The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
    Doctor Cleveland's picture

    Fighting 'The Government' by Killing Your Neighbors

    By Doctor Cleveland on Thu, 12/27/2012 - 2:45am | Politics

    Before dawn on Christmas Eve a man set fire to his car and his house and waited for the firefighters to arrive so he could murder them. He shot four, killing two. They were volunteers. One of the men he killed was also a local police lieutenant. They died for going out on a winter morning to protect their neighbors. Because the murderer kept the firefighters from doing their jobs, his fire spread to six neighboring houses, destroying thirty-three people's homes just before a blizzard rolled in.

    This happened seven miles from my house. The neighborhood is a strip of beach between Lake Ontario and a local bay. It is an idyllic place where people go to sail, swim, or sit while their kids build sand castles. I like to walk on the jetty by the harbor's mouth and stand looking at the patient motion of the water. It is restful there. I don't know how any of us will find it restful now, looking at the place where our neighbors were murdered, where their homes were burned.

    Gun-rights advocates insist that we have a right to semi-automatic weaponry in order to defend ourselves against the government. But this is what "resisting the government" looks like in practice: one disgruntled citizen shooting at the government agents who come to put out fires.

    The Christmas Eve killer is a twisted parody of the guns-vs.-government ideology, but he did not have to twist it much. The rhetoric has come to center on the individual right to resist the government with armed force, and to talk about the government as an alien entity imposed from outside. This is passed off as a version of the original ideology of the American revolution, but it is profoundly different. The modern focus imagines a private individual, perhaps with a few friends, motivated by his own conviction of righteousness, rather than a group of volunteers representing the community at large. It expresses impatience and even disdain for the political processes that the Revolutionary militias were formed to defend. The Minutemen did not believe taxes were illegitimate confiscations of property; they believed that their elected representatives should set the tax rates.

    Most of all, our modern guns-vs.-the-government narrative tends to oppose even local governments, exactly the governmental bodies that the Minutemen prized. The local sheriff and county tax assessor are just more government thugs. They are imagined as storm troopers beamed down from orbit somewhere, rather than as neighbors selected to do a job by the rest of the neighbors. But that is what they really are.

    The government is your neighbors. The cop who comes to your door is coming on your neighbors' behalf. So is the fire marshal. It's more polite than having us all come over as a mob. And your taxes aren't a confiscation of your property on the behalf of the less deserving. They're a contribution to the community fund that pays for lots of things that you need and benefit from. 

    I grew up in a community with a volunteer fire department and a mostly volunteer police department. My mother was the local police lieutenant, one of the few full-time professionals on the force. I remember her going out on calls on Christmas Eve to deal with emergencies. I understood that police had to be on call, because the other people in my town needed them. I was used to neighbors who volunteered as fire-fighters. I understood that people needed to be there for each other, that when there was a fire there had to be people who pitched in to stop it. The American revolutionaries that gun fetishists like to cite understood the same thing. That's why they volunteered. That's why they pitched in when the town needed them.

    The men who were killed and wounded on Christmas Eve were practicing the same basic, small-town virtues I saw around me growing up. They were being the "government," which means, for most people on most days, being the folks who step up to be responsible when the neighbors need it. The government is us. Pretending otherwise is suicidal.

     

    Topics: 
    Politics

    Comments

    Well said, doctor. I trust you realize that when posts like this draw few comments it's because you've left little room for either dispute or elaboration. There's little to add but "Yep!" or "Right on!"


    by acanuck on Thu, 12/27/2012 - 8:12pm

    That's where it left me, too.  Good read!


    by Michael Maiello on Fri, 12/28/2012 - 12:07pm

    I wish this piece could be published nationwide. It really gets at the misplaced distrust in government that fuels NRA marketing.

    This is also a case that's more typical of gun murders than the Adam Lanza case--guy who pretty clearly shouldn't have guns gets them and uses them against innocent people.

    Do folks in your area know where Spengler (Sprengler?) got the weapons?


    by erica20 on Fri, 12/28/2012 - 11:22am

    The news tonight says that someone has been arrested for buying two of the guns for him.

    He had someone else put her name on the application. But he was with her in the store. So that tells you how seriously enforcement of background checks gets taken.


    by Doctor Cleveland on Fri, 12/28/2012 - 6:30pm

    Gun ownership and Americans.

    It must be more than a 'guns vs. government ideology', call it a pathological form of consumerism.

    A twisted parody of lining up to get the latest IPhone or popular child's toy at Christmas. Gotta have a Bushmaster?

    How else do you explain this from Yahoo News 'Frenzied Buyers Swarm Gun Stores":

    ...The phones at gun shops across the country are ringing off the hook. Demand for firearms, ammunition and bulletproof gear has surged since the Dec. 14 massacre in Newtown, Conn., that took the lives of 20 schoolchildren and six teachers and administrators.....Assault rifles are sold out across the country. Rounds of .223 bullets, like those used in the AR-15 type Bushmaster rifle used in Newtown, are scarce. Stores are struggling to restock their shelves. Gun and ammunition makers are telling retailers they will have to wait months to get more....

    One buyer ordered 32,000 rounds of ammo, which had to be delivered in a truck.

    Why the massacre of 20 1st graders and 6 adults, and talk of trying to prevent another similar incident, would make thousands rush out and buy the exact same gun, can only be diagnosed as a sociopathic consumer driven malady. A sickness that will not end well for many of the gun buyers, their families, their communities or for the nation.

    The frenzy to get the latest best killing weapon in the news, before they are all gone, sold out like a Tickle Me Elmo.  This cannot be attributed to some sudden patriotic passion to save the nation from some imaginary iteration of that crackpot list of 'worst dictators of the 20th century'.

    It's a sign of a real mental illness present in our country.  A society that no longer deserves to have the volunteer services of the likes of those firemen who were gunned down in NY, a society that is certain to continue to pay a heavy price for its addiction to instruments made to kill.


    by NCD on Sat, 12/29/2012 - 3:49am

    Three short sentences 

     

    A sickness foretold

    Self -preservation instinct.

    Let your kingdom come  


    by Resistance on Sat, 12/29/2012 - 4:49am

    Wonderfully said, Doc.  It's heartbreaking any time, but when it hits so close to home we have to take it personally.

    We need to keep repeating "the government is us."  There was a time when almost everybody knew that.  I really don't know what happened to change us so radically as a nation.  9/11 should have been an event that strengthened our resolve and brought us together.  Instead, it seems to have driven a large segment of the population more than slightly nuts.


    by Ramona on Sat, 12/29/2012 - 6:55am

    It is heartbreaking, to see people who dedicate themselves to serve others, become victims of those they tried to serve

    I respectfully disagree, the government is not us;  ask those who fled persecution when the "government of us" hunted them down


    by Resistance on Sat, 12/29/2012 - 9:34am

    Of course the government is us.  We elect our leaders, rightly or wrongly--or at least that's the way it's designed to work.

    We've seen leaders who have been bought and paid for, but we could change that, too.  By selecting and electing leaders who can't be bought.  And we do that by giving some intelligent thought to their qualifications. We have to forget about single issues and choose people who understand the big picture--the needs of the entire country.  People who are willing to learn and can understand what being a public servant really means.

    It takes work on the part of the voters but it can be done.

     


    by Ramona on Sun, 12/30/2012 - 8:18pm

    Do you ever watch Moyer and Company, or go to the website

    http://billmoyers.com/

    His multiple guests will tell you  "It's the best government, money can buy" and they'll prove it.

    As a Washington politician, you've got a job, when your term is up.   So don't bite the hand that feeds you now and in the future.  Wink, Wink. 

    Hows the negotiations on spending and taxes working out, in dysfunctional Washington?

    This Democracy is done, stick a fork in it.

    Maybe, we of the lower classes will get the crumbs, that fall from the table?. 

    Maybe they'll give us cake to eat? 


    by Resistance on Sun, 12/30/2012 - 11:17pm

    I agree that this is a post that needs to be read far and wide.  The government is 'us'....

    So, perhaps all should consider, 'Do we have the government we deserve?'


    by Aunt Sam on Sat, 12/29/2012 - 11:00am

    I have been speechless in regard to this latest massacre.

    Firemen and firewomen for chrissakes! These are our heroes; these have been our heroes since we were 6 years old; these have been our heroes forever!

    Volunteer fire departments in addition to the union based fire departments have been saving our asses for a century and more.

    The kindergartners who are defenseless and the real heroes in our culture become targets?

    Reason goes out the window.

    What have we as far as tools to correct this situation?

    Education?

    Gun control?

    A police state?

    All medical records relating to the 'mentally disabled' must be published?

    I dunno.

    If I were not an a-theist I might scream that God is angry at all of us!

    But we must focus upon these massacres and publish for publication sake (MSM advertisements) because we know not what to do!

    I must project that the police state is upon us just as I predict that social controls will be put in place to 'protect' us all.

    Firemen?

    I am disillusioned to say the least.


    by Richard Day on Sun, 12/30/2012 - 3:05pm

    I've been thinking along the same lines, Richard, where attacking firemen is crossing a culture line where we haven't gone before, like attacking first graders. So I've been checking on updates on the story to see if that actually was the case, that he specifically targeted them. Instead, in reading newer reports, it seems more like what he set out to do is attack some cops,and the firemen were just what happened to be some of the first available first responders as things worked out with his ill-thought-out "plot" of burning everything down and killing people.

    And the criminal mind having fantasies of "attacking the coppers" is nothing new in this culture, see movies about famous glamorous gangsters beating out the cops, and novels before that, or Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham for that matter.

    But it doesn't seem he set out with any particular beef against firefighters, beyond wanting to stop them from doing the work of putting out the fire he started.

     


    by artappraiser on Sun, 12/30/2012 - 3:54pm

    Good post, Dr. Cleveland. The matter of what security is supposed to mean does revolve around the difference you observe between past and present ideas of 'self defense':

    The rhetoric has come to center on the individual right to resist the government with armed force, and to talk about the government as an alien entity imposed from outside. This is passed off as a version of the original ideology of the American revolution, but it is profoundly different. The modern focus imagines a private individual, perhaps with a few friends, motivated by his own conviction of righteousness, rather than a group of volunteers representing the community at large. It expresses impatience and even disdain for the political processes that the Revolutionary militias were formed to defend.

    The way the Second Amendment conjoins a private right with a collective purpose has generated controversy ever since it was agreed to. Your observation of the distance between modern gun advocates and any concept of local governance made me think of a book by Akhil Reed Amar :The Bill of Rights.

    He does an excellent job of looking at the Bill of Rights as a single document with integral parts; He focuses on how changes in the role of state's rights after the Civil War helped bring about the current understanding and legal status of the first ten amendments. Amar's 'holistic' view shows that the framers' intent was to balance the best of 'national' requirements with the best that 'local' governance could provide. As our history has shown, the location of that balancing point is not a fixed point in space and time but something that has to be constantly rediscovered if it is not to disappear entirely. The main problem with the idea that an unconditional right to bear arms is a guarantee of liberty is the assumption that something like a guarantee exists. The Constitution is not an insurance plan. The conflicting decisions of our Supreme Court are proof of that.

    In addition to the changes in our governance that need to be appreciated, I would like to point to some other developments since the Framers penned their documents that influence the location of the 'balancing point' that would forestall tyranny:

    When the Revolutionary was happening, the disparity between the rag tag militias and the trained regiments who fought them was not that great. They used the same weapons, they traveled through space the same way. The difference between a modern military force and private forces armed with some automatic weapons and maybe a few RPGs is much greater. It is much more important that the military class doesn't become a special segregated caste supporting who they like than maintaining some way to reliably kill them.

    As the devastating wars of the Twentieth Century have demonstrated, power to destroy is not just about killing people outright but control of resources. The evil central authority the NRA is arming itself to oppose doesn't have to shoot a single bullet. If you have no food, no gas, no electricity, you can shoot as many bullets as you like while you starve to death. That is why any survivalist worth their Bowie knife is more concerned with how they will feed themselves than how expertly they can group their shots.

    There is the world of self fulfilling prophecy. If everything one does is to be ready for a certain kind of disaster, it becomes really difficult to distinguish that behavior from willing the disaster to come about. This element is not something easily observed in this or that policy decision. For instance, in the recent debate about the need to bring more armed personnel to protect schools, the focus is on whether this or that measure will help bad things from happening. In that context, agreeing to have more force at hand is something I would consider if it will help protect my kid. But I wonder about the inflationary aspect of the move. More and more of my life has people with guns walking around in my face. The 'insurance policy' that was supposed to keep me free is turning into a standoff between shooters and the Police State the shooters said they would never let come into existence.

     

     


    by moat on Sun, 12/30/2012 - 7:42pm

    The 'insurance policy' that was supposed to keep me free is turning into a standoff between shooters and the Police State the shooters said they would never let come into existence.

    No one ever promised you freedom. Our soldiers on the front lines are defending it. There is no guarantee.

    Also, the shooters never said, they would never, ever let it come into existence.

    Our  forefathers knew, it's not a matter of "if the police state would occur" but how will the citizens defend themselves, when that day comes, as it has always happened, with other governments before us.

    Knowing this as a fact, they made provisions for the citizenry, to be able to protect themselves when that day comes.  

    Our forefathers knew about the French revolution, and in their wisdom, had THE BILL OF RIGHTS secure a means, for our citizens to be able to defend ourselves, against indifference and decadence

    1789

    Amidst a fiscal crisis, the common people of France were increasingly angered by the incompetency of King Louis XVI and the continued indifference and decadence of the aristocracy. This resentment fueled radical sentiments, and the French Revolution began in 1789

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Revolution

    The Bill of Rights is the collective name for the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution. These limitations serve to protect the natural rights of liberty and property. They guarantee a number of personal freedoms, limit the government's power in judicial and other proceedings, and reserve some powers to the states and the public. ...............The amendments were introduced by James Madison to the 1st United States Congress as a series of legislative articles. They were adopted by the House of Representatives on August 21, 1789,[1][2] formally proposed by joint resolution of Congress on September 25, 1789, and came into effect as Constitutional Amendments on December 15, 1791,

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Bill_of_Rights

    I wonder; if we go off the fiscal cliff, will the aristocracy that displays indifference and decadence, take a cut,  in pay or benefits? 

    PS........ People keep assuming, the people who want to have arms, are going to fight the government.

    NO! it's anarchy, their going to defend themselves, against.

    You're seeing first hand, a dysfunctional Washington government, unable to cope with a fiscal crisis and a self inflicted one at that.

    What makes you think they'll do better when another crisis confronts them?

    It would be foolish, to put faith in a dysfunctional government to protect you.

    Do you need more proof, than what we're seeing now take place?


    by Resistance on Mon, 12/31/2012 - 12:06am

    You have made it abundantly clear that you have abandoned all hope in the experiment of self-governance that propelled the formation of our Republic. To imagine that the Framers of said Republic had also given up on the project is an absurd flight of fancy.

    The dreams that decorate your bunker are your affair but the apathy you embrace does have a cost we citizens outside must bear. Your willingness to have any price paid in human lives to preserve an unconditional right to accumulate deadly force is fine if the only ones paying it share in your beliefs. I have confidence that if you were to become the next innocent victim of gunfire, you would maintain consistency with your convictions and not come back to complain or retreat from your previously stated positions.

    For those victims, however, that do not share your comfort level with the blank check you carry, the exercise of your right begins to look like a privilege that intrudes upon other people's rights.


    by moat on Mon, 12/31/2012 - 11:47am

    You have made it abundantly clear, you have no understanding of the promised reward, of self determination. rested upon the foundation, of the Bill of Rights.

    What's the next attack; on the Bill of Rights, religious freedom?

    As to the rest of your clearly one sided commentary

    I could use your own words

    For those victims, (of religious or racial persecution ) however, that do not share your comfort level with the blank check you carry, (or the self righteous do-gooders  assurances, they'll prevent such persecution)   the exercise of your right (the self righteous do-gooders, baseless promises will decide your rights  )begins to look like a privilege (of the self righteous do - gooders  superior foresight, in the ways of preventing persecution ), that intrudes upon other people's rights  (to Freedom from tyranny and persecution ).

    Our forefathers protected us from so called faithful of the self righteous do- gooders, who were willing to sacrifice the countless hundreds, who died at the hands of those seeking for themselves Self Determination.

    Ask the blacks in the South, about the self determination of the Southern Plantation States. If self determination was such the panacea you proclaim.

    Self- preservation is our foremost right, it is not yours, to compromise away, because YOU think it best.  

    Moat you can't assure anyones safety. 


    by Resistance on Mon, 12/31/2012 - 1:03pm

    You have given up on participating in governance through self determination. Your abandonment of the role of citizen is more of an attack upon the reasons why the Bill of Rights was drafted than anything I have put forward. You are in the absurd position of dissolving the very instrument you are purporting to defend.

    I am not advocating the primacy of central authority. We disagree with how to deal with it. None of my comments above promote weakening local authority. You are the one who dismissed any discussion of it when addressing the Doctor and Ramona.

    You have been arguing that the Second Amendment is principally for the sake of fighting the government when it inevitably becomes your enemy. For you, it is a built in suicide clause that kicks in whenever citizens reject central authority. This reading ignores the fact that the Framers viewed the idea of state based militias as an alternative to the negative consequences of maintaining a standing army. For better or worse, we have the standing army that the amendment was hoping to avoid. I think the change is a significant challenge for the continuance of a democracy. Your preparation for war against that army is not advancing anybody's efforts to meet that challenge. On the contrary, your withdrawal from the public weal strengthens the hand of central authority.


    by moat on Mon, 12/31/2012 - 2:28pm

    You have been arguing that the Second Amendment is principally for the sake of fighting the government.

    That is a lie; it is not my principle reason.

    If the government chooses to ignore the basic individual right "to have and bear arms shall not be infringed. Does it make it clear, they no longer which to honor the contract and by doing so, they have usurped power that was not granted to it.

    Thereby making itself, an enemy of the citizens, when it swore by oath, to defend the Constitution and now it wants to brush aside, because it has convinced some of the foolish citizens to join them, to trust them.

    The courts have held, in the case of DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA v. HELLER

    "The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for

    traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home.

    The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative

    clause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms.

    The prefatory clause comports with the Court’s interpretation of the operative clause. The “militia” comprised all males physically

    capable of acting in concert for the common defense. The Antifederalists feared that the Federal Government would disarm the people in

    order to disable this citizens’ militia, enabling a politicized standing army or a select militia to rule.

    The response was to deny Congress power to abridge the ancient right of individuals to keep and bear arms,

    so that the ideal of a citizens’ militia would be preserved.

    The Court’s interpretation is confirmed by analogous armsbearing rights in state constitutions that preceded and immediately

    followed the Second Amendment.

    The Second Amendment’s drafting history, while of dubious interpretive worth, reveals three state Second Amendment proposals

    that unequivocally referred to an individual right to bear arms."

    http://www.scotusblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/07-290.pdf

    Run along Moat; I and many others are not interested in dissolving the contract, and entrusting you with our freedom and safety.

     


    by Resistance on Mon, 12/31/2012 - 5:51pm

    It is odd that you call my statement a lie. If I have misrepresented you, why not simply say as much?

    I got my impression that you were preparing for war from your statement upthread:

    Our  forefathers knew, it's not a matter of "if the police state would occur" but how will the citizens defend themselves, when that day comes, as it has always happened, with other governments before us. Knowing this as a fact, they made provisions for the citizenry, to be able to protect themselves when that day comes.

    You then go on to suggest that this 'moment' the forefathers knew was coming is very near.

    So, whether you actually have to shoot agents of the state or just people who want what is yours when all hell breaks loose, it is hard to see how your preparations are consistent with the ideal of a citizen's militia when you insist that the government is not us.

    Now it so happens that you are misrepresenting my views by stating that I wish to "dissolve the contract" or that I have a plan that will 'ensure everyone's safety'. You may infer that is the result of my challenges to your point of view but you present these ideas as if I were actively promoting them. This is not the case. Come to think of it I do not see any of the points I originally made on the Doctor's post in your replies except where you agree with me that the Constitution is not an insurance policy.

    Your command for me to run along would make sense if I was a dog and you were my master. But I am neither of those things.


    by moat on Mon, 12/31/2012 - 8:30pm

    Moat I’d prefer to be your friend, who has a differing view.

    To all of you and Moat,  I hope you all have a good year.

     

    To proceed with our discussion   

    when you insist that the government is not us.

    I empathize with the poor Frenchmen, behind the barricades; who may have asked;  “If the government was them (us), why was King Louis XVI firing on his citizens.

    Except we know, they had no vote. So the king had no regard for his subjects.

    I empathize and remember the citizens at the Boston Massacre; who were shot upon, by our government at the time.  Did they ask “the government is us, why are they shooting us?”  

    But we know, the king had no regard for his subjects.   

    What we have now, is Democracy in name only; it wasn’t always that way though. But little by little, we have regressed and have been reduced to servants.

    For many it is obvious the plutocracy, the oligarchy or whatever name you want to attach to those of privilege, controlling what used to be, the Government of We the People.

    But again, the day has arrived when those in power, have no regard for their subjects.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Revolution

    French society underwent an epic transformation, as feudal, aristocratic and religious privileges evaporated under a sustained assault from radical left-wing political groups, masses on the streets, and peasants in the countryside.[1] Old ideas about tradition and hierarchy–of monarchy, aristocracy, and religious authority–were abruptly overthrown by new Enlightenment principles of equality, citizenship and inalienable rights.

    Look around Moat, the powerful, have retaken control.

    Look around, despite the restless crowds, at the Statehouses; equality and what we thought were inalienable rights, are being taken away

    Income equality, how do you propose to turn it around? You think the haves give a crap?  

    Who do you think is going to get hurt, when the fiscal crisis is resolved?  

    Whose benefits are going to be cut, to solve the debt problem, created by two wars, the common people didn’t want?

    Who can deny the incompetency of the seat of government, in Washington D.C.; or the decadency of the rich political donors, who like their earlier counter parts, the rich, French aristocracy, controlled the masses of the working class.

    Or think about the English Lords, who taxed the American common people heavily, to pay for England’s expansionism.

    Like everyone else, I want peace and equality; I want a government to respect our inalienable rights, so as to avoid confrontation. But history has shown time and again, the disgruntled masses will rebel, if they are constantly ignored.

    In our history, we already had a civil war, and already in some States today, they are again talking secession.   

    There’s something going on below the surface, something I’m afraid, will be the end of civility.  

    Who knows when, but it would be a bloodbath, to leave the masses, only pitchforks.

    Misrepresentation Definition: falsehood,

    So to set the record straight; I don’t know who is to be feared more; the government or the desperate people?

    When principles of equality, citizenship and inalienable rights, are attacked,

    IMHO, the people wont stand for it very long.


    by Resistance on Mon, 12/31/2012 - 10:53pm

    You are repeating yourself; word for word, for the most part. I not only understand your position but could now write it if for you if need be.

    This return to where the discussion began does nothing to support your view that the Bill of Rights was intended to be an instrument outside of the work of self governance. Beyond the question of how to read that document, your descriptions of the impending collapse you foretell does not illuminate what your connection to your neighbors is supposed to be if all forms of authority axiomatically negate communal life. Your response to Doctor Cleveland's post goes a long way toward proving his statement:

    The modern focus imagines a private individual, perhaps with a few friends, motivated by his own conviction of righteousness, rather than a group of volunteers representing the community at large.

    As for your offer to be friends, I respectfully decline. Whenever I have engaged in conversation with you in the past, there is always at least one moment when you make it obvious that you do not consider me to be your peer. Without equality, we cannot even be enemies.

     


    by moat on Tue, 01/01/2013 - 12:38pm

    Happy are the Peace makers.

    So be it, civility and forgiveness, start with forgetting the past.  

    I offered an olive branch and you offered a continuation of acrimony.


    by Resistance on Tue, 01/01/2013 - 2:39pm

    I appreciate your offer. I was and am sincere when I say that I decline it with respect for it being made. It misrepresents my intention to say I offer acrimony in return.

    I have not been confronting you for purposes of revenge or because I want to humiliate you. I have only gone to the trouble because I strongly disagree with many of your statements and decided it was intellectually irresponsible to let them go unchallenged. So there is a level of respect being expressed by the fact that I made that decision and have made the effort to follow through.

    When I see you wrestle with my words in the same way; making it important to accurately portray what I have said rather dismissing it out of hand, calling it something it is not, or just ignoring it entirely, then I will know you have accorded me the same courtesy I have already extended to you.

     

     


    by moat on Tue, 01/01/2013 - 7:48pm