Wednesday, February 13, 2008
I don't understand why this happens, but I do know that when it does, it a sign of a very sick society..
Firefighters have called for more protection after a new report revealed a shocking catalogue of attacks against crews who face the daily threat of being ambushed, shot at, stabbed and abused.
The Fire Brigades Union claimed that the number of incidents is increasing even though official figures show a fall in attacks against crews.
The union estimated there are 40 attacks on firemen and women every week and said the number of incidents recorded by fire authorities in England and Wales are four times those in the official Government statistics.
Attacks increased by 15% last year but official Government figures showed a dramatic fall of 68%, said the union. In some parts of the country, attacks are so frequent that they are no longer reported, according to the FBU.
Firefighters have been pelted with bricks, bottles and stones as they tried to tackle fires and have been lured into ambushes by hoax calls, according to the report.
Some people have set booby traps for crews who have also been attacked with knives, petrol bombs and lumps of wood.
FBU general secretary Matt Wrack said it is almost "beyond belief" that firemen and women can be attacked so viciously while fighting fires and trying to save lives.
More at Mere Rhetoric
Our founding fathers knew that without liberty every society is a sick society. The right to bear arms and act in self-defense is an essential part of liberty, and that's why it is in our U.S. Constitution.
It's the liberty, stupid!
There were similar attacks against firemen in pre-Giuliani New York city, in areas like the South Bronx. There is fair evidence that people in the South Bronx at that time had access to guns.
These organized attacks against firemen are a sign that people openly hate the government, but it's also a self-destructive thing too. As far as I can see, it's a very dangerous form of nihilism.
The failure to defend your own life, or that of an innocent neighbor, is an immoral act of cowardice. Our founders, and subsequent generations of brave Americans, were not guilty of this immorality; and that is why we are a free people today.
Erase the second amendment, and you erase American liberty.
In Britan, and in the rest of Europe, there is no God-given right to individual liberty; and therefore no right to bear arms and act in self-defense. There are only certain reversible government-given privileges, which pay lip service to real liberty.
I thank God every day for our founding fathers and this great nation of liberty.
The failure to defend your own life, or that of an innocent neighbor, is an immoral act of cowardice. ...Erase the second amendment, and you erase American liberty...In Britan, and in the rest of Europe, there is no God-given right to individual liberty;
All true, and it's also true that the English have suffered from laws that makes any form of self-defense, with or without a gun, illegal.
But it's not clear that a lack of liberty is to blame for these attacks against firemen. In the South Bronx, these attacks were inspired by a hatred of all state/uniformed authority, including firemen. It was also part of the general self-destructive crime wave in the area.
During the '70 and '80s, the South Bronx was a no-go area for the police. I wonder if the areas where these attacks are occurring are also no-go areas. In Britain, and in Europe, Islamists are, fairly deliberately, setting up their own no-go areas, places that are similar to Hezbollahland in Lebanon. I wonder if that's what's happening here.
A no-go zone, whether in America, Britain, or anywhere else is; by definition, a no-liberty zone - liberty denied by criminals or terrorists.
I truly feel sorry for the firemen of Briton, they not only have no-liberty zones imposed by criminals and terrorists, they are laboring under a denial of liberty by their own government - they apparently do not have the right to bear arms and act in self-defense.
The right to bear arms in our second amendment does not refer to guns. "Arms" may be a gun, knife, club, axe or guard dog - any implement to help an individual defend himself, his family or his neighbor.
Thank you, Mary, for the excellent discussion. Maybe more later!