What specifically has Scalise done that you think “maybe” justifies his assassination?
Dude read the fucking thread or go back to lurking.
He is indirectly trying to kill many many people by legislating away their healthcare so the rich can keep another percent of their billions.
I thought that is what was being implied. So, regardless of what he’s trying to accomplish, you object to an elected official using the legislative system to try to pass a law that you disagree with – presumably because he’s a bigoted homophobe – but not a Nazi. Yes, he surely deserves to die. Can someone pass me a napkin? This froth around my mouth is starting to get on my shirt.
“Legislation that will result in tens of thousands of unnecessary deaths swiftly and lead to millions of undesirable health outcomes in the medium to long term” presumably gets a bit stronger of a response than “disagreement” from some quarters. The dude’s not refusing to fund a handy highway expansion act or voting for stricter neutering/spaying laws, here.
Somewhat, although i do think deserve to die is a bit strong wording. Maybe it does make one start to believe in some sort of Karma system though.
Just because it is legally possible does not make it moral. Which is not to say i support the murder of anyone.
If a foreign agent was paid money to do something that led to the death of thousands of Americans, we would go to war over it. Hell, we did!
Wow, I love this.
The ratchet effect of government! Years ago we added more people to welfare. Now taking away that subsidy is the same as killing them.
To everyone’s credit, at least it’s better than “words are violence.” We’re that much closer to reality.
Like I said, I would not argue that violence against him is justified.
But I believe that he absolutely acts immorally, based on corruption. And I believe his actions harm millions of people.
So yes, that makes him a bad person. I’m allowed to make that judgement. Being a bad person will result in others judging you for being bad.
It doesn’t mean that it’s ok for people to commit violence against you. You are allowed to be a bad person. That is a right we have in our society.
But I am not going to have a lot of empathy for you then.
To paraphrase Rand Paul, a current GOP Senator, the 2nd Amendment isn’t to hunt deer, it’s to smack down the gov’t when they get tyrannical.
While this is all valid and defensible, it’s probably worth noting that it doesn’t accomplish anything worthwhile to give voice to that absence of empathy.
He still tweeted it, but some context.
I think that regardless of who said it first, the point of highlighting it is that it’s a paradoxical argument. 2nd Amendment folks use it regularly as part of their playbook, but many of them don’t really think too deeply about it. If you truly believe that one of the fundamental purposes of the right to bear arms is to defend the citizenry against a tyrannical government, then you have to accept the possibility that someday you may find yourself on the wrong side of the arm-bearing oppressed.
Oh, I don’t disagree, but I felt some context was in order.
As I said, it doesn’t matter what the political disagreement is – the point is that he doesn’t deserve to be assassinated.
As I understand it, foreign agents aren’t allowed to be members of the United States government.
There are many citizens and government officials who have a problem with how the government is involved in healthcare. Do all of those people deserve to die as well? Or are they all immoral because a policy change could negatively impact people?
I agree with you completely – but it is clear that you are backing away from your “maybe” statement.
I guess it depends on what you mean by “deserves” it.
Certainly from a legal perspective, he does not deserve to die for being a shitty person.
But from a karmic perspective, I honestly don’t know. Like I said, I don’t really have any pity or empathy for him.
What is deserved is a pretty complicated question to answer, especially when I’m reasonably confident there is no Universal Morality Laid Down from On High (cuz religion is dum u see).
So play a fun thought exercise.
For most of us, there exists some discernible line which an action can cross that engages our fight-or-flight response heavily enough that potentially lethal options arrive on the table. Guy is actively shooting/stabbing at you, I think we can nearly universally agree that calls for any necessary action to stop. I say nearly cuz hell, even I more or less subscribe to absolutist pacifism and am not sure how much I’d be willing to do to defend myself. Let’s change it up to “someone is lethally assaulting the most important person in the world to you” and I might be more onboard. In the heat of the moment.
At the far end of things, we might, for instance, have “person is existing in a manner that will never intersect with your life in any discernible way.” Pretty hard to arrive at any murder justification there, unless, you know, you’re a fully random serial killer, I guess.
But there’s a pretty broad spectrum of action between the two extremes. We as a society set down some fairly exacting laws to cover Self Defense, yes, but we also know that unjust or imperfect laws get passed. Perhaps self defense laws are too strict, or not nearly strict enough.
I think some nonzero percentage of the populace regards “making active and repeated efforts–with a high possibility of success–to damage healthcare outcomes severely enough to return us to the pitiful state we were in pre-Obamacare” as being close enough to “active lethal assault” to warrant violent response.
And I recognize that Obamacare’s far from perfect, and that yes, @TimJames, it’s “just” an entitlement. One that marginally improved a laughably imbalanced situation where insurance companies would routinely do whatever they could to avoid paying for expensive lifesaving care for their customers (or potential customers). Fewer people must die due to insurance company fuckery now than did a decade ago. Still more than I think we as a nation should be willing to accept, but quantifiably fewer.
Policies like the ones folks like Scalise pursue bring us closer to returning to the bad old days. More people will die. People who don’t have to die. Some of those people may feel directly threatened. Others may have loved ones who’d do anything to defend them.
Does voting to pass a law that will result in people dying who wouldn’t otherwise come near enough to “active lethal assault” to provide universal moral justification of murder? Society at large and our laws would pretty clearly say no. I think it’s not hard to argue that “civil society requires the answer be no.” But I’m not positive it’s impossible to argue “civil society requires the answer to be yes, sometimes.”
Well until recently anyway. Now they get to be National Security Adviser among other things.