Quote of the day—Sebastian

On the other side of the argument are the folks on our side who think just shouting “no” very loudly is a legislative strategy. How much impact do you think Ron Paul had on the overall direction of Congress? Because that’s effectively what he did for his whole career. People who do that in deliberative bodies get ignored, and worked around. For these people, the question is this: would you rather sulk in the corner and take solace in the fact that you believe you’re right and righteous as you lose one thing after another, or do you want to actually play the game and win? The latter is what you’re seeing now.

Sebastian
October 25, 2017
What’s Going on With Bump Stocks?
[Principles are, at best, merely guidelines when you are involved in the dirty business of politics.—Joe]

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9 thoughts on “Quote of the day—Sebastian

  1. Rand Paul is doing something along the same lines, except that his grasp of principle and logic is far inferior to that of his dad. He does have an effect occasionally — specifically, the effect of supporting Democrat policy positions.
    Lao Tzu got it right: “A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step”. “Incremental” legislation is a good idea. The bad guys use it to their advantage; it’s about time the good guys do likewise. That’s why “must issue” has merit even though constitutional carry is better, and why national reciprocity is a good step even though nationwide constitutional carry is the obviously correct answer.

    • We need not leave this incremental approach to the Leftists. It also worked for the NAACP in their defeat of Plessey v Ferguson until there was so little of the Plessey decision left that Brown v Board of Education was decided in the clearly constitutional direction.
      The same can be said for District of Columbia v Heller and its progeny. Never put everything on one fell swoop of a decision, but work it a little at a time. That way an historic, ground breaking decision can be revolutionary until one realizes that the plaintiffs had been working on that decision for 57 years, a little at a time.
      An anaconda plan, if you will.

  2. This is not a conundrum. It only looks like one;

    “What good are principles if you lose?” says the flake, the phony, the gamer who just…doesn’t…get it.

    But having been guided by principles was not the cause of your “losing”.

    “What good is winning if you’ve abandoned the principles?” says the fool, the chump, the schmuck, the holier-than-thou who just…doesn’t…get it.

    But abandonment of principles was not the cause of your “winning”.

    • Good point. Losing is not caused by the wrong principles, but by the wrong approach for achieving those principles.

      • I never said anything about wrong principles. That’s a whole other deal. The above presented dichotomy is only about the right principles.

  3. Your principles (put another way, your understanding of Principle(s)) are what guide you in deciding whether or not you can/should do something. Whatever that “thing” is, once you have chosen to do it, the next choice you must make is how well you are willing to do it. All else follows from those two decisions.

    Apparently, Rand Paul’s principles permit him to “do” politics, but only very badly.

  4. I don’t think that limiting damage is abandoning your principles. When you see that you are about to lose on an issue, make compromises that limit the damage.

    A good example is the AWB of 94. The gunnies knew that they were going to lose that one, so they passed the bill with a 10 year sunset provision, hoping that when the 10 years was up, the legal climate would be more favorable. They were right.

    As sucky as 922(o) is, the gun control crowd was out to sue gunmakers out of business. Losing the machine gun registry was a sacrifice that was made to get FOPA, and likely saved gunmakers and dealers from being sued out of business. Had the Republican led congress stood on “principles,” FOPA would not have passed, and we would have seen every major city in the USA suing gun makers for hundreds of millions. It would have been the end of firearms sales in this country.

    Sometimes, you have to pick your battles and take victory where you can get it.

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