//Illicit drugs were illegal from the outset.//

No they weren't. Heroin was first synthesised in 1874 but didn't become popular until it was re-synthesised in 1897, after which it was marketed as morphine substitute and cough medicine. It was still legal to prescribe it until the mid-1920's in the US and the UK; in Australia it wasn't banned from legal prescription until 1953.

Assets already approved by the State, purchased with prior State approval and with the State's currency and being used for legal purposes were retrospectively banned and confiscated. Do you think that people should have been allowed to keep their heroin because they purchased it legally? Or was it justifiable for the State to 'steal' their drugs on the grounds of public health? I vote for the latter.

//Its not ridiculous.//

It's ridiculous to persist with your claim that 'the FBI done it' after I've explained to you who the real masterminds are: the Women's Christian Temperance Union. They are an ancient organisation who have been working in the shadows for centuries to steal all mankind's booze - and they would have succeeded if we did not have protectors: the Inebriati, or Knights Tippler, who are the sworn enemies of the wicked WCTU and dedicate their lives to protecting us all from teetotalism.

Here is a short documentary on the Inebriati, although the WCTU seem to have added a laugh track to make it seem comical:

http://www.videobash.com/video_show/slightly-less-than-2-drinks-the-key-to-get-ahead-in-life-mitchell-webb-2653541

To try and pretend the FBI were to blame when a far more logical explanation presents itself - that the WCTU were responsible - is absurd. Unless you're working for the WCTU...

Poirot,

You really are lightweight on logic.

You can be a true believer, even in the extreme version, but find one's self unable to comply entirely.

Mateen was clearly gay, but tried to be a good muslim by getting married and regularly beating his wife. However, he was also clearly ashamed of his homosexuality and this conflict drove him nuts. If he had not been muslim this internal conflict would never have occurred, and Mateen would have been free to indulge his peccadillos and his faith.

I guess that this is a hard concept to grasp for someone unaccustomed to thinking, but give it a shot.

SM,

"Mateen was clearly gay, but tried to be a good muslim by getting married and regularly beating his wife. However, he was also clearly ashamed of his homosexuality and this conflict drove him nuts. If he had not been muslim this internal conflict would never have occurred, and Mateen would have been free to indulge his peccadillos and his faith."

And that's your interpretation of "devout"?

What a load of waffling nonsense!

Let's take a step back....

Your entire premise in starting this thread was to push the line that Mateen was a hard line devotee of ISIS - and that he chose the gay bar because ISIS would approve the target - being as it's against all their fundamentalist principles.

So your angle was pretty much cut and dried.

Here was an ISIS inspired fundamentalist doing the bidding of his movement.

You posted:

"It doesn't help either that the shooter was a registered democrat, or that an Imam at an Orlando mosque was advocating death to homosexuals."

"Trying to paper over it as just another attack forgets that it was an Islamic inspired terrorist attack on western values."

"Between you and Poirot, it seems as though you are trying to find any reason for the Orlando massacre other than islamic radicalism."

"....This was an act of Islamic extremism against western values of tolerance."

Now you're saying the tussle between his homosexuality and his religion drove him "nuts".

(I made a point earlier that he'd lost the plot for whatever reason - and you rejected that, harping on the Islam-inspired extremist angle)

What happened to the evil premeditated extremist action of behalf of ISIS?

You're making it up as you go along....

Paul,

See my post on the number of lethal projectiles that can be fired from a shotgun in a fraction of a second and then think.
You might also consider that Australia's second worst shooting massacre was carried out with a single shot rifle.

Why do you persist in ignoring the fact that the Greens support farmers/graziers being allowed to have firearms, in many cases firearms that the ordinary licenced shooter is not allowed to own?

Is Mise, are you making the argument for the banning of all guns in private hands in society? I'll vote for that. Then what would gunnies do then to get their kicks?

What is the number of collateral damage (dead is such a horrible word) victims from firearms in society that is acceptable to gunnies, before they would agree to a total ban of private gun ownership? Seems in America that number is way way away. 27 a day is not nearly enough! What is the figure for Australia, do you shooters have a figure in mind? 1,000 10,000.

Toni Lavis,

What a waste of words to demonstrate your Googling skills for trivia.

'Illicit drugs were always illegal' is obvious to most as a confirmation of the status of drugs like heroin that have been illegal for the living memory of all here.

That heroin might have been freely available at some less scientific time in the past, or (say) that arsenic was used as face powder, is irrelevant and a diversion, as was your reference to drugs as a false comparison in the first place.
BTT