Joe Clay

I just finished watching the CNN Tea Party Debate. While watching, I decided to give a run down of the candidates as I see them. But first, let me speak about the debate itself. It was horrible. There’s not even a nod to fairness. The intro to it focused only on Romney, Perry, and Bachmann. As usual, they totally ignore Ron Paul. Unfortunately for America, Ron Paul makes the most sense.

Instead of asking the same question to the entire panel and then allowing infighting, Wolf Blitzer asked the same question of one or two people, allowed infighting, and then changed the question for other candidates. This allowed people like Romney, Bachmann, and Santorum to monopolize time. It just wasn’t done well and it wasn’t done farily. Speaking of fairly, there was a question about Fair Tax and Ron Paul wasn’t even considered to respond to it. Many questions were directed at all of the candidates and Wolf picked and choose who got to answer.

As for the candidates themselves, the following are my thoughts. I’m going to do my best to go through them in the order that they stood.

Seems like he might have done some good for Utah, but he tries to go after Perry, who seems to have done better in a state with 12 times as many people. He doesn’t always answer questions directly. He’s a snake oil salesman. He might have a few good ideas but he spends the bulk of his time attacking other candidates. He’s obviously a bottom-rung candidate, and he acts like it.

One of the three people that didn’t really attack anyone. He has some good ideas, and tons of good experience in the private sector. He’s the only non-career-politician. He wants to trim out what doesn’t work in the government.

Her answer to everything is basically Obamacare. She mentions it almost as much as Giuliani mentions 9/11. I’ve always thought that she’s a nut. She hasn’t really proved me wrong yet. She may have some decent ideas, but there are plenty of better candidates that sound more like they know what they’re talking about and mean it, instead of attempting—rather poorly I might add—to make the soundbites that people will rehash over and over on the networks.

Even though he seems to agree with Perry on most issues, he clearly sees him as the alpha male in the group because he attacks him so fucking often. It’s really just annoying and sad to watch. He’s like a little dog trying to nip and Perry’s heels and Perry just stands there tall.

Even more annoyingly he brags about Massachusetts while doing it too, which is state with a quarter of the population of Perry’s. He also criticized him for only being up 1% in jobs compared to the country when Bush had 3%. And he ignored that Bush was governor during a booming economy. Perry’s number should be praised in that light. He also tried to purport that he knew better than Perry about how to secure a border. Massachusetts versus Texas? Uh Texas wins.

Romney is the GOPs Obama. A lot of crafty talk, but no substance.

It’s very creepy how similar Perry is to Bush. Except he’s not stupid. I didn’t like Bush. I didn’t like the expansion of government and limiting of rights under him and his shitty Congress. I don’t see the same thing happening with Perry. Perry was also another person who didn’t really attack anyone. He got his points off well. He’s got good ideas. And he seems to be one of the few people that wants to at least give people immigrating to this country a shot at making it on their own instead of with government help. He also realizes that building a wall to keep people out is pointless and stupid.

It’s probably no surprise that Ron Paul is my favorite so far. He’s a Libertarian and he’s running on pure common sense. People booed him for stating the truths about why we were attacked on 9/11—even though they agreed with the actual reason previously. Those people were idiots. He’s right. We shouldn’t have a military presence worldwide. Everyone knows that our army is the strongest. We don’t need to show it off. This only gives other countries the right to criticize our actions just like we do of any country starting problems anywhere else.

Ron Paul is also a proponent of Fair Tax, as long as we guarantee the repeal of income taxes as well. He wants to get rid of a lot of the useless institutions in government. He’s a smart man. He’s a good man. And he’s one of the only honest people up there. He didn’t attack anyone. He didn’t need to. His ideas were what was important.

He also didn’t bring the talk back to earlier points. Most of the others used that to make some sort of soundbite remark. In the end it may hurt him though the media would ignore it anyway. Even so, I respect that. He accepted his lot and made strong points with whatever question was asked of him. He also didn’t face a lot of attacks from other candidates, and that’s because they had nothing to attack him with. Only Gingrich and Santorum were stupid enough to fight with him about 9/11.

Overall, Newt wasn’t bad. I didn’t agree with everything. I think he’s wrong about national security and the causes of 9/11. He didn’t really attack anyone, and he didn’t really face attack. He was mainly after soundbites. They didn’t give him much chance to speak. As far as his ideas go, they’re better represented by the other candidates. He just seems like he wants a shot at the helm.

This guy is just a weasel. Not only do I disagree with his most of the things he’s famous for, I think he just comes off as a real asshole. Whereas Huntsman at least gets some sort of point out, Santorum is devoid of that. He’s twice the snake oil salesman that Huntsman is. Santorum is another bottom-rung candidate hell bent on clawing his way to the top no matter who he’s got to throw off. His nose is cocked to the side. I’m sure that’s from all the people who have hit that guy in the face.

He thinks that we can build a wall to keep out illegals. He’s an idiot. I don’t even think we should. He thinks that 9/11 just happened because people are jealous of America for being free? Yeah, that makes total sense. I mean, those oppressive governments are totally happy that their people protest the fact that their governments suck by attacking us. Like that makes sense, idiot.

Out of all of these candidates, my favorite is Ron Paul, but I wouldn’t mind Herman Cain, or Rick Perry. Those three people are the only ones that seem to understand what they’re talking about. They’re the most honest, and they let their ideas stand for them without resorting to personal attack or having to go back to make some silly “America should be awesome” kind of soundbite quote.

The plain truth is that we’re going down the crapper and because of that we have a real opportunity to fix a lot of crap that went wrong during the 20th century. I mean we’re actually talking about taking power away from the Fed, getting rid of useless departments, ending Social Security, Medicare, other welfare crap, and even the IRS. We’re talking about ending wars, ending occupations, ending Homeland Security, and ending the TSA! People are waking up. People want to fix this shit and get back to the freedoms we used to have. People are interested in not shitting on the Constitution! Now is the time to act. We don’t need lackeys that feel the need to attack others because their ideas aren’t sound. We need true leadership, a willingness to attack issues, and a willingness to get rid of spending that we don’t need.

While Cain and Perry go a long way toward that. The only person who truly espouses all of those things is Ron Paul. And hell, we might even get lucky and get a ticket with Rand Paul. Ron and Rand could do amazing things to bring common sense back into this country.

Ten years ago I was sitting in my high school physics class. It was a typical sunny, warm day just like most days begin in Florida. About half an hour into first period, a guy named Patrick came into the class very late. As soon as he got into the door he told us that the World Trade Center had just been hit by a plane. He had heard it just as he parked his car.

And of course, no one believed him. It was pretty unbelievable. This guy, and most of the guys in our senior class were jokers so we thought he was just joking. When we realized that he was serious, our teacher took us to the library because they had TVs. He had lived in New York and he wanted, as much as the rest of us, to know what was happening.

We were the first at the TV while other groups shuffled in behind us as word spread. Just before the end of the period, it happened. Another plane struck the other building. We watched in disbelief. One plane striking the building was an accident. A sad event. Another plane striking the other World Trade Center building was a coordinated attack. It wasn’t an error. It was terrorism. It was an act of war.

Some reluctantly left the library just minutes after the second strike to go to second period classes. My second period teacher was already there so I stayed. We saw the news of the other strikes and eventually the fall of the towers themselves as we were glued to the tragic scene unfolding before us.

I never thought the buildings would collapse. I knew that fires rarely, if ever collapsed buildings. Steel can’t be melted by jet fuel. I was in disbelief when I saw the first building fall. I thought surely that was an anomaly and that at least the second structure would survive. And then it too fell.

I felt bad for all of those people who jumped. I felt bad for those who didn’t make it out. I felt bad for all of those who were injured or killed by being too close as the towers fell. I was angry that I’d never get to see those towers in real life. I was angry that we were attacked.

A few months later, I was even more angry that instead of coming together and kicking ass to honor those victims as any generation of Americans before us would have done, we let that site languish. We let our government steal our freedom in the name of safety and security—both are a fallacy. I wished they had attacked in 1951 instead of 2001. Those buildings would have been back up within a month of calling off the search for the victims—hell maybe even within a week.

I’m pissed as hell that ten years later we’re maybe halfway done with construction of the new building and memorial. I didn’t even bother finding the site when we honeymooned in New York City in 2008. I knew nothing had progressed and I was absolutely disgusted with that.

Pearl Harbor was attacked, as you should remember, on December 7, 1941. By December 7th, 1943—only two years later—all vessels that were practically destroyed were rebuilt and fighting in the war. Only two ships were unsalvageable. Read that again in case you didn’t feel it’s impact.

No matter what anyone wants to believe, the September 11th attacks killed a lot more than those poor victims. It killed our spirit. Everyone was talking about not letting the terrorists win, but those fuckers have succeeded perhaps more than even they will ever know. And the saddest thing about that, is that we let them do it. They may have attacked us. They may have made us afraid. But we gave up our freedoms because of that fear.

September 11th is, as far as I’m concerned, the worst date in our entire history not only because of the tragic loss of innocent lives but also because of how we responded. I am more afraid of our inability to rebuild, our loss of core American traits, and our willingness to give up freedom for security—false or not—than I am, or ever have been, afraid of terrorism.

Often I try to be the voice of reason and logic where I can be. Recently I’ve had an argument on MacRumors, of all places, about gun control.

The first thing I debunked was the whole issue about, “if you have a gun you’re seven times more likely to kill someone you love than a criminal.” This implies that it’s an accident. People use statistics that show that those involved in 98% of homicides were not strangers. But this is always the case. Rarely do people kill those that they don’t know. Now, that doesn’t mean they love them. These are homicide statistics. How many people outright murder those that they love?

In the course of research and writing my other arguments, I found a very good study done by the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute (WPRI).

http://www.wpri.org/Reports/Volume19/Vol19no4.pdf

I had a lot of other sources that stated a lot of things, but in the end, this study was the only one that mattered. It’s mostly non-partisan in its attempt and it was done by a non-partisan research institute. It considers both sides. And it comes to a non-partisan conclusion about guns vs. crime in the US. However its stated goal was to find the answer to whether or not concealed carry weapons permits—or CCW—should be adopted by the state of Wisconsin. In case you’re wondering, it was, and I would imagine this study helped tremendously.

There are two main points that were addressed that should end anti-gun legislation in the US, at least as far as CCW permit holders are concerned.

1. Criminals reported in 1980s studies that they had been deterred 40% of the time by the possibility that someone had a gun. This study pre-dates shall-issue laws.

Florida was the first shall-issue state. In 1987 Florida enacted a law that said that, barring a background check and fee, the state shall issue CCW permits to anyone who wanted one.

In other words, this study was conducted at a time when getting a permit was much more difficult—it was less likely that they’d come across an armed mark.

2. Only .2% of CCW permit holders have had their permits revoked for ANY crime. Only around .01% were for gun related crimes.

So what does this information undisputedly tell us? Criminals are weary of attempting a crime on someone with a gun and CCW permit holders are, on the whole, 99.8% law-abiding people.

So why do anti-gun groups want to take guns away from those people? Perhaps you can now understand why people like me get so angry at anyone who wants to take away our guns. It’s not simply because we just like guns. It’s because we like our guns, they keep us safe—us being CCW people, perhaps not the populace at large—and we have proven ourselves to be more trustworthy than prophylactics.

The simple fact is that there’s no way to find out if a criminal has a gun without compromising the 4th Amendment. If someone is legally found with a weapon without the ability to legally carry it, they are arrested and the weapon is confiscated. In other words, there are already laws against criminals carrying weapons.

Any legislation that removes firearms only applies to people who legally own and carry them. Criminals don’t follow the law. That’s the definition of a criminal. So nothing changes for the criminals and people who were previously law-abiding become criminals under new legislation.

So by enacting anti-gun legislation—especially stupid things like mag restrictions—you are only bolstering the criminals. And, more than that, you’re taking away protection from a group of people that have proven themselves to be extremely trustworthy.

Anti-gun groups often like saying that even saving just one life is worth it, but they fail to take note of the innocent—proven innocent—lives that may have been saved because of guns. The WPRI study notes that the lowest estimate of defensive gun use is 64K cases per year. If only .0016% of those cases work out, that’s 1 life.

Enacting gun legislation is like telling a chef that he can’t cut vegetables with a knife because he might stab someone. It’s utterly ridiculous. In fact, there’s probably less certainty that the chef won’t stab someone than there is that a CCW holder won’t commit a crime.