HeyBub wrote:
Tim Daneliuk wrote:
HeyBub wrote:
Robatoy wrote:
The biggest problem with a two-party system like yours, is that in
order to be in agreement with the NRA, you also have to buy into all
that other nut-bar whacko claptrap that comes with a Repuglican
membership.
No, it's all branches on the same tree. You pick one of the
following two basic positions:

* The end justifies the means, or
* No good can come from an immoral act.

Almost everything flows from those two basic principles.




There is a third, much better, proposition:

- If an action is undertaken voluntarily by an adult and that
action harms no one else, it's none of the government's business.

No, the protection of society from the foolishness or malice of the
individual is worthy of effort. Someone cooking up a batch of nitroglycerine
in his bathtub is certainly of interest to his neighbors.

Right - because it represents threat and is thus is legitimately
within the scope of government action. Contrast that with a much more
common case, however, of the government sticking its snout into the
pharma and sexual habits of its citizens, neither of which are
remotely a threat to others in and of themselves.

More broadly, the government has no business whatsoever being in the
"what is moral" business. Both libs and conservatives just love to
peddle their own moral code as a justification for making law.
However, outside the narrow area where human action threatens, harms,
or defrauds other humans, morality - however important it is - is,
again, none of the government's business. It is moral to be faithful
to one's spouse but adultery is not the government's business. It is
moral to be eleemosynary but it is not the government's job to do the
collecting and handing out.


Obviously the threat of punishing the ultimate act is often an insufficient
deterrent (think suicide bombers) so watchfulness and sanctions on the
prefatory actions are prudent. Laws against negligent collisions are not a
substitute for laws against driving the wrong way on a one-way street.

That's why we must kill terrorists - and potential terrorists - before their
plans mature.

No argument here. When you're in a bar fight you do not have to wait until
someone actually hits you. If they threaten to hit you and have the
likely means to do so, you are morally justified hitting them "preemtively"
when the beer bottle they're holding is on the backswing.






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Tim Daneliuk
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