Republican Chairs Scream: WE WANT NO MORE STUPID BUTTS IN OUR SEATS

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2nd Amendment, anecdotal evidence, border security, damnable lieHagel, GOP, lies, NRA

Well they are still going to put up a hissy-fit over Chuck Hagel. I’m not sure how successful they will be. Inhofe says it’s not a filibuster, just a 60-vote margin. He’s a fool lost in the 18th century. No, he can’t even get that far, make it the 17th.

Lindsey is still flipping his lacy underwear, demanding more answers, about what we know not, probably Benghazi, which he loves to spout about. Since when did Hagel have a thing to do with that?

Marsha Blackburn has one of the most annoying voices I’ve heard lately, but that’s not the real reason I can’t stand her. She’s an idiot. From Tennessee. She talks about how her wonderful party, the GOP is having a “wonderful conversation, showing our big tent appeal”. Translation: we’re having a dirty internal fight about who are real Republicans and we are trying to help our corporate masters all the while appearing to welcome all those “other” people, because we want power.

The GOP is of course back to dragging out their tired argument that we can’t raise the minimum wage because it will hurt all the “lil black children who are trying to get some job experience.” The fact of the matter is, this tired excuse has been used since time immemorial by business. The truth is that once a new minimum wage is passed, fast food joints and a few others lay off some folks, until. . . . they can’t get the job done with the remaining staff, and they rehire back to the same levels again. The dips in employment are always temporary. You see, in the end, they know they need a certain staff level if they are to keep customers happy and coming back, and guess what? They still make a nice little profit in the end. It’s always about numbers in the end, and they always follow the money.

I’ve been plagued lately in Facebook conversations with people who insist that they can make a case for A by alluding to some situation they know of. It goes something like this:

• Inflation is about to explode and destroy the economy!
• Evidence?
• The case of chicken stock I bought at Cosco last year has gone up from $8 bucks a case to $10 bucks a case.
• But the CPI average for 2012 was 2.07% wherein 2.0% price increase is deemed normal and acceptable.
• Well plane fares are up dramatically!
• Well yes, but fuel costs have gone up rather dramatically haven’t they?
• Well gas prices are skyrocketing again, up ten cents in just a week!
• Yes, gas prices fluctuate a good deal, mostly due to energy giants speculating in gas futures, so they can buy low and sell high.
• Inflation is about to explode and destroy the economy!

You can’t get through the fog of personal experience. Anecdotal events are not evidence for a very good reason. Virtually anything you can dream up has happened to somebody. There is no necessary statistical correlation of your perception to your perceived conclusion.

The American Spectator, a fairly raggish Right-Wing group, says this:

“One of the favorite delusions of anti-gun hysterics is that a gun in the home is more dangerous to the folks who live in the house than to would-be home invaders. The theory, which makes sense in progressive circles and to some who’ve stopped taking their psychotropic drugs, is that if a bad guy tries to invade my home in the middle of the night I’m more likely to shoot myself than the invader.

This is transparent nonsense. Plenty of news stories of citizens defending their homes and person with legally owned guns confirm this as nonsense,. . . “

You note the “evidence” that the progressives are  delusional? “Plenty of stories”. How many is plenty of stories? Where is the study that shows that people defending themselves in their homes more often stop the bad guy than the gun being used in some other destructive way?

Of course this fails to elicit a nod of recognition from such people because they basically have no clue what you mean when you explain to them about critical reading and thinking. The event proves what they WANT to prove, or they read an explanation which they WANT to hear, so it all makes perfect sense.

Wayne La Pee Pee Pierre, continues to spew his blatant lies about border security in this country:

The president flagrantly defies the 2006 federal law ordering the construction of a secure border fence along the entire Mexican border. So the border today remains porous not only to people seeking jobs in the U.S., but to criminals whose jobs are murder, rape, robbery and kidnapping. Ominously, the border also remains open to agents of al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations.

The truth of the matter is that the borders have never been more secure.  Border Patrol personnel has doubled to 20,000 since 2004. There are vastly more “returns” under Obama than under Bush. In some locations along the border there has been a 50% drop in those attempting to enter without papers.   Secretary of Homeland Security, Napolitano suggests that we may actually be in a negative loop, where there are more undocumented workers RETURNING to their native homes because they cannot find work.

Business as usual. Say whatever will appeal to the preconceived beliefs of your base. Truth is just old-school.

Ya know what I mean?

Related articles

• Senate Dems to GOP: Forget your stupid games on Hagel (capitolhillblue.com)
• Blunt: We Have the Votes to Delay Hagel Nomination (breitbart.com)
• The Hagel flail (dailykos.com)
• Republicans begin filibuster against Hagel (sacbee.com)

When is a Fact a Conclusion?

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2nd Amendment, anecdotal evidence, law

As we work our way emotionally through the quagmire that is the 2nd Amendment, our discussions with friends and acquaintances, and strangers for that matter, devolves all to often in “evidence” for one position or another that is defined as anecdotal.

Anecdotal evidence is that which emanates from either word of mouth or from personal experience. It relates to an experience and is offered as “evidence” for a particular viewpoint or conclusion.

During the run-up to the election when we were discussing the GOP meme that the Democrats are instituting a welfare state wherein they gift folks with free stuff in return for power.  While checking out at the grocery store, the clerk related that she “knew” a woman who was on unemployment insurance and who said she had no intention of seeking a job until she had exhausted those benefits.

The point obviously was to the clerk that unemployment benefits help ensure that people will remain on the government dole rather than look for work. It is offered for that proposition. It of course is fallacious to come to that conclusion. We have no idea how representative that particular view-point is even if true. We have no statistical evidence that that is the case.

Similarly, during the gun debate, we are beginning to hear lots of anecdotal stories, mostly about how a gun “saved” some one. A Facebook connection of mine did so recently, apparently unhappy with my FB posts that were and are admittedly anti-gun. I have not minced words on the issue. Quite frankly I favor an amendment to the 2nd Amendment which severely limits weapons possession. The person who told me “her” story about guns told a compelling story of being confronted by a drunk who demanded entrance to their home after putting his car in a ditch. He threatened to come in even though he was assured that help had been called.

The shotgun her husband had behind the locked door was never used nor even made known to the drunk. He was taken away by police. But her point was that people need guns for self-protection. I certainly sympathize with the thought. It makes one feel safer to think one has a lethal weapon should anyone break down the door. But the story, which is offered as “evidence” that people need the right to have guns is quite obviously fallacious on its face.

No gun was needed in the incident. So the evidence fails.

But the story “sounds” authentic and it “sounds” persuasive.

She asks: What would you do? Have you ever faced this kind of terror?

Yes, in fact I have. I’ve had the unpleasantness of facing a group of young men and having to run for safety. When I lived in Detroit, I suffered more than one break-in. I had my car stolen. I walked down many a street where I recalled being taught to walk away from the storefronts and alley entrances and to stay near the street to avoid being pulled in. I recalled how my boss, an African-American lawyer of high repute, told me that when I drove home at night down a particular street, that if any man jumped out in front of the car, I should keep going, get home and then call the police. I am and was all too familiar with frightening and dangerous places and times.

Yet, I also had literally dozens of friends who worked in law enforcement from the average cop on the beat to deputy chiefs. I talked to homicide detectives and traded stories, and I spoke with untold numbers of investigators. The bottom line: People who keep guns for “self-protection” don’t often ever protect themselves or anyone else. Those guns get stolen, used upon themselves, or used by other family members or friends. There are much more subject to accidents involving those weapons.

Yes, in individual cases, guns have saved lives. That will always be true. But like in poker, in life you play the odds. Or at least you should if you are smart. The smart thing is not to have guns. Of course you will never convince someone who has been threatened that they should give up their weapon. I realize that. I am just trying explain that you need to realize that your conclusion is based on personal experience and not on the law of averages.

There are a boatload of anecdotal stories about how the immunization shots given regularly “cause” autism. You cannot convince thousands of mothers and dads that they don’t. But there is so far not one solid piece of scientific evidence that they do. Anecdotal evidence often carries the day, and for some people, depending on their personal relationship to the event, always will.

I’m just trying to establish a perspective is all. Realize that your emotions play a very big part in your conclusion, and that it may not reflect accurately at all the true nature of the world.

Nobody is going to end the 2nd Amendment any time soon. We are hoping to bring some measure of sanity to the activity of gun ownership in the same way that we license barbers. Is that too much to ask?