Date: Sun Aug 29 21:22:00 1999 From: zonie@AZTEC.ASU.EDU (RICK DESTEPHENS) Subject: Burning Issues To: AZRKBA@asu.edu
Hi guys, I am in the middle of a debate with an internet dweeb who made some assertions I had to combat. At the end of the post, look for a pro-rkba argument I have been using lately. Let me know if it makes sense. So far, every anti-gunner I have used it on has given me a rather dumb-founded look....
>The current events SIG is not the place for a primer on chemistry.
Well, you kinda made it one when the only thing you commented on from my post was a niblet about a solvent.
>Again, methylene (or ethylene) chloride is *non*-flammable.
Sorry, wrong answer, Mark. Dictionaries are fine for somethings, but for technical data, I prefer something more authoritative...
From OSHA's MSDS section:
"Methylene chloride is a colourless liquid with a penetrating ether-like odour. It is essentially non-flammable under most conditions of use, but it can probably burn if strongly heated."
As it was at Waco (aerosolized as well). OSHA continues:
"It can decompose at high temperatures forming toxic gases, such as hydrogen chloride and phosgene. It is TOXIC [emphasis OHSA's] It is also a mild central nervous system depressant. Methylene chloride may cause headache, nausea, dizziness drowsiness, incoordination (sic) and confusion, unconsciousness and death. POSSIBLE CANCER HAZARD [emphasis OSHA's]."
So when experts testified before Congress that many of the Branch Davidians were rendered "inert" by exposure, they had good reason.
Now, if I were the FBI and I wanted to kill a bunch of Branch Davidians who witnessed a crime, burning the place in the proximity of noxious chemicals would do pretty well. Shooting those who escaped out the back (away from the peering eye of TV cameras (set back a mile away) would help even more. The few who would escape on the _front_ side would be charged with murder (they were acquitted) and their accusations would be dismissed by a servile, ignorant and lazy press.
As for the flammability of _ethylene_ dichloride, the Ohio State University MSDS section states the following:
"Health-3 Severe (Cancer causing) Flammability-3 Severe (Flammable)... Ratings are 0 to 4 (0 = No Hazard; 4 = Extreme Hazard)."
>my point was that the thrust of an argument loses some of >its sharpness when factually in error.
Indeed.
>How can I believe that what was alleged is true when the >alleger slips up on a relatively simple detail? (And we >all do from time to time)
There is a difference between a mistake made an academician that escapes the watchful eye of someone giving a well-planned lecture and an army chemical weapons specialist composing a quick explaination to some internet buddies. The army chem-weapons person said that the burning of methylene chloride produced cyanide. What he should have said was that the burning of CS particles creates cyanide and the C2-H4-Cl2 when burned liberates hydrochloric acid and phosgene gas. The point was that the FBI used tese chemicals supposedly to get the Davidians to surrender when, in fact, it may have killed half of them. Now, that would be something to comment on, not the trivia that was chosen instead.
>The lack of understanding of chemistry and terminology is showing...
I must have wasted my time going for that minor in chemistry. Shoulda concentrated more on microbiology. I would love to sue the Ohio State University, but my guess is the statute of limitations is beyond that 15 year period.
>The military is very good at advancing, retreating, >illing, destroying etc, but no great shakes in chemistry. >Chemistry is not their job.
You think the military does not recruit folks with chemistry degrees? Heck the army recruiter practically begged me to sign on (biological weapons). I'm not the army type, however.
The army chem-weapons specialist said: >>the baby burnwers (sic) shot 40 mm ferret rounds
Randy says: >This kind of provocative language, perhaps true, reduces >credibility to nearly zero, for me. Usually, I feel the >individual has an agenda that is being pushed...
Kind of like the FBI saying that Koresh was a religious wacko who was raping and beating children despite Texas officials' information to the contrary. Being the intellectual that I am <g>, I try to look past that and just analyse the data and logic, otherwise we have ad hominem.
Now, back to the main issue. Are the BATF and FBI a bunch of murdering, lieing scumbags or what? Now that they admit that the Army's elite Delta Force was on sight and probably driving the tanks as well as shooting people as the attempted to escape a burning building, can we really say that only Janet Reno can take full responsibility (even though she has suffered no punishment)? Only the president of the USA can order federal troops to murder American citizens, so that means that Clinton must have ordered them there along with the select militias (National Guard) of Alabama and Texas.
Do you now see why the Framers feared standing armies and select militias? Is any of this starting to make sense? Would a force made up of volunteer militia have done this? As well, do you think that 55,000 militia members would have allowed themselves to be shipped to Vietnam to die for no good reason?
later,
Rick