...