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I will push back on this and suggest that if you give him a gun, access to a high-value political opponent, and approximately zero chance of being caught and punished for it, he is somewhat likely to pull the trigger.
That's closer to how I measure the virtue of a person. What they will do when given an opportunity to inflict harm under the belief they will not suffer consequences themselves. That is, how strong are your personal principles, and can you hold yourself accountable for following them.
I think we end up arguing over how much the person has the personal capacity to inflict violence vs. whether they find violence actually reprehensible. The former is a bit of a misdirect from the latter. That is, just because someone lacks the fortitude to pull the trigger themselves doesn't mean they don't want to see that trigger pulled.
Now the scenario I proposed up there is far from realistic, and will not come to pass, so I accept all the various objections and caveats to my argument. My position is best articulated as "in my experience only people who have a stated commitment to avoiding violence are serious about not wanting it. In contrast, people who can excuse violent acts easily are usually just in want of an opportunity commit it themselves."
So I don't think this guys 'private' texts reflect well on him at all.
Well I mean, given that he's running for AG, he gets to decide by a large degree who gets caught and faces punishment for what. And we've seen AG's use a lot of "discretion" in this regard. And so the question is, after statements like these, is there even a fig leaf of equal protection under the law?
Oh yeah.
Lets leave aside how he's in a central 'position of trust' for the State.
I feel vaguely hypocritical on this point because I generally support the idea of using political power to make your ideological opponents uncomfortable enough to leave (I mean implement policies they don't like and would want to get away from, rather than policies specifically targeting them for their political associations) but having your state's executive branch have an unstated policy of leniency on violence against political opponents is a genuinely terrifying thought to me. Doubly so if your state's self defense laws are weak. Virginia is Stand Your Ground, at least.
Thankfully one that IS pretty handily solved by moving away and/or organizing a campaign to oust the problem candidates. But it does harken back to my Skin in the Game rant. If you want to support the idea of political violence against opponents, in the abstract, I would prefer if you, personally, or people you care a lot about, are at risk of getting targeted by it. Instead, what always happens is the political class circles the wagons and ups their levels of security and leaves everyone else to fend for themselves.
Would it be wrong to suggest that a Gentlemanly duel between the parties in question here might be a way to resolve the grievances?
Who would challenge whom to a duel and why?
Mr. Todd Gilbert is the subject of the "Two in the Head" comment, isn't he?
Maybe he challenges Mr. Jones to pistols at dawn. Two bullets each. Or Mr. Jones can drop out.
No I don't think our elected officials have the fortitude for this these days. But its more to the point there should be actual consequences on the line for making such comments.
I'm old fashioned in many ways, but this reasoning seems so weird to me.
A: Threatens to kill B and his family.
B: Right. Tomorrow, at dawn, I'm going to give you the opportunity to kill me.
Very manly, yes, but not very helpful unless you're sure A is an abject coward. Hire somebody who knows how to use a telescopic sight or put a horse's head in his bed or something.
I am DEAD CERTAIN that A is a coward in this case.
If they don't want to kill or die over words then they can simply recant. Most people do not want to kill or die over words.
Of course, we can make the duel less than lethal if needed.
In this case I suspect you're right. But there is no law that bad people have to be cowards, or poor shots. Hamilton for example was killed by a belligerent nutbar, and I believe there were many such cases throughout history.
Belligerent nutbars can more easily be thinned out if we're allowed to shoot them under the right circumstances.
I think we're in an arguably worse equilibrium where public harassment and 'fighting words' can be thrown around willy-nilly, degrading the general discourse because there is no legal means of reprisal that doesn't also expose you to possible legal liability.
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