unixknight

Well that's why I take no firm position either way. As I said, if the police are satisfied then there's nothing more to say about it. I just wouldn't want people to start beating war drums about gunning down intruders outright.

How so?

The problem is that unless the person is a threat to someones' life, it's not legal to use deadly force in most states. Some states have a "duty to retreat" approach where you must try and escape and not stand your ground. (It's stupid, because it second guesses peoples' decisions long before they're even made) That said, I don't see it as ever justified to automatically open fire for no good reason. It seems to me this was just a cat burglar who broke into a home that was empty. That isn't a justification to kill them. If he was armed and/or lunged at her (and maybe he did) then I wouldn't question her decision to defend herself and her kids. I'm just not comfortable with the idea of automatically ending a human life just because they're in your home. So to reiterate: Without knowing exactly what happened, there's nothing to form a firm opinion on in this case. If the police were satisfied that she acted reasonably, then that's it.

I don't take a firm position on this one either way. There is absolutely no justifiable reason for a stranger to be in the kids' bedroom, so it's easy to imagine a serious threat is present. That said, if it was only a cat burglar a better option would have been to use the gun to try and scare the guy off before pulling the trigger, or even better, get out of the house and call the police. Maybe she was going to, the article isn't clear on that, so we don't know very much about what actually went on.

So now you want to bait me? Okie doke.

So now you want to bait me? Okie doke.

Show me the personal attack you claim I launched that justifies your personal remarks against me. I wouldn't presume to laud him either way, which has been my point. I'm fine with having my views challenged. What you did was build strawmen.

I haven't, but I will now. Thanks for the advice!

Thanks. I just feel frustrated because I've been very careful avoid expressing an opinion about whether the ruling was a good one, and yet I get hit with strawman arguments as if I had. I suppose I should have reacted more gracefully but I'm 4 days form unemployment and my daughter is over in Germany right now and I have daddy worry... So my fuse is shorter than it ought to be.

Show me where I said that. Your hostility and personal attacks are uncalled for. Again, what's your problem? What did I say or do to you to justify talking to me like this? If you can't handle your views being challenged then grow up before you post again.

I don't know what you mean by that. Maybe you're right. Like I said, I don't know enough about what went on in the courtroom to argue it either way. All I'm saying is that n one of us know ALL the details the way the judge was, so to praise or attack him as a judge is meaningless coming from armchair quarterbacks like us.

@LeSellers Well the death of Freddie Gray has been officially ruled a homicide, so if you want justice, somebody needs to be accountable. It's only a question of exactly whom and to what degree. As you said, we only know what was in the reports, but you also know as well as I do how reliable that really is. Ultimately, we're nothing but armchair quarterbacks, and no matter how many reports we watch on TV or read in the paper, we aren't going to know what the judge knows, nor are we legally qualified to say whether he was right or not. My point is this: He's only getting praise by people who already had made up their minds. (Just as people who had made up their minds the other way are probably excoriating him right now.) It has nothing whatsoever to do with the judge's actual competence or fairness. It's just confirmation bias.

The problem is that in order for you to assert that his ruling was judicially correct, you'd have to have access to all the same information he does. You'd also have to be qualified, legally, to make that call. Are you asserting that?

There's absolutely a racial component here. No question. I also agree with your point about that. But here's the problem with the first part: If the praise for this judge is only offered because it validates one's own view, then the praise is meaningless. This thread has been a lovefest for the judge, but not because of his fairness. It's because he validated the folks expressing that opinion. It would have been exactly the same if he'd found the defendant guilty and people who wanted to see that defendant go to prison came on here to praise the judge. Exactly the same. He validates one, so of course that makes him seem reasonable and fair. I reserve judgment because, frankly, he knows more about the case than I do so I'm not really in a position to praise or condemn the decision. It just is.

Wow. That was a bit more hostile than was necessary, don't you think? I asked a philosophical question. So does that mean that had he found the defendant guilty, you'd have just dismissed him, rather than accept all these honors and praise in the links provided above?

It is true. Some pretty credible sources have shared stories of memories of the pre-existence awakening. Not usually in much detail since the veil does prevent total recall, but I have had similar experiences of my own. I find them to be very comforting, actually and they strengthen my testimony.

You're probably right. My hesitation only comes from the real possibility that Blitzer just honestly believes it because he lives in a giant echo chamber and would be unlikely to question it.

You're probably right. My hesitation only comes from the real possibility that Blitzer just honestly believes it because he lives in a giant echo chamber and would be unlikely to question it.

Not just uninformed people. Wolf Blitzer even repeated that one. Ignorant or lying? Can't tell. What's even worse is when they resist the correction. "Sara Palin said 'I can see Russia from my house!'" "Palin didn't say that. Tina Fey did." "Oh no, Palin totally said that. She's such an airhead..." *facepalm*

I don't mean to come across as grumpy or anything, but I'm curious as to whether all these laurels would have been thrown at the judge's feet if he'd decided the other way?

^This. Nobody who supports Obama gets to whine about division between Americans. "We don’t mind the Republicans joining us. They can come for the ride, but they gotta sit in back." -Barack Obama 25 October, 2010 When a sitting President talks like that, you know he's not looking to reach across aisles and find bipartisan solutions. What kind of example does that set? Say what you want about guys like Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton, they worked with the opposition party to get things done. Well, at least I can agree with Trump when he says "Hillary Clinton is a world class liar." Well, maybe not the "world class" part, since her lies are pretty easy to expose. The problem is that the media doesn't like to report it, and Clinton's followers just don't care anyway.

The video with the little girls firing the rifles inspired me to teach my 8-year-old to shoot. I'm going to start by buying a BB gun that looks and feels like an actual firearm to use to teach her the safety rules and everything before we go to the actual range.

Can you imagine being in Boot with a guy like that if the draft ever came back?

It probably embarrassed him, and his coping mechanism for that is to think of himself as a victim of mean gun dealers than the legitimate concerns about his own alcoholism and the battery charge.

I've got a few vintage books, like a 1920 Book of Mormon and an 1832 Bible (beat up pretty bad) Useful to have around when critics claim the BoM is constantly being revised.