Florida Shooters Network

I don’t know about the rest of you but I’m getting worried about Obama being reelected!
The last election we on of the most liberal rinos (republican in name only) McCain running against Obama and he lost.
And McCain beat Romney.

With the republicans that are running I don’t think we have much of a chance.
God help us.

It was a completely different environment in 2008. I do not believe a Romney v. Obama cycle will be the same (just my opinion).

my prediction...Obama wins

Of course Obama will beat Romney, he's already polling ahead of him among registered voters. Why would anybody vote for Chuck E. Cheese when they can have Mickey Mouse? Romney is a vanity candidate, both for himself and the Republican party establishment. The only thing he's capable of winning is the Republican primary.

GreyShark wrote:The only thing he's capable of winning is the Republican primary.

I disagree. Plus he's eating Gingrich's Tea Party lunch.

I have said it before, and I will say it again.

It is very difficult to defeat a sitting president. Obama has an edge no matter how crummy his policies are. He DID build a coalition to get elected. McCain tried to patch one together.

The ONLY real chance any Republican has of beating Obama is by generating enthusiasm, creating a strong coalition, while bringing in large amounts of Independents. Running AGAINST Obama's policies and his record may sound good on paper, but unless you can put forward some strong ideas of your own, create a strong and dedicated following not only within your party but with Independents....well, you can yell and scream about how shitty the current Presidents policies are until your voice gives out...but you are most likely going to lose. Why? Because the sitting President always has the edge unless he has so shit on his base that he loses even his base support. And Obama has not shit on his Democratic base at all. They may not be excited about his, but they do not hate him.

And even most left leaning Independents do not hate him either. Love? No. But not hate by a long shot.

If the best that the Republicans can do is come out and say...."Vote for me, because I am not Obama" well.....the independent voters that voted for Obama in 2008 are not going to jump ship, and we may as well just sit back and get ready for 4 more years of Barry.

IMHO Romney can’t beat Obammy for several reasons. First he is perceived as a silver spoon corporate raider that is out of touch with the common person. He has sent a pretty clear message that he is for illegals (not only did he have them cutting his lawn he voted to pay for their education). He isn’t too friendly to gun owners either. He can’t sway the independent vote and barely maintain the republican vote. At the end of the day he gets handed his a** come November as people still haven’t forgotten that Bush was a republican.

Newt can’t win just because he is too republican old school that is out to do nothing more but line his pockets. If by some miracle he gets the nod I will bet dollars to donuts Obammy will wipe the floor with him.

Sanatorium doesn’t have the backing /nads to go all the way, nuff’ said.

Paul is the only candidate that has never flip flopped on issues, he hasn’t taken huge corporate donations, his ideas are strange because we as a nation have been handed a welfare system for years and years, we have become so dependant as a country on the Federal government that too many people fear the changes his presidency will bring about. The simple truth is people that don’t know any better fear him and that is why he is constantly ignored. He is the only candidate on the group that could also sway the independent and youth vote. The sad thing is that the sheep will keep on sleeping.

All of this is rather a moot point, we have the electoral college because “we the people” are too stupid to figure out who should lead the country.

It is just my prediction; if Dr. Paul isn’t elected you will see bread lines within a few years, this country is just that f**Ked up.

I'm scared if Romney wins. Some very foolish, uneducated portions of our population will think he is actually a conservative. They will form the opinion that anything to the right of him is extreme. In short, electing Romney will effectively end any chance of turning America around. The downward slide we have been in will continue unabated until total collapse.

I would MUCH rather see BHO re-elected than Romney win. Perhaps four more years of BHO will actually wake us up and realize that progressives of both parties should be eradicated from the political landscape.

George W wrote:I would MUCH rather see BHO re-elected than Romney win. Perhaps four more years of BHO will actually wake us up and realize that progressives of both parties should be eradicated from the political landscape.

Most socialist/Communist/Marxist countries tend to not have free and open elections on a regular basis. Obama has made some significant inroads towards socialism and I, for one, don't want to see what he can do to continue his "fundamental transformation" of America over the next four years. There's nothing etched in stone saying that we will keep the House or take back the Senate this year or that the courts (including the Supreme Court) won't continue to see the appointments of hardline leftists.

Unfortunately the Republican party didn't learn from McCain's failure against Obama in 2008 and they're making the same mistakes for 2012, keep doing what you always did and you'll keep getting what you always got. Besides, why should I favor a fascist police state over a socialist police state? So far the only "mainstream" Republican presidential candidate I can agree with is Santorum, he's absolutely correct that condoms take away all the feeling.

GreyShark wrote:Besides, why should I favor a fascist police state over a socialist police state?

The "fascist" or "socialist police state" argument is not only an extreme misnomer, it makes the debater for such measures "unacceptable;" not personally, but in political theory. The crazy argument just doesn't win. We're not under a police state with a President Obama administration, we weren't under one with Bush or Clinton either (Ruby Ridge and Waco are not sufficient arguments).

Now if we were rounding up Japanese Americans like in the 1940s, or we were amidst the Slacker Raids or Palmer Raids, you'd have a reasonable debate. Too many people talk about a "police state" as if its something they read out of a book or off of a blog (or as if they just finished watching The Siege with Denzel Washington & Bruce Willis). Go even further right of this one debate and we reach the not too distant 9/11 Conspiracies; it is just unaccepable.

You still have a vote. You still have the right to assemble (not occupy). You still have the right to bear arms. You still have the right to free speech (this forum is a prime example). You still have a free press. You still have a country where we file for redress (lawsuits even against the largest entities in the country). You have the right to cross borders from state to state w/o being stopped by a secret police or a road barrier. You still have rights against search and siezure w/o a warrant (SCOTUS reiterated this most recently).

I can go on but you know I do not have to. We call the far left socialists crazy, let us be aware that we do not fall under the same guise on our side of the line.

A good read on this very "police state" concept: Negative Intelligence: The Army and the American Left, 1917-1941

You still have a vote. You still have the right to assemble (not occupy). You still have the right to bear arms. You still have the right to free speech (this forum is a prime example). You still have a free press. You still have a country where we file for redress (lawsuits even against the largest entities in the country). You have the right to cross borders from state to state w/o being stopped by a secret police or a road barrier. You still have rights against search and siezure w/o a warrant (SCOTUS reiterated this most recently).

Just to play devil's advocate..

The right to vote means little to those of us who don't like either party, because both of them dominate the entire government from top to bottom. There are no viable alternative choices to the candidates the GOP and Democratic Party put forward. Now I'm sure some will say "well, work within the party you like better!" or "convince people to vote for an independent candidate!" but let's be realsitic. Unless they have a huge war chest of money and are able to get the establishment media to take them seriously, they won't go anywhere.

We do have the right to assemble on our own private property. However, that's nearly been relegated to a privilege when it comes to public demonstrations. Cities and localities in many places are free to deny you a permit to organize and it often requires threats of legal action or actual legal action to get them to comply. Then you have the whole issue of "free speech zones."

We have the right to free speech and are not censored by the goverment AFAIK, but the body politic is quick to try to censor and marginalize you if your opinions fall outside the norm. I'm sure that many of us here would agree that this is particularly true of gun owners concerned about their liberty, whether their rhetoric or views are radical or not.

Free press? The only free press is the new media and indepedent investigative jounralists. The establishment media is close to becoming the American equivalent of Pravda. They typically downplay or spike stories that hurt "their guy" while they sensationalize stories they feel are useful propaganda for their side.

We do have some key procedural protections intact but violations of them do happen and go unreported for a variety of reasons.

I think most of us can agree that the direction America is heading in is not a desirable one.

How long the protections we have will last in the face of a never-ending War on Drugs, War on Terrorism, and "War on Liberty" is anyone's guess. IMO, they are just another crisis away from being suspended.

I agree w/ you Mike.

Merriam Webster defines "police state" as

: a political unit characterized by repressive governmental control of political, economic, and social life usually by an arbitrary exercise of power by police and especially secret police in place of regular operation of administrative and judicial organs of the government according to publicly known legal procedures

fascism

: a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition

socialism

: any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods

Do I even need to mention the public surveillance?

Yes, things could be worse but they're very far from "right" with no sign of getting better and the Republican establishment has no particular interest in returning America to a healthy free and open society.

GreyShark wrote:Yes, things could be worse but they're very far from "right" with no sign of getting better and the Republican establishment has no particular interest in returning America to a healthy free and open society.

+1

Tom Fernandez wrote:

GreyShark wrote:Yes, things could be worse but they're very far from "right" with no sign of getting better and the Republican establishment has no particular interest in returning America to a healthy free and open society.

+1

While some of the technicalities of a police state are not yet extant, we're one "Reichstag Fire" away.

"Never let a crisis go to waste." (need I source?)

In a time of crisis, manufactured, amplified or real, an electorate easily can be led with the right rhetoric. Consider the "seething mob...." analysis by de Tocqeville. Also consider that the election which brought the NSDAP to power in Germany was as free as any and more honestly administered than most.

imo, we are pretty close to being in a police state, if you count the raw dairy and marijuana dispensery raids...

The home baked pie, lemonade stand and raw milk raids are just insane. We're actually already conditioned to think aggressive enforcement of many unreasonable laws is "normal."