Deep sigh… I thought he was doing better until the blender and the Vodka came around; might be a clue, eh?[edit] And it even gets uglier; not sure the good mind / free thinker comment is anything but bait.
Similar antics won't last as long today; police will shoot first and ask questions later. IMHO B&C were sociopaths that hadn't really been seen before. At first the Robin Hood ideal was in play but when you shoot folks that could have been otherwise put off it makes one less the bandit-hero and more the pond-scum type.Depression evoked images of the big bad banks left over from earlier times... can't rob oil companies or political parties; more's the pity. I see no Bonnie and Clyde types on the horizon... just dirty little pukes that will remain nameless vermin until written off.
If I didn't live in CA (the land of the fruits and nuts) I'd go for a Taurus Judge… .45LC / .410; sadly here in the PR of CA it would be on the list for the ability to fire the shotguns shells. More is the pity.
Britain did not need or desire to have complete control of the Chinese to get what they wanted, gunboat diplomacy and the threat of force was plenty for British purposes.
So, are bragging, or complaining?
I'd say neither... just a matter of the historical record.
Much depends on the projected use of the particualr piece… home defense might be better served with a .38, loaded with 3 snake loads and 3 wadcutters (IMHO).
Not sure either scout or HF are 100% correct here.Cultures are (or at least should be) judged by their success. Survival is the goal, if they do they win. If we make the mistake of judging other cultures by our own standards... they will always lose.The growth and blending of cultures is a process that has helped make the US what it is... what is required for this to succeed is for the acculturation of the various groups into one common culture. As long as people came here with the idea of becoming an American (like my GF, not letting my Mom go to the "ethnic" school, for their cultural group for fear she'd learn too much about it and not be assimilated enough into the US)... we don't seem to be going for acculturation and assimilation; too many Hyphenated-Americans. This observation if shocking to some has nothing to do with the extermination of the other groups.We can be tolerant of cultural differences w/o Balkanizing the US. So too, we can be critical of this Balkanization w/o being for ethnic cleansing. After all we are all immigrant stock, eh?
Along the same line; I'd move the time frame to 1900-1950… WWI (the first modern war*) submarine, tank, rifled artillery, growing use of air power. Then on to WWII; genocide w/in common memory, and the A-bomb.*Use of this term is tongue-in-cheek; every war is the first modern war; we role out and test the latest technological advances to extract an ever more impersonal toll on humankind. Much easier to kill if we don't have to stand toe-to-toe and hack the opponent to death with a saber, eh?[Hedges the question... 1950-present: social, geopolitical, and economic changes... civil rights, emergence of the third world, efforts break the lock oil on the world.]