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<blockquote> what's the gun ownership laws in Europe?</blockquote>I know that in England, it is illegal to own a gun and in fact, it is illegal to defend yourself if someone breaks into your home. What's theresult of this policy? Crime is up. Violent crime, in fact - with guns.<br><br><blockquote> How about the social programming.</blockquote>Even European social programming can't overcome groups of immigrants who refuse to integrate and assimilate therefore making it difficult toearn a living. The French are grappling with this as poor Muslim communities repeatedly riot, loot, burn, and send police to the hospital.<br><br>Euro social engineering aside, as I said, it works pretty good here in Seattle though the unfortunate result is rapidly increasing real estate prices.<br><br>What is it about the US you want to know?<br>
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<img height="20" src="http://mmb.maverick.to/images/smilies/hmmm.gif" width="20" alt="image">I can't quite put my finger on what it is, but I thinkit's something to do with the intensity of a demanding society. A very high sense of competition is really instilled into the American psyche, which, hasimmense benefits for advancement, but when you couple that with this gotta have it all American Dream thing, there seems to be a lotta loosers too. I'm notknockin' the work ethic and the desire to live life comfortably, but you gotta admit that it's really gone overboard with a lotta people. I dunno! Inthat bird thread the Bald Eagle was mentioned as a symbol. Symbols are powerful messages if you really think about what it is and represents. The eagle is theAmerican King of the Jungle as is the British lion, or the Russian Bear. These animals take what they want from wherever they want whenever they want, and noneof the lesser species have any say over their own fate. It symbolizes that the US is the Top-O-The-Food-Chain. Scary, but kinda fascinating at the same time.The US, and particularly Southern California is the dead center of the Universe. And maybe as far as we are concerned, Hawthorne, if that's the place Ithink HotWheels were first made<img src="http://static.yuku.com//domainskins/bypass/img/smileys/happy.gif" alt="image">! Greed is a force in the Universe notunlike gravity, being a drawing inward thing, that has been cultivated, fertilzed, and harvested really more-so in the US than anywhere else I can think of.It's called creation of wealth. If that gravitational field suddenly jumps to Asia, it'll turn the world on it's head. The US will become theEurope of N. America. Who's gonna spank China when need be. I'll say, I dig the US when they sent the 5th fleet or something to the waters of Taiwan tosend China the Yosemite Sam,.............. BACK OFF! That was in defence of Democracy, inwhich the rule of law is one of the most, most , most importanttenets. The very type of society I think most people really don't realize the importance of and how lucky they really are. You can thank the Mesopotamians(Iraqis) for settin' up the town, The Jews for creating a sense of humanity, and The Greeks for the Institution of Democracy. Andy<img height="15" src="http://redlinesonlinemessageboard.yuku.com/domain/bypass/images/pacman.gif" width="15" alt="image"><p><br></p>
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<p> And you can thank Germany for Schprokets Mit Deiter<a class="image" title="A guest obliges Dieter's request to "touch my monkey"" target="_blank" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Snl89188.jpg"><img class="thumbimage" height="144" alt="A guest obliges Dieter's request to "touch my monkey"" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/1/1c/Snl89188.jpg/180px-Snl89188.jpg" width="180" border="0"></a></p>
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Maribell and Dan: perfect examples of exactly what I mean. I'm not talking about people who have been busted a few times for growing a few plants on theirpatio. I gave a prime example of the type I feel cannot be rehabilitated - a convicted child molester, out in the population once again, living in a trailerwith others with felony convictions (not registered at that address, either!). He kidnapped a little girl in the middle of the night <em>from her ownbedroom</em>. The people living with him knew damn good and well what he was doing with the child. He repeatedly raped and tortured her, depriving her ofsunlight (kept her in a closet), food, water and bathroom visits. When he tired of using her as some sick effin toy, he buried her, ALIVE, right next to thetrailer and covered the shallow grave with fallen leaves. She died from the abuse and from suffocation.<br><br>Now would someone please tell me WHY the guy should be allowed to live. He can't be rehabilitated. It's been shown through more studies than many othersubjects that repeat sex offenders can <strong>not</strong> be cured or rehabilitated. So we're supposed to spend money to house the guy in a safe place inprison, away from genpop, with more comfort than our fricking SOLDIERS in Afghanistan and Iraq live under? Give me a effin break.<br><br>As I already mentioned, there are cases when people should be given understanding and forgiven, but some banger who shoots up a bus stop full of people for themere sport of killing (or gang initiation)? Hell no!<br><br>Now, that social programming bit and country living versus city living. I have a few examples for this one:<br><br>1. I lived in an extremely crowded city of over seven (yes, 7) million people, and that was in 1974. The crime rate was VERY low. One of the main reasons was,if you got put in jail there, you damn well better have family to come feed your sorry butt because otherwise, you have to fight the rats for scraps, or use ascrap to catch a rat and make dinner out of that. State-run prisons weren't much better. Rice and water was provided, as was the occasional doughy wheatroll, but other than that, again, no family, you don't need a "Sweatin to the Oldies" video set.<br><br>That was for basic crimes. If you were caught with illegal drugs, especially heroin or cocaine, chances were about 99.99 percent that you wouldn't livepast another 30 days. Court systems there did not have a backlog of cases. If the evidence showed you to be guilty, the judge would skip the trial and sentenceyou on the spot. You'd have maybe two days to say goodbye to your family before facing the firing squad. Rapists were treated with even less respect. Itwould be announced in the newspapers that some guy had shamed his family, his friends, his employer and his people, by committing such a violent act and is nowa eunuch, spending life in prison. That means his lifespan was probably less than a few weeks, as inevitably, another prisoner already facing the firing squadwould exert his hatred for someone who was waaaaay worse than himself in whatever way possible. Many would consider that barbaric but again, crime there waslow enough that even a 14-year-old foreign girl could walk the streets at night with little worry. That is, until the US announced that they were pulling theirmilitary support out of the country in order to normalise relations with China. Another story, another time..<br><br>The point of all the above is to demonstrate how people living elbow-to-elbow can still live peacefully. It's part of their culture. Their upbringing isdifferent. If a kid gets in trouble, they are punished. If they cannot stay out of trouble, they are sent to a military type of boarding school. It's partof their <em>culture</em> to be peaceful and settle things as evolved human beings.<br><br>2) Culture shock. We moved from the Capital city of seven million people in Taiwan, to a little fleaspeck on the map in southwestern Oklahoma with a populationof maybe 27,000. The local joke about their consistent population was, every time a baby was born a man left town. It wasn't far from the truth. Plenty ofsingle mothers there, mostly quite ignorant and having made those babies when they too were still babies. One girl I knew in school was a year older than herown aunt, and her mother was only 13 years older than she was. No kidding. Box o' hamsters. So, we had all these local boys who grew up without a fatherand a mother barely old enough to buy booze, running amok. The vast majority of them were white. Most of my friends were black and the majority of them stillhad fathers present in their lives. They were far more decent people than the white trash we Air Force brats went to school with. The crime rate in that townwas pretty high, although convictions were more likely to be against black people than whites. Yes, I lived in Crackertown, where white men drove pickup truckswith rebel flags in the rear windows, along with either a rifle, shotgun, or "walking stick" (referred to as a "(n-word) knocker").<br><br>This is all but one example of how things can be flip-flopped on the nature vs nurture debate. In this case, it's a little of both, but more demonstrativeof proper nurturing producing upstanding citizens, while lack of nurturing and ignorance produces criminals and people really not worthy of populating thisplanet.<br><br>So where was I going with all this? The main point of all this is, there <em>can</em> exist a society - even a crowded one - that is peaceful. I'm all fortrying to rehabilitate people. I understand mental illness. As I mentioned in a previous discussion, I know a lot about it through both study of the subjectand personal experience. I understand that some people can <em>not</em> be rehabilitated. Some deserve to be cared for and treated with kindness andunderstanding, but <em>many</em> do not. There is no cure, no treatment... nothing that can be done so that they can be a productive and peaceful member ofsociety and not repeatedly commit violent crimes. Those are the people who are the reason I am for the death penalty. They have absolutely no redeeming valueto society or this planet. Worm chow, baby.<br><br>To bring all this back around to the beginning (yaaaaay!), again, my decision would be for the death penalty of Cutts. He was a law officer. He knew damn goodand well what the rules are and he tried to get past them, and it was his own son who helped to bring him down. "Mommy's in the rug" he said.Cutts is not worthy of forgiveness. He thought he could escape the law and got caught. He murdered someone out of selfishness, including his own unborn child.He deserves to die for his crime.
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<blockquote> but more demonstrative of proper nurturing producing upstanding citizens, while lack of nurturing and ignorance produces criminals and people really not worthy of populating this planet.</blockquote>Well dayum, that just cuts to the crux of the matter right there.<br><br>Andy - a very thoughtful post and respectfully written. I like this version of you much better than the sarcastic one.<br>What you said is essentially what I tried to tell you a few months ago. You start off talking about the US but then talk about humanity in general and itspropensity for certain forms of greed. You say that it's more advanced here because of our economy, but seem to recognize it as a trait that all peoplegroups are prone to and actively seeking. In your earlier posts(months ago), you came off as seeing this as a uniquely American trait, which a number of ustook exception to. If I read you correctly now, you are spreading the salt on everyone.<br><br>That I can agree with.<br>
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<blockquote> <strong class="quote-title">BlueWagoon wrote:</strong> <hr><img height="20" alt="image" src="http://mmb.maverick.to/images/smilies/hmmm.gif" width="20">I can't quite put my finger on what it is, but I think it's something to do with the intensity of a demanding society. A very high sense of competition is really instilled into the American psyche, which, has immense benefits for advancement, but when you couple that with this gotta have it all American Dream thing, there seems to be a lotta loosers too. I'm not knockin' the work ethic and the desire to live life comfortably, but you gotta admit that it's really gone overboard with a lotta people. I dunno! In that bird thread the Bald Eagle was mentioned as a symbol. Symbols are powerful messages if you really think about what it is and represents. The eagle is the American King of the Jungle as is the British lion, or the Russian Bear. These animals take what they want from wherever they want whenever they want, and none of the lesser species have any say over their own fate. It symbolizes that the US is the Top-O-The-Food-Chain. Scary, but kinda fascinating at the same time. The US, and particularly Southern California is the dead center of the Universe. And maybe as far as we are concerned, Hawthorne, if that's the place I think HotWheels were first made<img alt="image" src="http://static.yuku.com//domainskins/bypass/img/smileys/happy.gif">! Greed is a force in the Universe not unlike gravity, being a drawing inward thing, that has been cultivated, fertilzed, and harvested really more-so in the US than anywhere else I can think of. It's called creation of wealth. If that gravitational field suddenly jumps to Asia, it'll turn the world on it's head. The US will become the Europe of N. America. Who's gonna spank China when need be. I'll say, I dig the US when they sent the 5th fleet or something to the waters of Taiwan to send China the Yosemite Sam,.............. BACK OFF! That was in defence of Democracy, inwhich the rule of law is one of the most, most , most important tenets. The very type of society I think most people really don't realize the importance of and how lucky they really are. You can thank the Mesopotamians (Iraqis) for settin' up the town, The Jews for creating a sense of humanity, and The Greeks for the Institution of Democracy. Andy<img height="15" alt="image" src="http://redlinesonlinemessageboard.yuku.com/domain/bypass/images/pacman.gif" width="15"><br></blockquote><p> Wow, I thought this thread died yesterday! Well, I did enjoy reading both what Kitty and Greg had to say, although I don't agree with Greg, I doappreciate an intelligently written argument that stays on topic.<br><br>I see Andy is still bouncing around off topic and his most recent stop seems to be that he has US envy! That is okay, it is fairly common!<img src="http://static.yuku.com//domainskins/bypass/img/smileys/roll.gif" alt="image"></p>
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Yeah, we made it, finally! Drinks on me!<br><a target="_blank" href="http://news.aol.com/story/_a/record-number-of-americans-in-prison/20080228163909990001?ncid=NWS00010000000001">http://news.aol.com/story/_a/record-number-of-americans-in-prison/20080228163909990001?ncid=NWS00010000000001</a><br><br>Until we change the system, gangsters are still goin to walk up to a crowded bus stop and blast 8 people, including children, with lil thought towards thefuture. The reason is simple, in the US, prison isn't really that bad. Here, you get to hang with your homies-which they do on the outside-right? They getas much, if not more drugs-which they do on the outside-right? If they're married, they get a little nuckie during their conjucal visits while locked up.They don't have to work hard-which is what they do on the outside-right? They get fed better, they get plenty of beauty rest per night, which theydon't get on the streets. They get to ride the gangtrain, which is actually harder to do on the streets. They even get to wear almost the same cloths asthey do on the streets. And it's so hard to get the DP these days, you have to be a real sorry POS to earn that.<br>Until we change how it's run, start making serious standards for X crime with serious punishments, and take away the society in the joint, nothins'getting any better. I'd bet serious cash, the Blood or Crip that shot or killed 8 at a bus stop yesterday, never deals with the DP, not even for a second.How many lives were changed yesterday because of him? And he deserves what again-a chance? He deserves his own PPV special, just $19.95!
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<br><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;"><font size="7">Running Man!</font></span><br>I like Chris' PPV idea! Even better take a portion of the proceeds and donate them to families of the victims. Only $19.95 per show eh? Sign me up!<br>
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I want to clarify, the $19.95 is for singles, if there's a full card and undercard, it's $49.95 for the package. High Schools would be given thepackage for free of course. Start televising what happens to serious criminals. Change the prison system entirely, PINK one piece swimsuits for EVERYONE-trybeing a tuff guy in a unitard. Bread and water per meals, accept for rice and beans for Taco Tuesdays (I got a heart too). Non serious offenders work 12 hoursa day, everyday. No conjucal visits EVER. No TV's. Tattoo removal is mandatory. GED is mandatory. College education for those doing more than 5years-mandatory. Lifers would be given the choice of their own PPV special or a trip to the hole for their ENTIRE tenure-no Taco Tuesdays for them either!<br>Why is this so hard anyway?
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Prisons would also be safer if inmates wore pink unitards. A lot harder to conceal a shank in skin tight clothes.<br>
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