You have done such a good job of keeping things like the Patriot Act from being approved, no wonder it will get worse.

Guns don't create the courtesy, however. Sometimes they establish a delicate truce, sometimes a condition of enforced obedience.. I wouldn't confuse these with a culture that has established a tradition of courtesy. Our traditions of short-tempered rage and self-deprecating jealousy might too often upstage our wish for 'Polite Niceness'.

I am sure that this does not fit jrc9596's ideology, but twice, in two separate planning forums, New Orleanians were asked what they most wanted to preserve about our beloved city.

It was not music, food, architecture or even Mardi Gras

In both cases, by large margins, it was the way that we relate to each other.

Many native New Orleanians, after being forced out, lived for the first time elsewhere in the USA and were uniformly shocked by the social isolation prevalent elsewhere in the USA.

"People don't talk to each other".

Best Hopes for New Orleans,

Alan

something like that.

In 1946, the Swiss bought a shed load of tracked armoured vehicles from Germany. They were low profile , slanted armour 75 mm gunned high velocity weapon systems.

They were called the 'Hetzer' which is German for trouble maker.

aka Teenage boy.

One of these things could quite happly defend a mountain pass.

Nobody has fooked with the Swiss since Napoleon....