tugger From United States of America, joined Apr 2006, 4629 posts, RR: 7 Posted (4 months 4 weeks ago) and read 3643 times:
So the NRA made its big statement today:
Quote: In an impassioned speech, marking the NRA's first in-depth public comments since the Newtown tragedy, LaPierre pointed the finger not at gun proliferation but violent video games, the media and the absence of armed guards at schools.
He argued that if banks and members of Congress can have protection, schools across America should be afforded the same security.
"It's now time for us to assume responsibly for our schools," he said. "The only way to stop a monster from killing our kids is to be permanently involved and invested in a plan of absolute protection."
He added: "The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun."
Warning that the next mass killer could be "waiting in the wings," LaPierre urged immediate action to protect school children.
He said efforts over the years to pass laws for "gun-free school zones" have only told "every insane killer in America that schools are the safest place to inflict maximum mayhem with minimum risk."
He said that when it comes to America's children, "we as a society leave them, every day, utterly defenseless. ... That must change now."
LaPierre called for a national school security plan, including an appropriation from Congress for armed guards in every school. He tapped former Rep. Asa Hutchison, R-Ark., to lead the effort to develop the security plans, which would cover everything from building design to access control. There are nearly 100,000 public schools in America.
"Will you at least admit it's possible that ... 26 innocent lives might have been spared that day," he said, if the shooter had encountered "qualified armed security."
To be honest I don't get it, it just doesn't seem as "savvy" as the NRA has been known to be. I mean they had an entire week to come with this and they blame video games and "the media" and want armed guards in every school.
I would question why stop at schools, but I guess that plays into what they are perhaps actually seeking which is to essentially have every person in the USA be armed.
Tugg
I don’t know that I am unafraid to be myself, but it is hard to be somebody else. -W. Shatner
DeltaMD90 From United States of America, joined Apr 2008, 5284 posts, RR: 47 Reply 1, posted (4 months 4 weeks ago) and read 3629 times:
Yeah, disappointed but not surprised. This is only a treat for the symptom and not the cause. I figured they'd come up with something at least halfway decent as an alternative to some of the other more strict measures.
I honestly think if they came up with something reasonable, the public might choose that over the AWB. But as this option and the AWB as the only two offers, I can see the AWB passing...
EMBQA From United States of America, joined Oct 2003, 9286 posts, RR: 13 Reply 3, posted (4 months 4 weeks ago) and read 3627 times:
Quoting tugger (Thread starter): I would question why stop at schools, but I guess that plays into what they are perhaps actually seeking which is to essentially have every person in the USA be armed.
Maybe we just need the perception of that since over the last 20+ years nearly 100% of these mass shooting have happened in "Gun Free Zones" The only people reading and obeying those signs are the law-abiding citizen. All the criminal is thinking is that no one there will stop me.
[Edited 2012-12-21 10:50:50]
"It's not the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog"
L-188 From United States of America, joined Jul 1999, 29349 posts, RR: 62 Reply 4, posted (4 months 4 weeks ago) and read 3605 times:
Yes the fix is to fix the mental health system in this country, not banning guns.
but still the reaction by gun grabbers to this is why I have finally joined the NRA. Anybody else thinks Obummers "commission" is just a fraudulant attempt to reach a conc'uskonnhe has already come too?
OBAMA-WORST PRESIDENT EVER....Even SKOORB would be better.
luv2fly From United States of America, joined May 2003, 11957 posts, RR: 51 Reply 6, posted (4 months 4 weeks ago) and read 3571 times:
I m always amazed with the spin the NRA can put on gun violence and deflect from the obvious. If guns are the problem, more guns can not be the solution. No offer to work towards a solution and or fix, deflect, deflect, deflect.
tugger From United States of America, joined Apr 2006, 4629 posts, RR: 7 Reply 7, posted (4 months 4 weeks ago) and read 3566 times:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 4): Yes the fix is to fix the mental health system in this country, not banning guns.
Would a tax (similar to other focused taxes for cigarettes and alcohol) that goes toward supporting mental health services and perhaps the medical costs of guns be supportable? I am thinking many would scream bloody murder about "more taxes" but I think it could be a good idea that could actually do something.
Quoting L-188 (Reply 4): but still the reaction by gun grabbers to this is why I have finally joined the NRA. Anybody else thinks Obummers "commission" is just a fraudulant attempt to reach a conc'uskonnhe has already come too?
No I don't. And that comes from the fact the Obama appointed Simpson-Bowles commission didn't come to a conclusion that anybody in politics liked which means it was actually a good and reasoned conclusion.
(And also, name calling BS is silly and childish and not conducive to good conversation nor does it present the argument the person doing the name calling in a favorable light.)
Tugg
[Edited 2012-12-21 11:10:48]
I don’t know that I am unafraid to be myself, but it is hard to be somebody else. -W. Shatner
HoMsaR From United States of America, joined Jan 2010, 798 posts, RR: 0 Reply 8, posted (4 months 4 weeks ago) and read 3564 times:
Ignoring the many obvious flaws with the idea of having more guns in a school with kindergarteners and whatnot, who's going to pay for this?
In general, those whose politics make them most favorable to the NRA are also those who are most reluctant (to be kindly) to put any kind of money into our education system.
AirframeAS From United States of America, joined Feb 2004, 14150 posts, RR: 26 Reply 10, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3521 times:
Quoting HoMsaR (Reply 8): Ignoring the many obvious flaws with the idea of having more guns in a school with kindergarteners and whatnot, who's going to pay for this?
I'm a huge advocate of arming teachers in schools rather hiring one guard in each and every school in this country. It's cheaper and more teachers would be armed vs. only one guard. It's quite easy for a gunman to take out the hired guard then go havoc on the rest if the school.
In my opinion, having armed teachers, like what one Texas school district is doing, is much, much better.
luv2fly From United States of America, joined May 2003, 11957 posts, RR: 51 Reply 13, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3508 times:
Quoting mt99 (Reply 11): What if a teacher doesn't want to be armed?
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 10): In my opinion, having armed teachers, like what one Texas school district is doing, is much, much better.
The shooters Mother was a teacher, tell me again how that worked out for us having her be a gun owner!
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 14, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3507 times:
Okay, so armed men in every school: check!
How about the movie theatre shooting? Okay, armed men in every theatre: check!
How about the supermarket shooting? Okay, armed men in every supermarket: check! How 'bout the Fort Hood shooting? ...okay, armed men on every military base: check... hey, wait a minute!
Seriously, if this is the way the NRA wants it...
The NRA pays for it. Cops at every school, your idea ... you pay.
Or to pay for cops at every school...levy a taxi on every gun owner, saayyy... an Annual Gun Fee of $1200 per registered gun owner per weapon!
BN747
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
roswell41 From United States of America, joined Aug 2001, 576 posts, RR: 1 Reply 16, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3499 times:
I think the NRA's idea is an interesting one. Why don't we harden schools much like we harden banks and airports? Aren't our children important and valuable enough? Honestly, with the fiscal cliff and the Christmas/New Years holidays, I think the uproar from the shooting will be short lived much like Aurora. Most of the news coverage is decreasing even on networks like MSNBC. If this had happened at a different time of year, maybe the anti-gun crowd would have a greater chance of success. In the meantime, the NRA is collecting tons of donations and firearms are flying off the the shelves. Those of us who value our 2nd Amendment rights are writing our government officials and we are politicially active and donate money to our causes. I support the NRA proposal. It makes far more sense than the so-called AWB.
KBJCpilot From United States of America, joined May 2012, 92 posts, RR: 8 Reply 17, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3487 times:
A simple tax of 2 cents per bullet would fund mental health across this country. Or it would fund two National Guard soldiers at every elementary and middle school.
L-188 From United States of America, joined Jul 1999, 29349 posts, RR: 62 Reply 18, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3469 times:
BN747
You realize your tax idea would cost ne iver fifty grand a year?
Forget it!
Oh and i and everybody who spent time in the service can tell you have no idea about weapons security at a military base.nobody except the civilian cops and MO's on duty where packing.....save for the shooter....funny how all these incidents happen in gun free zones eh?
OBAMA-WORST PRESIDENT EVER....Even SKOORB would be better.
Braybuddy From Ireland, joined Aug 2004, 5276 posts, RR: 35 Reply 19, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3468 times:
Quoting tugger (Thread starter): He added: "The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun."
So where were all the "good guys with guns" when all these multiple murders have occurred? Sitting at home bragging about their arsenal?
I don't understand why people like to lay the blame on mental health. An angry, testosterone-fuelled teenage male doesn't need to be insane to let fly at anyone, not least when he has a loaded weapon in his hand.
L-188 From United States of America, joined Jul 1999, 29349 posts, RR: 62 Reply 20, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3460 times:
Actually Braybuddy their weapons where left at home because that school was a gun free zone and they where respecting the law.
Funny how only the shooters/criminals seem to ignore those laws
Edit....he wasnt a teenage he was twenty and from what i have read seems to have lead a very smothered life being protected by his mother. This lack of socialization seems to have caused him not to have the ability toi deal with society
But i am not a shrink
[Edited 2012-12-21 12:11:44]
OBAMA-WORST PRESIDENT EVER....Even SKOORB would be better.
mt99 From United States of America, joined May 1999, 6348 posts, RR: 7 Reply 21, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3457 times:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 20): Actually Braybuddy their weapons where left at home because that school was a gun free zone and they where respecting the law.
Is that a fact? can you prove it?
Name 1 person who was at the school that has said: "if i only had my gun..."
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 22, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3455 times:
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 16): I think the NRA's idea is an interesting one. Why don't we harden schools much like we harden banks and airports? Aren't our children important and valuable enough?
Quoting KBJCpilot (Reply 17):
I'd pay the tax if it meant a safer society.
We non-gun owners should NOT have to pay for gun owners adamant over-the-top attitudes over the 2nd amendment...they need to figure out away to police themselves (as Mr. NRA is suggesting -without shouldering cost so far) or let us do it for them.
BN747
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
Ken777 From United States of America, joined Mar 2004, 7438 posts, RR: 5 Reply 23, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours ago) and read 3449 times:
Quoting EMBQA (Reply 3):
Yes the fix is to fix the mental health system in this country, not banning guns.
I believe that the ability (authority) to do so in place but it's clear that the GOP isn't going to allow funding or actual operations at a national level. That's not on the Tea Party Approved List of Government Spending.
Quoting luv2fly (Reply 6): I m always amazed with the spin the NRA can put on gun violence and deflect from the obvious.
I'm not. It's about money, which puts the Second Amendment way down the list of importance for the NRA.
mt99 From United States of America, joined May 1999, 6348 posts, RR: 7 Reply 25, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 3583 times:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 24): You can look up the law that says schools are gun free zones yourself MT99
And yes it is a law
I did not ask for that. I asked you to prove that there was at least 1 person at Sandy Hook, who would have otherwise had gun in his/her possession if it wasn't for the fact that the school was a gun free zone and tha he/she would have been able to stop this guy.
Quoting L-188 (Reply 20): A their weapons where left at home because that school was a gun free zone and they where respecting the law.
roswell41 From United States of America, joined Aug 2001, 576 posts, RR: 1 Reply 26, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 3564 times:
Gun-free zones aren't really gun-free unless you have access control and administrative searches of all persons and property entering the building. Examples would be airports, court houses and government buildings. Calling someplace a gun-free zone doesn't make it so. I think armed security at schools is a good idea, although, arming and training willing volunteer teachers should also be considered. Let localities decide which is best for their district based on their budgets and parent/teacher organizations. The idea of leaving hundreds of children with a few dozen unarmed (and mostly female) adults seems reckless in hindsight.
KBJCpilot From United States of America, joined May 2012, 92 posts, RR: 8 Reply 27, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 3597 times:
Quoting BN747 (Reply 22): We non-gun owners should NOT have to pay for gun owners adamant over-the-top attitudes over the 2nd amendment...they need to figure out away to police themselves (as Mr. NRA is suggesting -without shouldering cost so far) or let us do it for them.
OK Mr. Overreaction, if you had read my entire post I said
Quoting KBJCpilot (Reply 17): A simple tax of 2 cents per bullet would fund mental health across this country. Or it would fund two National Guard soldiers at every elementary and middle school.
I'd pay the tax if it meant a safer society.
We would pay for your pacifist society with a bullet tax.
brilondon From Canada, joined Aug 2005, 3163 posts, RR: 1 Reply 29, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 3573 times:
Quoting tugger (Thread starter): He said that when it comes to America's children, "we as a society leave them, every day, utterly defenseless. ... That must change now."
So why don't we teach the 5 and 6 year old children how to properly handle a gun, then maybe one the child who knew karate would have been able to shoot the killer.
Quoting tugger (Thread starter): He added: "The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.
This is the stupidest thing I have heard in a while.
Quoting tugger (Reply 7): Would a tax (similar to other focused taxes for cigarettes and alcohol) that goes toward supporting mental health services and perhaps the medical costs of guns be supportable? I am thinking many would scream bloody murder about "more taxes" but I think it could be a good idea that could actually do something.
That is the reason that the founding fathers put in the right to bare arms in the constitution because of the King of England wanting to tax and control the colonies.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 10): I'm a huge advocate of arming teachers in schools rather hiring one guard in each and every school in this country. It's cheaper and more teachers would be armed vs. only one guard. It's quite easy for a gunman to take out the hired guard then go havoc on the rest if the school.
Oh yeah lets arm the teachers and while were at it don't forget to arm the administrators and the janitor who of course will be able to shoot the gunmen who are storming the schools. Why in the world would you think that is a great idea?
Quoting Braybuddy (Reply 19): I don't understand why people like to lay the blame on mental health.
Because a sane man would not have gone into the school and shot 5 and 6 year old children.
Quoting mt99 (Reply 21): Name 1 person who was at the school that has said: "if i only had my gun..."
I agree. If there were an armed person at the school it would have done no good. By the time it was apparent that there was a gunman in the school, he would already dead.
Pu From Sweden, joined Dec 2011, 642 posts, RR: 12 Reply 30, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 3568 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 10): I'm a huge advocate of arming teachers in schools
Do you have any idea how far in the opposite direction you are going with ideas like this compared to the rest of the first world - which has almost eliminated gun violence as a threat? Why don't you consider whats worked elsewhere instead of advocating the untenable idea that a suicidal crazy man or a terrorist is going to be stopped in a shootout with a teacher?
Video games, violent movies, crazy people and unarmed teachers exist in Australia, Japan and Europe....yet somehow an American-style monthly shooting rampage almost never occurs.
roswell41 From United States of America, joined Aug 2001, 576 posts, RR: 1 Reply 31, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 3555 times:
People made similar criticisms about arming pilots. Well, we as a country, decided it was worth the risk and it has been a success for going on ten years. What makes volunteer teachers so different than volunteer pilots? Both are educated and respected professionals. Both have an interest in their personal safety at work, nevermind the safety of those in their care. I honestly don't understand the resistance to arming and training volunteer teachers. Is it solely politics? Is it because many teachers and their union espouse a left wing political ideology that is anti-gun?
Polot From United States of America, joined Jul 2011, 1490 posts, RR: 0 Reply 32, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 3524 times:
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 31): People made similar criticisms about arming pilots. Well, we as a country, decided it was worth the risk and it has been a success for going on ten years. What makes volunteer teachers so different than volunteer pilots? Both are educated and respected professionals. Both have an interest in their personal safety at work, nevermind the safety of those in their care. I honestly don't understand the resistance to arming and training volunteer teachers. Is it solely politics? Is it because many teachers and their union espouse a left wing political ideology that is anti-gun?
Money is a big issue though. There were approximately 618,660 registered pilots in the US in 2011, with a vast majority of those being student and private pilots. On the other hand there are approximately 7.2 million teachers in the US. The costs for pilots can be recovered by increasing fees on airline tickets. The only way to raise money for this initiative is to just raise taxes, or increase taxes on guns/ammo. Neither option is that appealing to most conservatives.
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 33, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 22 hours ago) and read 3517 times:
Quoting ogre727 (Reply 5): If guns are the problem, more guns can not be the solution
You make the assumption that guns are the problem.
Quoting ogre727 (Reply 5): Or banning them until the mental health system is fixed perhaps is a happy medium???
And, in what world do you live in where out beloved leaders will willingly return power to the people after they have wrested it away?
Quoting tugger (Reply 7): Would a tax (similar to other focused taxes for cigarettes and alcohol) that goes toward supporting mental health services and perhaps the medical costs of guns be supportable?
I would not be opposed to this, so long as the tax is not unreasonable and the money does not go into some "general fund" to be used at the whim of the politicians. And, it would be a state and local tax, not a federal tax.
Quoting HoMsaR (Reply 8): Ignoring the many obvious flaws with the idea of having more guns in a school with kindergarteners and whatnot,
Please, help me with the "many obvious flaws" are with having law-abiding citizens carry firearms around kids. Note: carry, not leave unattended.
Quoting mt99 (Reply 11): What if a teacher doesn't want to be armed?
Then the teacher is not armed.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 14): How about the movie theatre shooting? Okay, armed men in every theatre: check!
Since the Aurora shooting, I do carry a firearm whenever I go to a movie. After careful reading of the law...and asking a couple of cop buddies, in this state, a "no firearms sign" does not have the force of law (unless it is posted on a property specifically listed in the various statutes) and if I'm "found out, it's a trespassing charge, but only if I don't leave. So, now I carry in many more places.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 14): Okay, so armed men in every school: check!
Unfortunately, schools are specifically spelled out in the statutes. So, all our primary and secondary schools are gun-free and violations are a felony. I will not carry on school property, though, the law does allow a firearm in my car, so long as it can legally be there.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 26): Gun-free zones aren't really gun-free unless you have access control and administrative searches of all persons and property entering the building.
I wonder why people don't understand this? Of course, a gun-free zone is really only designed to add an additional criminal charge when someone is caught inside one with a firearm.
tugger From United States of America, joined Apr 2006, 4629 posts, RR: 7 Reply 34, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 21 hours ago) and read 3504 times:
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 31): People made similar criticisms about arming pilots.
Pilots are in a closed, limited access space. The gun is kept secure in the cockpit. The passengers are all screened. It is an entirely different situation. Where exactly do you propose the teachers keep their guns? On their person, in their holster? In their gun safe? Do you have one in every classroom? Are you willing to pay the additional costs for training (it's gotta be at least annual) and the increased insurance cost?
Just curious.
Tugg
I don’t know that I am unafraid to be myself, but it is hard to be somebody else. -W. Shatner
You realize your tax idea would cost ne iver fifty grand a year?
Forget it!
Yes, many people have expensive hobbies, some collect ferraris, some collect expensive suits & shoes, others collect horses....just add guns to the costly prestige list. I see no problem with it whatsoever.
When I fly domestically or abroad to 'shoot airliners', I gotta purchase a ticket (I;m not an airline employee), I must buy a hotel room, rental cars cost money as does food and video equipment supplies. I don't expect any of you to share that cost...nor should I.
Most of you gunowners are hobbyist..so it now becomes an expensive Hobby. Mr. NRA may be on to something.
If all teh people who've said 'I'm a responsible gun owner..' truly were, we could probably slash gun deaths by about 50-70% or more...you want a number I can live with.. that's about right. But as it stands, we've crossed the lone..it's gptta stop!
Your hobby is costing us TOO MANY innocent lives. The tradeoff is simply not worth it. You're 'someone might break in and get me' maybe...is not worth scores of innocent people getting shot to death every freakin' week of the year. And those numbers aren't receding...they are increasing - week by week by week,
A price has to be paid.
So far it's been too many bodies and blood of the innocent.
So yes, bullet taxes, gun owner taxes and escalated it for multiple ownership...no one person can shoot 5 guns at once.
BN747
[Edited 2012-12-21 13:30:18]
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
RussianJet From Kazakhstan, joined Jul 2007, 6268 posts, RR: 23 Reply 36, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 21 hours ago) and read 3487 times:
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 31): Is it because many teachers and their union espouse a left wing political ideology that is anti-gun?
Or is it possible that many people for perfectly sane reasons think that a school should not need to be stuffed full of guns in a healthy society? Maybe that's the key word there, healthy - seeing as a lot of people here seem to think that the issue is mental health rather than guns. On that note, how do American mental health stats compare to other western countries where gun crime is lower?
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 39, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 21 hours ago) and read 3480 times:
Quoting brilondon (Reply 29): So why don't we teach the 5 and 6 year old children how to properly handle a gun,
A parent would be irresponsible not to teach the children in the home proper gun handling. Of course, the proper handling of a firearm by just about any child under the age of 16 is to NOT handle the firearm and contact a responsible adult, immediately. My 10 and 6 year old know this.
Quoting brilondon (Reply 29): By the time it was apparent that there was a gunman in the school, he would already dead.
One thing that has not been expanded upon very much is how this dickhead immediately killed himself when he realized there was an armed response. What if that armed response had come from a teacher, parent or administrator? Of course, we'll never know, but it does bear thinking about.
Quoting Pu (Reply 30): Do you have any idea how far in the opposite direction you are going with ideas like this compared to the rest of the first world -
And here is the problem with that train of thinking. We are not the rest of the free world. Just like Greece is not the US. Just like the UK is not the US, nor is Germany, Japan, France or Australia. We have a different culture. A different history and a outlook. It doesn't mean we can't change.
One thing: there are an estimated 200,000,000 firearms in non-state hands. If there were an instant and immediate gun ban how many of those guns would be turned in? How many would remain in criminal hands (who, by definition, ignore laws)? Would that make Americans safer?
Revelation From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 10443 posts, RR: 20 Reply 40, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 21 hours ago) and read 3479 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 10): I'm a huge advocate of arming teachers in schools rather hiring one guard in each and every school in this country. It's cheaper and more teachers would be armed vs. only one guard. It's quite easy for a gunman to take out the hired guard then go havoc on the rest if the school.
In my opinion, having armed teachers, like what one Texas school district is doing, is much, much better.
Guns are the problem not the solution. No guns, no shootings.
In Newtown the shooter had body armor, the AR, and more clips than he could shoot through before law enforcement got him. Do you really think a posse of teachers would have changed things much? Clearly things would be a lot different if the shooter didn't have the weapons he had.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 33): And, in what world do you live in where out beloved leaders will willingly return power to the people after they have wrested it away?
In what world do you live in where it's the gun owners that have such influence over the government? Are you saying that the only thing preventing Obama et al from "wresting away power" or some such is private gun owners? Are you high?
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 41, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 21 hours ago) and read 3451 times:
Quoting Revelation (Reply 40): In what world do you live in where it's the gun owners that have such influence over the government?
"...the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."
Quoting Revelation (Reply 40): Are you saying that the only thing preventing Obama et al from "wresting away power" or some such is private gun owners?
Lest you misunderstand me...anytime a law or regulation is written, our liberty is eroded. Yes, many laws are required and necessary to a "free" society in order to maintain order.
When I say power is wrested away from the people, I don't mean a dictatorship, I mean that if one of our liberties are taken away (any one of our liberties) because of some "crisis", it will be darn near impossible to get it back when the "crisis" is over.
roswell41 From United States of America, joined Aug 2001, 576 posts, RR: 1 Reply 42, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 21 hours ago) and read 3429 times:
Those saying that guns are the problem have a naive and simplistic view of the world. Most mass shooters are cowards and target helpless people. They kill themselves at the first sign of an armed response typically. You will never get rid of the guns, so cross that idea off your list. The next best solution is to make the helpless more protected. That is done through arming qualified individuals and hardening soft targets like schools. The guns are here to stay, let's find some solutions based in reality.
mt99 From United States of America, joined May 1999, 6348 posts, RR: 7 Reply 43, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 21 hours ago) and read 3425 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 41): "...the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."
But that can be changed!. The constitution CAN be amended. It can be amended to ban gay marriage, abortion, citizenship rights to kids born on US soil - this can be fixed as well.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 41): "...the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."
Let quote the entire sentence shall we:
"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
Ken777 From United States of America, joined Mar 2004, 7438 posts, RR: 5 Reply 47, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 21 hours ago) and read 3410 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 39): What if that armed response had come from a teacher, parent or administrator? Of course, we'll never know, but it does bear thinking about.
The problem with arming teachers & administrators is how they would respond in a battle at school. Train them all you want, but when they are put in basically a hostile fire environment you have to ask how well they can control their actions. Every bullet they fire will end up somewhere - and that somewhere may well be a kid.
Maybe instead we should look at increasing the police departments around the country and give them ongoing training. Buy sufficient police cars and SWAT equipment that there can be a rapid response. That is the critical factor for minimizing damage from what I have read. Fast responders and immediate entry into the school. No waiting around.
So maybe part of new taxes on guns & ammunition can help pay for increases in police forces around the country.
DeltaMD90 From United States of America, joined Apr 2008, 5284 posts, RR: 47 Reply 50, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 21 hours ago) and read 3384 times:
Look, I love shooting as a hobby, and it kills me to say it, but Pu is right... look at our violence compared to everyone else's... it has nothing to do with the US having a higher rate of insane people. Our gun laws are different from the rest of the world and our gun violence is also different.
The least intrusive measures get shot down which paves the way to measures we really don't like. Instead of making people get intensive medical checks before buying an AR, now we are getting a bill that totally bans them. In the end, our undying defense of our hobby screws us over
I think arming all these teachers is not a good idea, but I would not oppose having administrators or principals optionally armed after going through intensive training. In addition to the resource officer, a school may have a few guns carried properly trained individuals (I'm talking ex-military/police folk, I had some at my school)
StarAC17 From Canada, joined Aug 2003, 3211 posts, RR: 9 Reply 51, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 20 hours ago) and read 3352 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 10): In my opinion, having armed teachers, like what one Texas school district is doing, is much, much better.
If taxes go up in that district to give the teachers police level firearm training then whatever works
Quoting BN747 (Reply 14): How about the supermarket shooting? Okay, armed men in every supermarket: check! How 'bout the Fort Hood shooting? ...okay, armed men on every military base: check... hey, wait a minute!
Quoting mt99 (Reply 28): Awsome.. convince this guy:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 18):
You realize your tax idea would cost ne iver fifty grand a year?
I think that applies to the eariler posted registration tax of about $1200 which is about 40 guns or so. Not 2.5 million rounds of ammo.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 31):
People made similar criticisms about arming pilots. Well, we as a country, decided it was worth the risk and it has been a success for going on ten years.
I thought the plan for that was air marshals which seem to make a lot more sense. The pilot is there to fly the plane and I want them to do that, let the marshal(s) deal with a hijacking.
roswell41 From United States of America, joined Aug 2001, 576 posts, RR: 1 Reply 52, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 20 hours ago) and read 3312 times:
While we have more murders per capita than the U.K., they have a worse problem with crime in general. I won't lecture the U.K. on how to solve their crime issues but the likes of Piers Morgan and others need to realize we don't want their solutions either. The U.S. is not Europe-West.
The political far left in our country has been waiting to pounce on the Second Amendment and 20 dead children has proven too enticing an opportunity. The bodies weren't even carried from the classroom and politicians were already calling for gun-control. Very few politicians are calling for meaningful changes to help prevent future tragedies, but instead are rehashing their 1990's era wish list of firearm restrictions. I feel the NRA offered some good faith initiatives that would actually improve school safety. We should approach this pragmatically, not emotionally.
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 53, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 20 hours ago) and read 3309 times:
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 42):
Those saying that guns are the problem have a naive and simplistic view of the world.
Say that with a straight face looking at the complete agregate of Global Violence. Child soldiers in central Asia and Africa with guns - it's not the giuns...it's the kids. Are you completely insane?
Nutcases don't get guns..normal people get guns THEN become nutcases or know where to get one..in daddy's closet.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 42):
Most mass shooters are cowards and target helpless people.
Allow me to finish that sentence for you...
Most mass shooters are cowards WITH GUNS and target helpless people.
Think about your sentence..who on Earth every heard of a Mass Shooter WITHOUT a gun (or guns).
Faulty wiring somewhere?
BN747
[Edited 2012-12-21 14:40:22]
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
Revelation From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 10443 posts, RR: 20 Reply 54, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 20 hours ago) and read 3301 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 41): Quoting Revelation (Reply 40):
In what world do you live in where it's the gun owners that have such influence over the government?
"...the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."
Thanks for the selective quoting. The context is to maintain a militia, which of course is to support the government, not defend itself from the government.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 41): Lest you misunderstand me...anytime a law or regulation is written, our liberty is eroded.
What about the liberty to not be shot at? Seems we do a piss poor job of that in the US.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 42): You will never get rid of the guns, so cross that idea off your list.
The current approach is not working. We have to change directions. We can add regulation that responsible gun owners find acceptable.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 42): The next best solution is to make the helpless more protected.
Who wants to live life on the edge of Armageddon? Your approach brings that closer instead of making it further away.
Quoting mt99 (Reply 43): "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
Hmm seems that militia is there to enhance state security, not what some gun owners seem to think...
Attack the real problem: guns. Adam Lanza without a gun is a much smaller problem than Adam Lanza with a gun.
Quoting Ken777 (Reply 47): The problem with arming teachers & administrators is how they would respond in a battle at school. Train them all you want, but when they are put in basically a hostile fire environment you have to ask how well they can control their actions.
Guns have myriad problems. Keep them stored safely in a secure location, they're too far away. Keep them on the teachers, then it's just a matter of overpowering the teacher (obviously for high school not elementary) and now you have an armed student when you didn't have one.
Then, add to that, do we really expect our teachers to be trained killers and to have guns in our schools? That might make mentally ill kids more likely to want to start a gun fight, not less.
Arming the teachers is just another attempt by the gun lobby to change the topic, and one that seems very likely to not work out in their favor since the public at large is not buying it.
wingman From Trinidad and Tobago, joined May 1999, 1836 posts, RR: 5 Reply 55, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 20 hours ago) and read 3298 times:
Must stay calm, yet so difficult n the face of such absolutely incredible positions stated by inflexible NRA bots. Just to rehash some of the finer points that thoroughly dismantle this new twist from Wayne LaPierre and his 18th Century hacks.
1. As stated above, this new position assumes that only the United States has people with mental issues, violent movies, and violent video games. Does the NRA and its followers not know about the other 189 countries on this planet? Buy a NatGeo folks, those pictures are real. Kids everywhere are exactly the same, they do the same stuff, and they have the same problems. But we stand alone on only one striking difference, the mass availability of weapons of mass death. I'm pretty sure even the GEICO caveman could understand the solution here.
2. How does Wayne LaPierre explain Ft. Hood, yet another beautiful example above that smashes even the tiniest remnants of logical thought that might remain within the ranks of the NRA. Here we had a gunman mass murder 13 trained professionals on an installation not only brimming with assault weapons, but also Apache Attack helicopters, some 1000 Abrams tanks, and probably 100 tactical nuclear weapons.
So just how the hell is putting assault weapons into the hands of Kindergarten teachers going to solve this national epidemic of death?
roswell41 From United States of America, joined Aug 2001, 576 posts, RR: 1 Reply 56, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 20 hours ago) and read 3284 times:
Adam Lanza without a gun would be Timothy McVeigh or the Unibomber.
After reading some comments on here, I'm convinced many on here have never been educated in civics or American government. The entire Bill of Rights restrains government action and some on here argue the 2nd Amendment guarantees a militia to maintain the government? When you show such ignorance of the most basic and fundamental parts of America's founding, how can you expect any of us to respect your corollary arguments? I mean this sincerely and am not trying to insult.
Ken777 From United States of America, joined Mar 2004, 7438 posts, RR: 5 Reply 57, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 20 hours ago) and read 3261 times:
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 52): The political far left in our country has been waiting to pounce on the Second Amendment and 20 dead children has proven too enticing an opportunity.
Don't worry about the far left. Or the far right.
Where you need to look is moderates in the middle. We are not looking to cancel the Second Amendment, nor do we believe that automatic weapons, assault rifles, huge clips or bazookas are really necessary for those who enjoy weapons, or want something around the house for protection.
What 20 dead little children should be driving is an intelligent discussion to bring down the risks we have today in a manner that does not trample Second Amendment rights.
Pu From Sweden, joined Dec 2011, 642 posts, RR: 12 Reply 58, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 20 hours ago) and read 3269 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 39): If there were an instant and immediate gun ban how many of those guns would be turned in? How many would remain in criminal hands (who, by definition, ignore laws)? Would that make Americans safer
Guns don't get banned, they get controlled, and you only need look to Europe and Australia to see what happens when guns get controlled.
Europe, Australia, etc... already experienced the "gun freedoms" and the exact same outcries from gun fans when guns were brought under control...the results speak for themselves....not only gun crime, BUT ALL CRIME goes down.
Yes, a bounty on all guns would get most of them turned in, and better yet, the inability to buy bullets at Walmart would make the remaining guns of ever-decreasing value.
YES, sophisticated criminals like the mafia and big drug dealers always have guns...even in Australia, Japan and Europe...but the INABILITY for the average idiot to obtain guns and bullets on demand solves 90% of the gun violence problem, according to historical example. Other countries used to be as gun loving as the American Right you know.
Revelation From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 10443 posts, RR: 20 Reply 59, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 19 hours ago) and read 3245 times:
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 52): The bodies weren't even carried from the classroom and politicians were already calling for gun-control.
Might have something to do with Aurora, VA Tech, etc?
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 52): I feel the NRA offered some good faith initiatives that would actually improve school safety.
IMHO their ideas are nonsensical.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 56): some on here argue the 2nd Amendment guarantees a militia to maintain the government?
Yes, if you read the documents, the context of Militia is always a trained citizen army to defend the state.
DeltaMD90 From United States of America, joined Apr 2008, 5284 posts, RR: 47 Reply 60, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 19 hours ago) and read 3247 times:
Quoting wingman (Reply 55): 2. How does Wayne LaPierre explain Ft. Hood, yet another beautiful example above that smashes even the tiniest remnants of logical thought that might remain within the ranks of the NRA. Here we had a gunman mass murder 13 trained professionals on an installation not only brimming with assault weapons, but also Apache Attack helicopters, some 1000 Abrams tanks, and probably 100 tactical nuclear weapons.
I see where you are going, but this is a terrible example. Believe it or not, guns are way more restricted on military bases than practically anywhere else. Minus some bases that will temporarily allow private guns for shooting ranges (and that process is very very regulated) guns are not allowed. Service guns are locked away most of the time, and ammo is always used up or taken away after using it at the ranges. Go to a military base... minus the base police, you won't see any loaded guns (except at the range.) It's not like there were a ton of loaded weapons... in fact, a ton of military guys carry but aren't allowed to on base
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 56): Adam Lanza without a gun would be Timothy McVeigh or the Unibomber.
Except you don't see that happening all the time in Europe. Come on, we need to stop fooling ourselves... gun control can and WILL reduce violence.
We gun owners need to strike a balance that reduces violence and preserves rights...
luv2fly From United States of America, joined May 2003, 11957 posts, RR: 51 Reply 61, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 19 hours ago) and read 3201 times:
We gun owners need to strike a balance that reduces violence and preserves rights...
GDB From United Kingdom, joined May 2001, 12701 posts, RR: 80 Reply 62, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 19 hours ago) and read 3200 times:
Quoting Braybuddy (Reply 19): So where were all the "good guys with guns" when all these multiple murders have occurred? Sitting at home bragging about their arsenal?
Yes, funny that. And when the cops do arrive they'll see an armed person, who is not a cop, when they have been called out to deal with an armed person who is not a cop.
This doughty armed citizen who saves the day is a myth, it's from the movies.
Not saying it's never happened ever, but at any of the major mass killings?
So make the schools non gun free zones? So American kids, totally unique in a first world country, have to attend a school that is tooled up like one in say, Afghanistan, in some safe zone guarded by coalition troops?
Because if your killer has a high velocity assault style weapon, is wearing body armour, as the CT killer and other have done, you'll need a level of protection rather better than some rent a cop with a Glock.
Arming teachers? Really?
Why stop there? Why not encourage everyone to aim a gun at each other during any kind of interaction? Yes, including THAT kind too.
Have Bushmaster pulled that ad yet for the type of weapon that blew apart 20 young kids and those teachers, the one with the whole 'redefine, or defeine, your manhood' advertising copy?
(Maybe better if that target audience got a discount for Viagra and Elliot Spritzers favourite cell phone numbers).
The NRA had better get used to trying to dream up evermore bizarre rationales, since as crime generally in the US declines (thus disproving the NRA on the whole delinquency, drugs, violent media imagery, bad parenting stuff), one is bucking the trend. Mass shooting, becoming more frequent, more deadly - due to the type of weapons available - against every younger and more innocent targets.
My own country does have some gun crime, has had 3 shooting sprees in 25 years, the weapons used to perpetuate the first two are not now legal, had the killer in the third one had them, he would have likely killed many more. But the US has 6 times our population. With around 40 deaths a year from gun crime, you can multiply that by 6 but will still be around 8500-9000 short of the average US total. But we also have problems with dealing with the mentally ill, with broken families, have the same video games, same other violent films.
dragon-wings From United States of America, joined Apr 2001, 3920 posts, RR: 0 Reply 63, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 19 hours ago) and read 3194 times:
I didn't read all the replys in this thread so if it was mentioned already I am sorry, but I wonder if Mr LaPierre knows that Columbine had armed guards and that didn't stop that mass school shotting.
luv2fly From United States of America, joined May 2003, 11957 posts, RR: 51 Reply 64, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 19 hours ago) and read 3165 times:
"Instead of offering solutions to a problem they have helped create, they offered a paranoid, dystopian vision of a more dangerous and violent America where everyone is armed and no place is safe," he said. "Enough. As a country, we must rise above special interest politics."
Democratic congressman and senator-elect Chris Murphy, whose congressional district includes Newtown, tweeted a sharp reaction from Connecticut after the group's comments: "Walking out of another funeral and was handed the NRA transcript. The most revolting, tone deaf statement I've ever seen."
MSPNWA From United States of America, joined Apr 2009, 1565 posts, RR: 4 Reply 65, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 19 hours ago) and read 3142 times:
Not surprising that I don't much agree with the comprising NRA's statement. I believe there needs to be the possiblity of an armed presence at schools, but I don't want it to be from the police. Eliminate the gun-free zones from schools. Let citizens carry if they desire to.
roswell41 From United States of America, joined Aug 2001, 576 posts, RR: 1 Reply 66, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 19 hours ago) and read 3143 times:
Quoting DeltaMD90 (Reply 60): Except you don't see that happening all the time in Europe. Come on, we need to stop fooling ourselves... gun control can and WILL reduce violence.We gun owners need to strike a balance that reduces violence and preserves rights...
I know you think you mean well and all, but I'm glad you don't work for the NRA. The side you would be negotiating with, the left and so-called 'moderates', will not negotiate in good faith. Give them compromise today and after the next shooting they will look to you for more restriction, then more, et cetera until nothing resembling the Second Amendment is left. There are not enough honest people such as yourself at work in Washington. That is why I support a no-compromise approach on 'gun-control' by the NRA and will donate my own money to that end. This may be why few things get done by Congress, but in this case, I'm fine with that.
HoMsaR From United States of America, joined Jan 2010, 798 posts, RR: 0 Reply 68, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 18 hours ago) and read 3130 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 33): Quoting HoMsaR (Reply 8):
Ignoring the many obvious flaws with the idea of having more guns in a school with kindergarteners and whatnot,
Please, help me with the "many obvious flaws" are with having law-abiding citizens carry firearms around kids. Note: carry, not leave unattended.
Carry. So, you're saying that we should have teachers carry guns on their waists while helping teach a second grader how to read?
Or, as others have asked, are they stored somewhere? What good does a stored gun do if someone were to barge into your classroom? Make it difficult to access, and it might as well be useless. Make it easy to access, then any kid wandering through an unattended classroom can get to it.
But, more to the point, what does it say about our society that we feel the need to arm grade school teachers? Seriously, if we, as a society, honestly can't see something wrong with that, then we truly, seriously, just need to give up. There's really no point. (Thankfully, I don't believe that we really have a need to arm our teachers. I'd like to believe there just might still be some hope left for our society, but that hope is dwindling).
Others have pointed out that the rest of the western, industrialized world has not seen the need to arm everybody. Heck, in the UK, many COPS don't even carry a gun.
And they have lower crime rates to boot.
What does that tell you?
Seriously, think about it.
I often hear that "guns aren't the problem," and while that may technically be true, they sure as hell aren't the solution either.
Just like the solution to cutting yourself isn't more band-aids to put over the cuts, the solution to violence isn't more guns to stop the offenders.
Guns don't kill people, but guns make it awfully easy to turn a bad situation into a deadly one.
Having read much about this debate from various sides of the issue, I really think that people either aren't able to comprehend, or don't want to admit, what the real problem is in our society.
It's not guns, per se, and it's definitely not the lack of guns.
(Edit: I actually wrote a much longer response, but I'm editing it right now to try and get it in some logical order; it gets into my opinion of the real problem with our society. I'll post at some point, hopefully later tonight).
Revelation From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 10443 posts, RR: 20 Reply 69, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 18 hours ago) and read 3093 times:
Quoting HoMsaR (Reply 68): But, more to the point, what does it say about our society that we feel the need to arm grade school teachers?
Apparently the NRA feels that is the natural order of things, that we should all be armed to the teeth from cradle to grave and be prepared for gun battle at any and every instance in time.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 66): That is why I support a no-compromise approach on 'gun-control' by the NRA and will donate my own money to that end.
Still, after reading the statements in the thread starter? Are you glad your money is being given to former Rep. Asa Hutchison, R-Ark to come up with a plan to fortify our 100,000 schools? Do you think the right approach is to spend our money on "absolute protection"? Should we fund a plan to make our schools resemble our prisons?
mt99 From United States of America, joined May 1999, 6348 posts, RR: 7 Reply 70, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 18 hours ago) and read 3081 times:
Quoting Revelation (Reply 69): Still, after reading the statements in the thread starter? Are you glad your money is being given to former Rep. Asa Hutchison, R-Ark to come up with a plan to fortify our 100,000 schools? Do you think the right approach is to spend our money on "absolute protection"? Should we fund a plan to make our schools resemble our prisons?
NRA wants our TAX dollars to pay for this craziness.
Where is Grover Norquisk? Where is the Tea Party?
"He urged Congress “to appropriate whatever is necessary to put armed police officers in every single school in this nation.”
usflyer msp From United States of America, joined May 2000, 1784 posts, RR: 0 Reply 71, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 18 hours ago) and read 3076 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 10): I'm a huge advocate of arming teachers in schools rather hiring one guard in each and every school in this country. It's cheaper and more teachers would be armed vs. only one guard. It's quite easy for a gunman to take out the hired guard then go havoc on the rest if the school.
I am sorry but that is the dumbest idea I have heard in a while. I don't know why these pro-gun people keep going there. My mom is a kindergarten teacher and the last thing she needs is to worry about where her gun is on top of trying to teach a bunch of very active 5-year olds. It would just result in more little kids accidentally shooting each other during play time or the gun being so secure that the teacher being unable to actually get to it if there was a shooter.
Ken777 From United States of America, joined Mar 2004, 7438 posts, RR: 5 Reply 72, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 17 hours ago) and read 3057 times:
I've seen a few clips of the VRA dude - the one with the really bad combover hair do. All I can do is hope that pubic reaction to this guy is so strong that even the NRA has to relent and get rid of the guy.
The sad part is that this is all the NRA can come up with?
seb146 From United States of America, joined Nov 1999, 9798 posts, RR: 17 Reply 73, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 17 hours ago) and read 3033 times:
So, the answer to gun violence is more guns? Really? More guns didn't help stop the gunman in Portland a few weeks ago. There were armed guards at Columbine too. How did that work out?
EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12556 posts, RR: 64 Reply 74, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 17 hours ago) and read 3023 times:
Quoting RussianJet (Reply 2): Did I read correctly that just at the point they started going on about better security, a protester burst in? Good job chaps, really good job.
He was protesting, not opening fire. Kind of a big difference, don't you think?
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 26): Gun-free zones aren't really gun-free unless you have access control and administrative searches of all persons and property entering the building.
Spare me. Most law-abiding people would see the sign and say, "Ok, guess I can't carry my firearm there," whereas would-be criminals wouldn't give two shits about the sign.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 35): Your hobby is costing us TOO MANY innocent lives. The tradeoff is simply not worth it. You're 'someone might break in and get me' maybe...is not worth scores of innocent people getting shot to death every freakin' week of the year. And those numbers aren't receding...they are increasing - week by week by week,
A price has to be paid.
Sorry, but depriving EVERYONE of rights because a handful abuse them is too high a price to pay. Full-stop.
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 75, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 17 hours ago) and read 3014 times:
Quoting mt99 (Reply 43): It can be amended to ban gay marriage, abortion, citizenship rights to kids born on US soil - this can be fixed as well.
Please point to any amendment that has banned an action by The People. There is only one, and it was repealed. Any Amendment that restricts The People will eventually fail because our constitution was designed as a restraint on government not The People.
Quoting mt99 (Reply 43): "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
Since when did we forget the word: REGULATED?
Quoting Revelation (Reply 54): The context is to maintain a militia, which of course is to support the government, not defend itself from the government.
And, I will quote, once again, from the Heller opinion:
"(a) The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative clause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22."
So, basically, the amendment could say "...because venison tastes so goods, the right of the people....", it does not change the fact that we are allowed to keep and bear arms as a constitutional right.
Quoting Ken777 (Reply 47): but when they are put in basically a hostile fire environment you have to ask how well they can control their actions.
You can also ask, is having an armed person who can possibly engage an assailant and return fire, better than having just victims?
Quoting wingman (Reply 55): Here we had a gunman mass murder 13 trained professionals on an installation not only brimming with assault weapons, but also Apache Attack helicopters, some 1000 Abrams tanks, and probably 100 tactical nuclear weapons.
I have never, not once, seen a non-MP armed on a military installation in the US. Not once, and I spent the better part of my 20's on military installations as a contractor.
Quoting HoMsaR (Reply 68): Carry. So, you're saying that we should have teachers carry guns on their waists while helping teach a second grader how to read?
I carry a gun on my waist just about everywhere I go, and not a soul knows it's there but me.
Quoting Revelation (Reply 69): Apparently the NRA feels that is the natural order of things, that we should all be armed to the teeth from cradle to grave and be prepared for gun battle at any and every instance in time.
Here's the paradigm you folks have to get used to:
-there are over 200,000,000 firearms in the US that are in non-state hands.
-something like 40% of households have at least one firearm.
-we do not have a national (or state) mental health program that identifies and adequately treats (and/or institutionalizes) the mentally ill
Given these 'facts', whether you ban or control guns will make no difference. Guns will remain in the public square and the mentally ill will be able to get to them.
Now, we can work on the mentally ill and get them the help they need or remove them from a position where they can do harm, but, if you take firearms away from the citizens, or overly "control" them, you make more potential victims. And, let's not forget the criminal element that is probably salivating at thought of a disarmed populace.
Quoting usflyer msp (Reply 71): My mom is a kindergarten teacher and the last thing she needs is to worry about where her gun is on top of trying to teach a bunch of very active 5-year olds.
No one is saying they have to be armed, just that they should be given the option to be armed. In this state it is illegal (a felony) to carry a gun onto school property. Take away that retriction and allow a parent or a teacher to carry, if he or she chooses to carry.
Quoting mt99 (Reply 70): NRA wants our TAX dollars to pay for this craziness.
We pay for all other sorts of stupid, unnecessary things with our tax dollars. Why not a program that supports a right that is spelled out in the Bill of Rights?
Revelation From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 10443 posts, RR: 20 Reply 76, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 16 hours ago) and read 2987 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 74): Sorry, but depriving EVERYONE of rights because a handful abuse them is too high a price to pay. Full-stop.
I'm not sure where you are going with this. Banning sales of assault rifles and large capacity clips is not taking away a right any more so than banning sales of bazookas or stinger missiles. Please don't tell me you're one of those "give them an inch and they'll take a mile" folks.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 75): So, basically, the amendment could say "...because venison tastes so goods, the right of the people....", it does not change the fact that we are allowed to keep and bear arms as a constitutional right.
And again, absolutely no one is talking about taking away the right to bear arms.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 75): Given these 'facts', whether you ban or control guns will make no difference.
Indeed, if we do absolutely nothing to take these incredibly effective killing machines out of circulation, then nothing will change. That's why so many want change.
Reality check, mass shootings are horrible bu they are a small part of the problem. The big areas are all the killings of one or two people, all the injuries.
Just the yearly accidental killings is twenty times Newtown.
The real problem is how gun owners allow them to get their weapons. That is when the industry isn't selling it to them directly.
Quoting DeltaMD90 (Reply 50): Our gun laws are different from the rest of the world and our gun violence is also different.
Quoting DeltaMD90 (Reply 50): a school may have a few guns carried properly trained individuals
Properly trained is the key.
I found Wayne LaPierre's comments about Secret Service very demonstrative of the problem with NRA. Have every gun owner go through the same training as Secret Service and I will be fine with them carrying.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 56): Adam Lanza without a gun would be Timothy McVeigh or the Unibomber.
This is one of the other common claims not lining up with reality but sounding so good to those who are looking for justification for their stance.
Reality is that some will take it to the next step but most will give up. A simple example. Suicide rate in the Israeli army went down when soldiers couldn't bring home weapons during weekends. Weekday suicide rate remained the same.
Ease of availability is a significant factor.
Quoting Ken777 (Reply 57): Where you need to look is moderates in the middle. We are not looking to cancel the Second Amendment, nor do we believe that automatic weapons, assault rifles, huge clips or bazookas are really necessary for those who enjoy weapons, or want something around the house for protection.
Quoting Pu (Reply 58): Hunting, gun clubs, shooting for fun, are alive and well all over Europe and Australia.
No shortage of ranges and they are used. Plenty of hunting too.
Quoting GDB (Reply 62): This doughty armed citizen who saves the day is a myth, it's from the movies.
The reality is that having a weapon doesn't make you safer, it makes you more likely to be a victim. In no small part because you have poorly trained people being second to the party. But at least they tried...
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 74): Sorry, but depriving EVERYONE of rights
Again, there is no suggestion to deprive, only to be responsible.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 75): You can also ask, is having an armed person who can possibly engage an assailant and return fire, better than having just victims?
Unless they have been properly trained, yes.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 75): -there are over 200,000,000 firearms in the US that are in non-state hands.
And increasing. But so what.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 75): -something like 40% of households have at least one firearm.
So what.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 75): -we do not have a national (or state) mental health program that identifies and adequately treats (and/or institutionalizes) the mentally ill
The problem is much bigger than mentally ill.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 75): Given these 'facts', whether you ban or control guns will make no difference. Guns will remain in the public square and the mentally ill will be able to get to them.
Ease of access is important. Things will not change overnight but the first step is to stop making it worse and the next step is to make owners responsible for how they store them.
Storing weapons so other people the the owner can access them is irresponsible. Having mentally ill people nearby makes it worse. There are no excuses for gun owners letting their weapons be easily available.
Don’t repeat earlier generations mistakes. Learn history for a better future.
EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12556 posts, RR: 64 Reply 78, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 16 hours ago) and read 2959 times:
Quoting Revelation (Reply 76): Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 74):Sorry, but depriving EVERYONE of rights because a handful abuse them is too high a price to pay. Full-stop.
I'm not sure where you are going with this.
I don't know if you read the quote from BN that I was replying to, but going further up in the thread and seeing his posts you'd see that his argument isn't about assault rifles, but rather all weapons. His idea:
Annual Gun Fee of $1200 per registered gun owner per weapon!
When one gun collector here mentioned such an idea would cost him over $50,000 annually, he replied:
Quoting BN747 (Reply 35): Your hobby is costing us TOO MANY innocent lives. The tradeoff is simply not worth it. You're 'someone might break in and get me' maybe...is not worth scores of innocent people getting shot to death every freakin' week of the year. And those numbers aren't receding...they are increasing - week by week by week, A price has to be paid.
So again, he's advocating imposing drastic regulations on ALL gun owners, based on the fact that only a handful of people abuse their Second Amendment rights. That's like punishing all your kids because one misbehaved.
Quoting cmf (Reply 77): Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 74):Sorry, but depriving EVERYONE of rights
Again, there is no suggestion to deprive, only to be responsible.
So why not hold the irresponsible accountable instead of infringing on or restricting the rights of those who are responsible?
Or, better yet, do away with "gun free zones" entirely? Places where it's generally easier for law-abiding citizens to own and carry firearms (if they choose) have lower crime rates than in places where restrictions keep the law-abiding folks from carrying, whereas those with criminal intent don't pay one bit of attention to it and know they have less likelihood of encounterning armed resistance.
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 81, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2908 times:
Quoting cmf (Reply 77): And increasing. But so what.
My point is that there are so many firearms out there that any action short of out-right door-to-door confiscation (in violation of the 2nd, 4th & 5th Amendments) will mean millions of guns will remain in public hands. And, since, we are looking to control or ban (and please, don't kid yourself, banning is the goal) firearms, it means those firearms out there will be in the hands of criminals.
Quoting cmf (Reply 77): There are no excuses for gun owners letting their weapons be easily available.
Absolutely correct. We do need to hold firearms owners to some accessibility standard that does not infringe on the right to keep and bear the firearm.
Quoting cmf (Reply 77): The problem is much bigger than mentally ill.
Yup, but the media (and the general public) latch onto these emotional mass murders, that are generally committed by the mentally ill. Action is demanded because of these events, not because of the evryday "mundane" murders that occur across the country.
Legislating from emotion is a terrible way to legislate.
Quoting cmf (Reply 77): Unless they have been properly trained, yes
Really, so it's your opinion that everyone should just cower away and wait for the police while a shooter methodically works his way through the crowd? How's that been working out?
Facts:
-Sandy Hook was a gun free zone
-The Century Movie Theatre in Aurora had a policy forbidding guns
-Omar Thornton shot up his, supposedly, gun-free workplace (Hartford Distributers) in a fit of racial anger.
-Fort Hood, as are all federal facilities, was a gun-free zone
Pick the any of the mass shootings, post-Columbine, and you'll see that they probably occurred in gun-free zones, where law abiding citizens do not carry their firearms.
And, even though there may have been an armed person at Columbine (I see no evidence of that and would be interested to read about it), the paradigm shift in response occured after Columbine. Before (and during Columbine) the police would attempt to secure a scene and contain the violence. Columbine showed the folly of that policy and now most police forces attempt to engage a shooter immediately in order, at the minimum, to distract him from his intended victims.
In any of these cases, an armed response may have limited the death toll.
cmf From United States of America, joined Jun 2011, 2474 posts, RR: 35 Reply 82, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2905 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 78): So why not hold the irresponsible accountable instead of infringing on or restricting the rights of those who are responsible?
Look at how things are today and it is clear that after the fact doesn't work. Demonstrate how to do it before people are injured and killed and we ave the perfect solution.
Love to see working solution so all ears as to how you propose it is done in practice.
Don’t repeat earlier generations mistakes. Learn history for a better future.
DeltaMD90 From United States of America, joined Apr 2008, 5284 posts, RR: 47 Reply 83, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2906 times:
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 66): Give them compromise today and after the next shooting they will look to you for more restriction, then more, et cetera until nothing resembling the Second Amendment is left. There are not enough honest people such as yourself at work in Washington. That is why I support a no-compromise approach on 'gun-control' by the NRA and will donate my own money to that end. This may be why few things get done by Congress, but in this case, I'm fine with that.
I realize this but I'm not gonna argue something I think is wrong just because "it may lead to something I don't like." I don't operate that way. I see a problem and I offer a solution that I feel is right. When it comes to the next fight and I feel like it's unfair and my rights are being stripped away, I'll gladly take the NRA's lines.
I am NOT going to sit back and support measures that allow mentally unstable people from getting weapons or untrained, pardon my French, FREAKING MORONS acquiring weapons and blowing people away because they were never trained to handle a deadly weapons.......... even if that will indirectly lead to one of my favorite hobbies going away. I'm sorry, I can't and won't do that, even if I agree that I may be working against myself
Quoting cmf (Reply 77): Quoting DeltaMD90 (Reply 50):
a school may have a few guns carried properly trained individuals
Properly trained is the key.
I found Wayne LaPierre's comments about Secret Service very demonstrative of the problem with NRA. Have every gun owner go through the same training as Secret Service and I will be fine with them carrying.
Yes, I did not have time to elaborate, but I'm not for the BS approach set forth by the NRA. I don't even think my idea will solve the problem, it just may help stop future shootings (emphasis on "may.") But top level school officials or maybe certain teachers with extensive military or law enforcement backgrounds can go through extensive mental screening and training and I wouldn't mind them having a gun. But some Joe/Jane Blow random teacher?? That's ridiculous. I was specifically thinking of a former teacher who was a Sergeant Major in the US Army Reserves (very high rank for those who don't know) having a weapon... I'd trust him with a gun more than a cop. That is who I'm talking about
Braybuddy From Ireland, joined Aug 2004, 5276 posts, RR: 35 Reply 84, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2903 times:
Quoting brilondon (Reply 29): Quoting Braybuddy (Reply 19):I don't understand why people like to lay the blame on mental health.
Because a sane man would not have gone into the school and shot 5 and 6 year old children
While there is evidence to show that Adam Lanza may have had mental health problems, not everyone who goes on a killing spree does. And how do you propose to identify and treat people with mental health problems which are not readily apparent, not least to the person themselves?
seb146 From United States of America, joined Nov 1999, 9798 posts, RR: 17 Reply 85, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2902 times:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 80): Why would any sane person ever look at the huffington post.
To balance the insanity from FOX.
If the NRA can *DEMAND* the government find money for armed security at every single school, I think we should, first, *DEMAND* the government find money for more teachers.
2707200X From United States of America, joined Mar 2009, 6928 posts, RR: 1 Reply 86, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2887 times:
I think the NRA statement would have meant something if massacre enabler Wayne LaPierre actually cared more about the people who died from the Sandy Hook massacre, the Aurora massacre, Virginia Tech and Columbine than he cares about the availability and commonality of AK-47s, A-15s and 100 round drums to any anti-government wacko, paranoiac or doomsday cult leader(s) who wants these weapons. All this dude did was blame the culture of violence on movies the media, TV, music videos, video games, movie production firms saying shareholders and those involved (actors) are accessories to crime and of course the media, what a shame they brought attention to the Newtown school shooting. I want to see why this coward Wayne LaPierre thinks America, the leader in the the developed world in gun violence and large scale shooting sprees is safer with assault rifles and 100 round clips available to the public. The NRA bosses will never accept that assault rifles and high capacity magazines are better off in the war field and the shooting range, not with some nut.
"The NRA is a protection racket, an old fashion protection racket" Richard Painter fmr, G.W. Bush chief ethics lawyer, assoc. council.
[Edited 2012-12-21 20:06:07]
"And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by." John Masefield Sea-Fever
Flighty From United States of America, joined Apr 2007, 7427 posts, RR: 2 Reply 87, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2879 times:
Quoting seb146 (Reply 85): I think we should, first, *DEMAND* the government find money for more teachers.
Our schools spend as much money, or more, per pupil as any school system worldwide... I'd rather we concentrate on making teaching a meritocracy. The money is already there.
Quoting 2707200X (Reply 86): All this dude did was blame the culture of violence on movies the media, TV, music videos, video games, movie production
What kind of good and lawful use of these weapons should the media and games project? "Shirley was walking to school, and on the way, thank goodness she had the high capacity magazine in her AR-15 rifle, because what happened next was, she blew up 8 cars and killed three dozen people, all legally..."
jamincan From Canada, joined Aug 2006, 764 posts, RR: 0 Reply 88, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2875 times:
Looking at this from outside the US is strange. It is like some sort of Cold War arms race where the only solution to guns is more guns. Peace and security through mutually assured destruction doesn't seem very peaceful or secure to me.
FlyDeltaJets From United States of America, joined Feb 2006, 1623 posts, RR: 3 Reply 89, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2874 times:
The NRA statement is crazy to me. A person with a gun at the school door is only a deterrent to a person that will actually think about thier actions. I don't believe that people that intend to shoot up a school really think about wether people are armed or not before shooting at young children. That is a level of rationallity that cannot be expected from a person that without any reasoining kills unarmed children. A likely scenerio is the armed guard is the first one shot attempting to defend the school. Schools are not banks. People don't barge into a school with guns for some sort of gain. I doubt the people that shoot up shools, movie theatres and malls really sit back and think about the reprocussions of their actions.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 31): People made similar criticisms about arming pilots. Well, we as a country, decided it was worth the risk and it has been a success for going on ten years. What makes volunteer teachers so different than volunteer pilots? Both are educated and respected professionals. Both have an interest in their personal safety at work, nevermind the safety of those in their care. I honestly don't understand the resistance to arming and training volunteer teachers. Is it solely politics? Is it because many teachers and their union espouse a left wing political ideology that is anti-gun?
Guns in the flight deck have so far only lead to guns discharging accidently in the flight deck.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 56): Adam Lanza without a gun would be Timothy McVeigh or the Unibomber.
What studies can you point to that leads you to this conclusion. Guns were around for the Unibomber and Timpthy McVeigh so why didnt they shoot up a school.
HoMsaR From United States of America, joined Jan 2010, 798 posts, RR: 0 Reply 90, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2871 times:
Quoting 2707200X (Reply 86): All this dude did was blame the culture of violence on movies the media, TV, music videos, video games, movie production firms saying shareholders and those involved (actors) are accessories to crime and of course the media
Which is interesting, since, statistically, violent crime in the US has been on a declining trend since the early 1990s. The nationwide homicide rate is as low today as it was in 1960. It did spike in the 70s and 80s, but violent video games didn't really even exist until the 1990s (unless you count blowing up pixellated spaceships as "violence").
Ken777 From United States of America, joined Mar 2004, 7438 posts, RR: 5 Reply 91, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 2869 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 74): Sorry, but depriving EVERYONE of rights because a handful abuse them is too high a price to pay. Full-stop.
I guess those6 and 7 year old kids really didn't have rights. At least the big boy rights for those wanting to have their guns.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 75): I carry a gun on my waist just about everywhere I go, and not a soul knows it's there but me
Into a bank? How about all the businesses that have those "No Guns" stickers on the door?
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 75): Given these 'facts', whether you ban or control guns will make no difference.
Reality is that the Second Amendment is not going away. There might be some possible laws, but when you live in a state like Oklahoma all you can hope for are laws that protect the business owner who says "no guns". Maybe even some laws making it illegal to "carry" in businesses that cater to children.
And we need to match the price of treating gunshot wounds with tax revenues from the industry.
Revelation From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 10443 posts, RR: 20 Reply 92, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 14 hours ago) and read 2845 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): My point is that there are so many firearms out there that any action short of out-right door-to-door confiscation (in violation of the 2nd, 4th & 5th Amendments) will mean millions of guns will remain in public hands.
Right, but door-to-door confiscation will drive the NRA types into visions of the End of Days, so it will not happen.
Stopping sales of assault weapons and high capacity clips, and hopefully coming up with some standard for how guns should be stored and 100% screening of new gun owners, would at least stop the monotonic increase in putting guns into the hands into anyone who can find their way to a gun show.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): And, since, we are looking to control or ban (and please, don't kid yourself, banning is the goal) firearms, it means those firearms out there will be in the hands of criminals.
Banning is not the goal, responsible gun ownership is the goal.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): Really, so it's your opinion that everyone should just cower away and wait for the police while a shooter methodically works his way through the crowd? How's that been working out?
Seems to me even if the teachers had body armor and guns that had been deployed in advance, Adam Lanza would still have done much of what he did. On the other hand, if Ms. Lanza didn't own an assault weapon and many large clips, or if she had secured her guns properly, a lot less would have happened.
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 93, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 14 hours ago) and read 2835 times:
Quoting FlyDeltaJets (Reply 89): A person with a gun at the school door is only a deterrent to a person that will actually think about thier actions.
Deterrence is only part of it. Response is the other part.
Quoting HoMsaR (Reply 90): violent crime in the US has been on a declining trend since the early 1990s.
Coincidentally, the early 90's is when states began loosening restrictions on gun ownership and concealed carry.
Quoting Ken777 (Reply 91): Into a bank? How about all the businesses that have those "No Guns" stickers on the door?
I can carry into a bank all day long. There is no law, in the Commonwealth of Kentucky that prevents me from entering a bank, while armed. As for businesses with the "No Gun" stickers...see my reply 33. I will generally honor a business' request that I not be armed when I enter, but I will do so only after careful consideration of my own self-preservation. The way the law reads and apparently the state attorney has been interpreting it, I am not breaking the law unless I refuse to leave after being confronted. And then, the charge is trespassing.
Oh, and my response wasn't concerning where we carry, it was in response to the insinuation that if a teacher carried a firearm, it would be readily apparent to a child and thus, distract from the learning process.
Quoting Revelation (Reply 92): Seems to me even if the teachers had body armor and guns that had been deployed in advance, Adam Lanza would still have done much of what he did.
And, you come to that conclusion, how? You can't make that assumption, much like I can't make the assumption that an armed response by a parent, a teacher, and/or administrator would have made a difference. We don't and can't know. But, I submit, that the odds are that if someone were armed and responded, the outcome may have been different.
Quoting 2707200X (Reply 86): "The NRA is a protection racket, an old fashion protection racket" Richard Painter fmr, G.W. Bush chief ethics lawyer, assoc. council.
All special interest groups are a protection racket. It's in the job description. We exist to protect XXXXXXXX.
usflyer msp From United States of America, joined May 2000, 1784 posts, RR: 0 Reply 94, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 13 hours ago) and read 2821 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 75):
I carry a gun on my waist just about everywhere I go, and not a soul knows it's there but me.
There is a big difference between you and the average teacher.
Where is a teacher going to conceal a weapon on their body. Most female cops have trouble concealing their weapons so where is your average 5'1", 120 lb female kindergarten teacher going to put her weapon while she hugs kids, kisses the boo boos, and rolls around on the floor making art? Not realistic! Anyone who supports this is probably a man that has obviously never worked in an elementary school.
AirframeAS From United States of America, joined Feb 2004, 14150 posts, RR: 26 Reply 97, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 13 hours ago) and read 2798 times:
Quoting mt99 (Reply 11): What if a teacher doesn't want to be armed?
Then that teacher has a right not to be armed. It's their choice.
Quoting luv2fly (Reply 13): The shooters Mother was a teacher, tell me again how that worked out for us having her be a gun owner!
We didn't know that until AFTER the fact. I don't see how this is relevant. Ganging up on the mother isn't a great idea. It's not her fault that her son killed her and shot up the elementary school.
Quoting brilondon (Reply 29): Why in the world would you think that is a great idea?
It's quite amazing as hell that you didn't even read and comprehend my quote you posted.
Quoting Pu (Reply 30): Do you have any idea how far in the opposite direction you are going with ideas like this compared to the rest of the first world - which has almost eliminated gun violence as a threat
You don't have to like my opinion.
Quoting Pu (Reply 30): Why don't you consider whats worked elsewhere instead of advocating the untenable idea that a suicidal crazy man or a terrorist is going to be stopped in a shootout with a teacher?
Because we are not you, nor living in your country which bans guns. I didn't ask you to like my opinion, rather to respect my opinion and not flame me for having one. No need to be a jerk.
Quoting Revelation (Reply 40): Guns are the problem not the solution. No guns, no shootings.
Absolutely 100% false in the USA. if you really thought that, you're quite mistaken. You're wrong. Guns will never ever be eliminated from this earth. Criminals (not law abiding citizens) will always have a gun, period. It will be used to commit a criminal act to just screw it up for the rest of the law abiding citizens who chose to exercise their second amendment rights.
Yes I am. And I'm not the only one in this country that shares that view. Again, a school district in Texas is doing exactly that currently.
As for this thread, and many other gun threads in the past, these conversations do not end well. With so many disagreements and name calling here at A.net, it is pathetic. I'm surprised that many here cannot respect each other's opinions on this subject, it is disgusting. I cannot believe that we cannot close ONE thread with a common agreement and move on. Unfortunately, we all will never agree on anything gun related, instead we are all gawking at each other like little kids in a hissy fit fighting for silly crap.
It is sad, really.
If you have nothing nice to say, don't say it.
A Safe Flight Begins With Quality Maintenance On The Ground.
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 98, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 13 hours ago) and read 2794 times:
Quoting usflyer msp (Reply 94): Anyone who supports this is probably a man that has obviously never worked in an elementary school.
I volunteer plenty of time in the classroom, every year.
I know my children's teachers and the administrators.
I taught Junior Achievment to children in K-3 and will teach 1st grade again for my boy and 4th grade for my girl.
I'm there every career day and, when I'm able, I pop in and have lunch with my kids.
So, to your point, I'm not talking out my ass. Concealing a firearm is not difficult.
Quoting seb146 (Reply 96):
Which is why teachers making $30,000 a year have to buy supplies for their classes, we have over crowded classes, old computers, etc. etc. etc...
Try looking at some budgets and what the money is spent on.
cmf From United States of America, joined Jun 2011, 2474 posts, RR: 35 Reply 99, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 12 hours ago) and read 2791 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): My point is that there are so many firearms out there that any action short of out-right door-to-door confiscation (in violation of the 2nd, 4th & 5th Amendments) will mean millions of guns will remain in public hands
How do you eat an elephant? You got to start somewhere. Certainly no make it worse.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): And, since, we are looking to control or ban (and please, don't kid yourself, banning is the goal) firearms, it means those firearms out there will be in the hands of criminals.
Calling banning the goal is equal to stating that everyone owning a gun do so to kill people. Let's stop the hyperbole.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81):
Absolutely correct. We do need to hold firearms owners to some accessibility standard
Great!!
So lets do it. Let's stop the blocking of everything.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): Yup, but the media (and the general public) latch onto these emotional mass murders
Sadly the pro-gunners are very good at making it look like a mentally ill problem. Just read the posts of the last days.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): Really, so it's your opinion that everyone should just cower away and wait for the police while a shooter methodically works his way through the crowd? How's that been working out?
Pretty damn well. Because people who stand up tend to be the next victim. Especially when they don't know what they are doing. Even more so when the shooter is methodological.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): Pick the any of the mass shootings, post-Columbine, and you'll see that they probably occurred in gun-free zones, where law abiding citizens do not carry their firearms.
Again, mass shootings isn't the typical situation.
And what do you think will happen if the follow the NRA proposal. Who do you think will be the first victim?
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): and now most police forces attempt to engage a shooter immediately in order, at the minimum, to distract him from his intended victims.
The difference between amateurs and pros.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): In any of these cases, an armed response may have limited the death toll.
More likely they would have ended up dead.
Quoting DeltaMD90 (Reply 83): I don't even think my idea will solve the problem,
I think are opinions are fairly close.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 93): I enter, but I will do so only after careful consideration of my own self-preservation.
What you're actually state is that you do not respect other peoples will on their property. If you don't like their rules don't go there.
Don’t repeat earlier generations mistakes. Learn history for a better future.
mal787 From Australia, joined Jul 2007, 687 posts, RR: 0 Reply 100, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 12 hours ago) and read 2790 times:
An outsiders point of view here. Watching Sky news this morning in Australia , and a guy was giving a speach saying " if the schools had armed gaurds, these kids would be alive" Sorry but what kind of society needs to have armed gaurds at a school for kids of this age .
Your constitution may say that all citizens may carry arms , but this is just plain stupid. This will keep happening until you as a society do something about it , what you can/will do is to hard for the brains trust on here to work out. Its all politics and the power of the gun lobby overe there that has you guys screwed , and until you sort that out , this kind of thing will just keep happening .
Why does the average Joe need a fully automatic rifle to protect himself , a gun that shoots 11 rounds per second is not designed to be used as a warning salvo over a bad guys head, it designed to kill and kill lots of people very quick, I hate to think what else you can but at your corner gun store with what must be limited training etc and most of all justification as to why you need it in the first place
So put armed gaurds on your schools , kindergardens whatever , it will not stop it
cptkrell From United States of America, joined Sep 2001, 2548 posts, RR: 14 Reply 101, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 12 hours ago) and read 2775 times:
Against my better judgement, I'll weigh in.
How many of you posters actually watched Wayne LaPierre's press conference? How many of you watched Fox's follow-up coverage? How many watched MSNBC's follow up coverage? And compared? I didn't think so. (I'm retired; so I can do this).
I do have a couple of issues with some NRA points but basically agree with most of LaPierre's thrust of statement(s). I am also impressed with the commitment of the NRA to to offer (at no fees, btw) comprehensive security training for schools by one of the (if not THE) largest assemblage of current and retired police officers, military personel, EMTs, etc to begin RIGHT NOW a program that could very well put at least a psychogical, not to mention a physical, dent in a few of these killer-lune's homogenized thought processes. Sorry about being non-pc, but yes, there are lunatics amongst us.
I also agree with LaPierre's comments about the irresponsibility of the media in general and to the acceptability of extremely violent kid's games. I have a daughter who is a Gulf War, 6-yr Navy Veteran and a current New Orleans Deputy Sheriff and SHE can't even believe what is "normal" entertainment for kids these days. Damn; I didn't even know there was kid's game called "Kindergarten Killers". Did y'all?
Anyhoo, this another terrible tragedy...reminding us all of...
MAR 16, 1996; Scotland; 16 kids and 1 teacher killed, 10 wounded.
APR 26, 2002; Efurt, Germany; 13 teachers, 2 students, 1 policeman killed, 10 wounded a the Johann Gutenberg School.
SEP 13, 2006; Montreal, Canada; 18 died and 12 students/faculty wounded at Dawson College.
SEP 23, 2008: Finland; 9+ students killed just north of Helsinki.
Oh, yeah...April of last year; former student kills 12 children and wounds 12 more in Rio, not to mention the 68 killed at the massacre in Norway 4 months later but that wasn't at a school.
Point? Problem isn't patticularly new or exclusive to the U.S., but "gun control" in the extreme forms being advocated by a lot of the naive, or more politely recognised as the uninformed, isn't the answer. My late night ramblings...jack
cmf From United States of America, joined Jun 2011, 2474 posts, RR: 35 Reply 102, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 12 hours ago) and read 2761 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 97): It's not her fault that her son killed her and shot up the elementary school.
Considering she was the owner of those guns I find it very hard to not hold her responsible for him getting hold of them.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 97): Because we are not you, nor living in your country which bans guns.
1) You do not speak for all of US. 2) Sweden does not ban guns.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 97): Criminals (not law abiding citizens) will always have a gun, period.
Yet they use them less in all other industrialized nations with less innocent killed and injured.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 97): Unfortunately, we all will never agree on anything gun related, instead we are all gawking at each other like little kids in a hissy fit fighting for silly crap.
I notice changed opinions by many people and I will never call discussions about innocent being killed silly crap.
Don’t repeat earlier generations mistakes. Learn history for a better future.
greaser From Bahamas, joined Jan 2004, 1081 posts, RR: 4 Reply 103, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 12 hours ago) and read 2759 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 10): I'm a huge advocate of arming teachers in schools rather hiring one guard in each and every school in this country. It's cheaper and more teachers would be armed vs. only one guard. It's quite easy for a gunman to take out the hired guard then go havoc on the rest if the school.
In my opinion, having armed teachers, like what one Texas school district is doing, is much, much better.
Columbine had an armed guard, and that certainly did not stop the massacre.
Quoting L-188 (Reply 20): Actually Braybuddy their weapons where left at home because that school was a gun free zone and they where respecting the law.
Funny how only the shooters/criminals seem to ignore those laws
That will always be the case. But escalation is an easy answer, just not the right one.
Quoting mal787 (Reply 100): " if the schools had armed gaurds, these kids would be alive" Sorry but what kind of society needs to have armed gaurds at a school for kids of this age .
Yup, Columbine had an armed guard. Adam Lanza was trained to shoot...he had a good deal of practice, and you never know what collateral damage may occur in a shootout with school staff. Can you imagine the repercussions if a teacher accidentally shoots and kills students while aiming for the gunman in the midst of the worst and most stressful moment in his/her life. Friendly fire is prevalent enough in the military - I can't imagine what a bunch of well-armed and inexperienced shooters do in a school setting. Training only goes so far - ask any police officer or soldier - nothing prepares you for the real moment, except experience itself. The issue is that these "armed" teachers will likely never, if maybe once, in their careers face an active shooter situation. That's why we have police, trained and experienced professionals, to protect our citizens. They have the training, they have the experience.
Yes, I think that the classroom doors, and main entrances should be armored, so that gunmen can't shoot their way into school as easily as Lanza did. Yes, I think there should be gunfire detectors in schools that cities like LA and Chicago have, so that the police are immediately notified of gunfire without having to wait for a 911 call. Yes, I think violence is glorified in movies and TV shows. But no, arming inexperienced personnel who don't spend their careers learning to deal with life-threatening situations and having to make a choice to take a life is not the right answer.
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 104, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 12 hours ago) and read 2760 times:
Quoting cmf (Reply 99): What you're actually state is that you do not respect other peoples will on their property. If you don't like their rules don't go there.
Actually, I have the utmost respect for the property rights of others, but I have more respect for my right to defend myself. So long as I'm not breaking the law, I don't see an issue.
I've posted in the past, that I have spoken to local business owners when I see one of those signs and have gotten mixed results.
I've pointed out that a concealed weapons permit holder:
-has had a background check
-has had some training
-does not have a felony record
-is not under an EPO
Can he say the same of all the other customers?
Well, over 100 posts, and once again, no resolution, not that one was expected. Everyone just putting out their opinions. I expect we'll have this one locked up soon.
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 105, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 11 hours ago) and read 2749 times:
kiwirob From New Zealand, joined Jun 2005, 5274 posts, RR: 3 Reply 106, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 11 hours ago) and read 2743 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 41):
"...the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."
This is what I don't get, this is an amendment to the constitution, as such it should be fairly easy to amend the amendment, it's not written in stone, laws can and are changed.
I have no problem with people who shoot for sport, hunt or want a pistol for home protection, I just don't see there being any place for non military personal to be allowed to own and operate military style weapons. Of course there can be exceptions like collectors but these people should have to obtain a special license and go through a more intensive check before being given this license.
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 107, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 11 hours ago) and read 2723 times:
Quoting kiwirob (Reply 106): This is what I don't get, this is an amendment to the constitution, as such it should be fairly easy to amend the amendment, it's not written in stone, laws can and are changed.
Actually, it is very difficult to amend The Constitution, as it should be. Else, we would amend it based on emotions, rather than sound rationale.
flyingclrs727 From United States of America, joined Apr 2007, 621 posts, RR: 0 Reply 108, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 10 hours ago) and read 2707 times:
Quoting kiwirob (Reply 106): This is what I don't get, this is an amendment to the constitution, as such it should be fairly easy to amend the amendment, it's not written in stone, laws can and are changed.
It's extremely difficult to amend the US Constitution. It takes a 2/3 vote by the House and a 2/3 vote by the Senate to propose an amendment and send it to the states for ratification. Then the legislatures of 3/4 of the states must vote to ratify. Also, most amendments proposed since the 20th century have time limits for ratification.
The proposed Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) was rejected when it failed to get enough states to ratify before the 7 year limit (later extended to a little over 10 years) expired in 1982. The extension bill was rather controversial, because several state legislatures had already voted to rescind their states' previous ratification, and the extension bill didn't allow states to rescind ratification prior to adoption of the amendment. Not one state voted to ratify the ERA during the 3 year extension period.
Federal Air Marshall's will most likely never need to fire their weapon. The one time they have, at least in recent times the shot was dead on. It's about training not the actual experience. I will also say I would rather have someone shoot and maybe miss than not shoot at all.
This is a multi issue problem. Everyone saying that guns are the only problems sound just as dumb as everyone saying mental health is the only problem or that more guns is the only solution.
I just wrote an extensive law research paper on mass shootings and mental health confidentiality laws. It required a lot of research in past mass shooting cases. So so many of them had warning signs of the impending doom.
This needs to be tackled on many aspects. An assault weapon ban would probably be a good thing. At the same time many deaths if not the same amount could have been done with a handgun. Extensive background checks should be implemented, at least for concealed carry which would allow these "gun free zones" to no longer exist. At the same time the shooter was not the owner of the gun anyway. Mental health education and funding needs to go up along with better structured laws in how someone can be detained for mental health reasons and when confidentiality MUST be broken.
As for a POLICE Officer in every school I see no problem with that. I feel that most cities have police in middle schools and high schools already anyway. Why not put them in elementary schools. These are police officers, people small children are taught at a very young age to trust. Police officers having a gun will have ZERO impact on a child's life.
As the NRA Exex said, the U.S. gives billions upon billions in foreign aid. Shouldn't we be able to take some of the money and use it to protect our children?
Supermarkets do usually have a off duty officer in them, at least down here in Florida.
Malls usually do have police or armed security.
Airports have police
Sporting events have police
Banks have armed guards
Jewelry stores have armed guards
Bank trucks have armed guards
Yet schools should not have uniformed police officers who carry a weapon? How in the world that makes sense is beyond me.
"It was just four of us on the flight deck, trying to do our job" (Captain Al Haynes)
FlyDeltaJets From United States of America, joined Feb 2006, 1623 posts, RR: 3 Reply 110, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 10 hours ago) and read 2703 times:
Quoting cmf (Reply 102): Anyhoo, this another terrible tragedy...reminding us all of...
MAR 16, 1996; Scotland; 16 kids and 1 teacher killed, 10 wounded.
APR 26, 2002; Efurt, Germany; 13 teachers, 2 students, 1 policeman killed, 10 wounded a the Johann Gutenberg School.
SEP 13, 2006; Montreal, Canada; 18 died and 12 students/faculty wounded at Dawson College.
SEP 23, 2008: Finland; 9+ students killed just north of Helsinki.
Oh, yeah...April of last year; former student kills 12 children and wounds 12 more in Rio, not to mention the 68 killed at the massacre in Norway 4 months later but that wasn't at a school.
Point? Problem isn't patticularly new or exclusive to the U.S., but "gun control" in the extreme forms being advocated by a lot of the naive, or more politely recognised as the uninformed, isn't the answer. My late night ramblings...jack
It is a problem that is severe in the US. of that list find even 5 more incidents of similar scale in each of those countries.
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 111, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 10 hours ago) and read 2698 times:
Quoting flymia (Reply 109): just wrote an extensive law research paper on mass shootings and mental health confidentiality laws. It required a lot of research in past mass shooting cases. So so many of them had warning signs of the impending doom.
Mir From United States of America, joined Jan 2004, 19687 posts, RR: 56 Reply 112, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 10 hours ago) and read 2689 times:
Quoting luv2fly (Reply 64): "Instead of offering solutions to a problem they have helped create, they offered a paranoid, dystopian vision of a more dangerous and violent America where everyone is armed and no place is safe,"
This is what this really boils down to. If the NRA is going to push the idea that we can only be safe by turning our schools into fortresses, good luck selling that to the US public - they're not going to buy it. A society where you need guns everywhere in order to be safe is not a free society, it's practically a police state.
I don't dispute the fact that there are a number of qualified people out there who could do good if put in schools. But the number of schools is far larger, and thus you will invariably end up with unqualified people with guns in schools. It'll be the TSA, except they'll be armed. And it won't just be for schools - it'll have to be for movie theaters, and shopping malls, and street corners, and all the places that we've had people killed as a result of gun violence. It's like an episode of Oprah: "YOU get a TSA guy, and YOU get a TSA guy, and YOU get a TSA guy!" And this is the sort of country they expect us to want to live in? Hell no. I don't want to have rent-a-cops with guns around children. And I don't want my teachers to have to worry about being trained with firearms properly - they've got far more important things to spend their time on.
The NRA jumped the shark today. They could have come to the table with a new attitude, one that shows that they respect the pain of those who have been affected by gun violence, and they could have proposed certain common sense solutions that have incredibly high support among the public. We're not talking bans on anything, even assault rifles, just mandatory registration programs, closing gun show loopholes, and doing more to put those who illegally sell guns, especially across state lines, in prison. All of those are things that would cut down on a lot of murders every year and are completely compatible with the 2nd Amendment. Instead, they came out in their traditional bombastic manner and suggested that there is nothing we can do about criminals getting guns and that it's our own fault if we don't buy guns as well and get shot at. I refuse to accept that, and so does a large majority of this country. And then they went with the whole "we're starting a dialogue today, but we're not taking questions today" line, which made me wonder whether the world had actually ended and I was living in some sort of parallel universe where people can say those sorts of things without their brain starting an open rebellion against them.
There are things we can do to cut down on gun violence that don't include putting the country on armed lockdown. And we will do them. If the NRA doesn't want to be part of that process, that's their prerogative. But they should know that they're only dooming themselves to obsolescence.
-Mir
7 billion, one nation, imagination...it's a beautiful day
NoUFO From Germany, joined Apr 2001, 7792 posts, RR: 13 Reply 113, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 8 hours ago) and read 2646 times:
Quoting Mir (Reply 112): . And it won't just be for schools - it'll have to be for movie theaters, and shopping malls, and street corners, and all the places that we've had people killed as a result of gun violence.
Next could be hospitals. Lots of "lying ducks" there.
Or restaurants: "We have an armed guard here, so enjoy your meal ... and better don't forget to tip him, too."
But L-188 (or whoever mentioned it) does have a point: What are you going to do with the millions of guns that are already in the "wild"? Publish an official announcement that people need to return (some of) their guns until February 15?
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 114, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 7 hours ago) and read 2623 times:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 80): Why would any sane person ever look at the huffington post.
Well certainly not the type of character who goes around PM'ing people that he knows do not care for him asking 'if he is a nazi' - that is indeed disturbing unhinged behavior and psychologically problematic ...to say the very least.
Moving on.. externalize your perspective and listen to these replies...
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 98):
So, to your point, I'm not talking out my ass. Concealing a firearm is not difficult.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 97): Then that teacher has a right not to be armed. It's their choice.
Quoting flymia (Reply 109):
Supermarkets do usually have a off duty officer in them, at least down here in Florida.
Malls usually do have police or armed security.
Airports have police
Sporting events have police
Banks have armed guards
Jewelry stores have armed guards
Bank trucks have armed guards
Yet schools should not have uniformed police officers who carry a weapon? How in the world that makes sense is beyond me.
This is completely insane.
These collective expressed thoughts show a great lack of foresight in that 'where does it end'!? They easily endorse the knee-jerk reaction of upping the stakes at every turn until the final end result...every American, every age is walking around armed.
No thought is given to any of these answers at ALL. Zero!
Please show me where I'm wrong and you've indicated where a line is drawn in weapons escalation among the citizenry.
First off, by their very nature MOST teachers abhor violence and there is just no way the majority is going to accept guns on their persons. They are peaceful people who strongly advocate a harmonious society. They are constantly breaking up classroom squabbles and fights and teaching the virtues of human cooperation..they are Tae Kwon Do instructors teaching self-defense classes NOR do they wish to that! You haven't a clue what these people are like. Next, as soon as there is another Hospital shootout... you same people will be saying, only the nurses, orderlies and doctors had guns to augment the security details on each floor. You people simply don't know where to draw the line. Your type of thinking is leading America to become Beirut 1982 and you can't even see it coming right at your at the speed of light. This is really the BEST thinking you can do..??? God help us.
Secondly, do any of you seriously think the police forces (and all law enforcement agencies) of America want everyone walking around with guns??? Look at the accelerating rate of cop shootings/killings... do any of you seriously think that rate will decrease with more people packing???? I'm certain there maybe one nutjob A.net member who is a cop that may have a 'bring it on' attitude - if so that person's psych-eval needs to seriously scrutinized and rejected.
Thirdly, what on earth do you need police for when you get to the point that every one is armed? They become totally unnecessary.
Any of you have any idea how many bar fights breakout from thurs nite til sun? More than you could possibly imagine....and already we have people going back their cars and returning to blast someone.. yea, that number of incidents would increase dramatically as well.
Let's see... we have Cops in the school halls, Teachers packing..
Supermarkets do usually have a off duty officer in them
Malls usually do have police or armed security.
Airports have police
Sporting events have police
Banks have armed guards
Jewelry stores have armed guards
Bank trucks have armed guards
Playgrounds with cops
All we need to do now is place a cop at every single intersection corner.. the nw corner, the sw corner, the ne corner and the se corner... and now who do we look like?
Answer: Cuba.
That's exactly what Havana looks like if you've ever been..you've seen it. A police state...brought to you by the NRA and their one dimensional thinking fans.
Half the nation becomes employed by police agencies, the other half armed to the teeth, teachers, lawyers, doctors, bus drivers, taxi drivers, waiters, hostess, the shoe shine guy, dog walkers, Fitness club instructors - that's way too many police reports for any town to handle.. because people are a animal species - ALL capable of moments of bad judgement - place a weapon in their hands and you're now create the perfect recipe for TOTAL disaster.
Quoting mal787 (Reply 100): This will keep happening until you as a society do something about it , what you can/will do is to hard for the brains trust on here to work out.
Thank you!!!
Quoting cptkrell (Reply 101): Anyhoo, this another terrible tragedy...reminding us all of...
MAR 16, 1996; Scotland; 16 kids and 1 teacher killed, 10 wounded.
APR 26, 2002; Efurt, Germany; 13 teachers, 2 students, 1 policeman killed, 10 wounded a the Johann Gutenberg School.
SEP 13, 2006; Montreal, Canada; 18 died and 12 students/faculty wounded at Dawson College.
SEP 23, 2008: Finland; 9+ students killed just north of Helsinki.
Oh, yeah...April of last year; former student kills 12 children and wounds 12 more in Rio, not to mention the 68 killed at the massacre in Norway 4 months later but that wasn't at a school.
Point? Problem isn't patticularly new or exclusive to the U.S., but "gun control" in the extreme forms being advocated by a lot of the naive, or more politely recognised as the uninformed, isn't the answer.
See Below...
Quoting FlyDeltaJets (Reply 110): It is a problem that is severe in the US. of that list find even 5 more incidents of similar scale in each of those countries.
Sorry Cpt Jack, point missed the target by a cosmic mile.
How some of you can so easily sign off while looking squarely in the eyes of escalating violence..and be okay with it .. is completely baffling. On the scale of Human flaws.. that's gotta be a 10.
BN747
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
AirframeAS From United States of America, joined Feb 2004, 14150 posts, RR: 26 Reply 115, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 6 hours ago) and read 2585 times:
Quoting cmf (Reply 102): 1) You do not speak for all of US
I never said I did.
Let me ask you all this: What are you going to do if a gunman comes into the crowded place you're at with pistols and rifles, shooting the place up if the second amendment is thrown out (for example)? How are you going to defend yourself and others? Just stand there and get killed as if this was no bug deal? Seriously?!
Ok, fine, if that's how you all anti-gun ban all guns folk feel, don't look at me after you are 1) injured, 2) psychologically traumatized or 3) killed by a madman gunman. You wanted guns banned, this is what YOU get. Not my problem.
It's the same thing if you don't wear a helmet while riding on a motorcycle. You crash without a helmet, I don't call 911. If you cannot protect yourself, you don't deserve help form someone else, IMO.
It's quite amazing how very few people uses their brains and common sense. Again, it's sad.
A Safe Flight Begins With Quality Maintenance On The Ground.
luv2fly From United States of America, joined May 2003, 11957 posts, RR: 51 Reply 117, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 5 hours ago) and read 2556 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 97): We didn't know that until AFTER the fact. I don't see how this is relevant. Ganging up on the mother isn't a great idea. It's not her fault that her son killed her and shot up the elementary school.
She had a child with known mental problems and she still had guns in the house. If that is not irresponsible I don't know what is. Wait we do know the outcome. No it is her fault. What I find eye opening is that you don't see it.
You don't see how this is relevant! Tell that to the dead.
Cerecl From Australia, joined Jul 2008, 646 posts, RR: 0 Reply 118, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 5 hours ago) and read 2558 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 115): What are you going to do if a gunman comes into the crowded place you're at with pistols and rifles,
By tightening gun ownership and restricting/banning the sale of assault/military grade weapons there would be less of this type of incidents to begin with. Yes, members of crime syndicates will still have access somehow, but these people use these weapons for other purposes. In a sense they are pros, they generally don't go into a mall and just open fire indiscriminately.
If the people of US want to live in eternal fear of another mentally imbalanced man/woman who easily obtains weapons that kill many in a flash, if the people of US wants to see their children under constant armed guard, if the people of US can only feel safe when they carry a big gun around, then go ahead and do nothing. If this is how you want your society to develop, fine. For someone from the outside looking in, such a society is a twisted society, such a society is a mad society, such a society is not one worth living in.
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 119, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 5 hours ago) and read 2554 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 115): Let me ask you all this: What are you going to do if a gunman comes into the crowded place you're at with pistols and rifles, shooting the place up if the second amendment is thrown out (for example)? How are you going to defend yourself and others? Just stand there and get killed as if this was no bug deal? Seriously?!
I don't know a bug deal is..but even you cannot name a situation in history where your example has happened.
People (including YOU) are easily frightened panicky animals. Scene: scrambling rats in a full panic. That's us..just look an all the 9/11 footage of people fleeing lower Manhattan. Gun fire...and people scatter quickly. Except for you of course..you'd stand there with your gun like John Wayne unflinched by the mayhem - of course that's ALL in your mind.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 115): It's the same thing if you don't wear a helmet while riding on a motorcycle. You crash without a helmet, I don't call 911. If you cannot protect yourself, you don't deserve help form someone else, IMO.
Tells us quite a bit about your humanity and all the reason why not to follow the leads of people who think like you.
That very situation occurred in front of me in a hit 'n run in the middle of heavily traveled Western Ave one evening. I quickly got another person to re-direct traffic as they would have surely ran that kid over in the darkness. I tended to him the best I could until the EMTs arrived..I never forget his fear in that moment nor the gratitude expressed by his parents for probably saving his life.
Perhaps you're simply angry in the moment and sensitive to this subject and not thinking clearly..but I painted a picture of a 'armed to the teeth' society above... let's now go the other extreme, total gun ban!
In a total Gun Banned America, here is what we have.
Most you will dutifully turn in your weapons.
Many of you will not for 1 of 2 reasons.
1. Your strong beliefs in 'your 2nd Amendment Right' no matter what (from my cold dead hands mentality).
2. This crowd fears the gov't may go bonkers, commie or V for Vendetta .. and see themselves as the last line of defense in a totalitarian state - and they think they'd have a chance against a fleet of drones hovering a mile away.
or they fear the coming day when Minorities or darker skins are so great in number..that they'll soon turn on them and they'll shoot their way to safety (somewhere).
I don't expect many to admit to the latter.
Now the criminals (real, not the gun holdouts) who will not surrender their weapons.. some may think they'll see themselves as reigning supreme in a gun banned environ, but that's bogus. If anything, they'd realize that they must now be extra careful because they now really standout. If any relative or neighbor get's wind of their having a weapon..the next thing they know there is a knock at the door and away they go.
But there will be zero to virtually no school slaughter by gun...ever again
No mass Mall killings by guns
No mass Office/Work place killings
No restaurant hold ups at gun point - been in that one.
Virtually no 7-11 stick ups.
Cops the tv show....relegated to just car chases and domestic disputes.
THIS vs the world see where Everyone is armed... is the clear winner.
Right now is the time to come up with plan to take responsibility and curb your fellow gun owners who are reckless and enabling these horrors .. or a decision will be made for you.
Huffington Post front page:
TO LIVE AND DIE IN AMERICA
3 Shot And Killed In Mich... 18-Year-Old Shot Multiple Times, Dies... Man Kills Wife, Teen, Himself... Man Shoots, Kills Own Son... Cops Shoot Teen Dead... Man Gunned Down In Parking Lot... 5 Dead In Spate Of Shootings... 2 Murdered In Philly... 2 Kansas Cops Shot Dead... Shooter Killed... 4 Die In Apparent Murder-Suicide... Ga. Cop Dies From Gunshot... Argument Leads Teen To Shoot Friend... Man Shot To Death... Teen Dies After Being Tied Up, Shot... Man Shot Dead In Street... Drug Deal Leads To Shooting Death... Mother Of 2 Killed In Road Rage Shooting... Man Shoots, Kills Intruder... 1 Killed In Coney Island... Man Dies From Gunshot Wounds... Cops Investigate Gun Death... Shooting Victim's Body Found On Bike Trail... Man Charged With Shooting Own Brother Dead... Man Dies After Being Shot In Chest... Body Of Shooting Victim Found In Pickup... Teen Arrested For Robbery Shooting Death... Man Carrying 2-Year-Old Son Shot Dead... Man Fatally Shot Near Home... Parolee Dies In Shooting... 1 Killed In Buffalo Shooting... Man Shot Dead In Apartment Complex... Street Gun Battle Kills Grandma Bystander... Man, Woman Dead In Apparent Murder-Suicide... Woman Shot Dead By Intruder... 14-Year-Old Arrested Over Fatal Gun Attack... Man Found Shot Dead In Parking Lot... Woman Shot In Face By Ex-Boyfriend... 1 Woman, 3 Men Shot Dead... 2 Die In Attempted Robbery... Army Reservist Shot To Death In Alley... Man Shot To Death In Bodega... 2 Shot Dead In Burned House... Man Shot During Break-In... Man Fatally Shot... 20-Year-Old Gunned Down... Man Shoots Self During Police Pursuit... 1 Killed In Baltimore Shooting... Cops ID Shooting Victim... 60-Year-Old Man Shot Dead... Shot Man's Body Found In Vacant House.... Woman Shot And Killed Outside Her Home... Shooting Victim Was 'Trying To Turn Life Around'... Slain Shooting Victim Found In Street.... Driving Altercation Leads To Shooting, 1 Dies... 3-Year-Old Dies In Accidental Shooting... Man Turns Self In After Allegedly Shooting Wife... Man Shot Dead Outside Home... 3 Slain In Separate New Orleans Shootings... Cops Investigate Shooting Death... Man Shot Dead In Ohio... Teen Shot To Death... Man Dies After Being Shot Multiple Times... Man Charged Over Son's Shooting Death... Cops Find 2 Men Shot Dead... 1 Dies In Shooting... Man Charged Over Gun Killing... 1 Shot Dead In Confrontation... Man Charged With Murder Over Shooting... Motel-Owner Shot And Killed... Husband Shoots Estranged Wife Dead... Suspect Arrested Over Deputy's Shooting Death... Police Probe Fatal Shooting... Cops Kill 2 Suspects In 3 Shooting Deaths... Man Killed Fighting Back Against Robber... Man Killed In Home Invasion.... Nightclub Shooting Kills 1... Child Brain Dead After Drive By Shooting... Man Charged Over Shooting Of Ex-Wife... Body Found In Vacant House... Teen Fatally Shot...
...think about it..
BN747
[Edited 2012-12-22 06:46:52]
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
TheCommodore From Australia, joined Dec 2007, 2346 posts, RR: 7 Reply 120, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 4 hours ago) and read 2546 times:
Quoting luv2fly (Reply 117): She had a child with known mental problems and she still had guns in the house.
She also had mental issues.
The woman believed the end of the world (or the US) was imminent, and was stockpiling food and provisions in the house.
And you say the son had issues ?
My family and I went out to dinner with 15 friends last night....
The subject of guns in the US was mentioned.
Everyone groaned and sighed, rolled their eyes and said, whats wrong with Americans, whats wrong with their society ?
Why can't they agree that guns are bad news. How many more innocent people have to die before the get it ?
Quoting Cerecl (Reply 118): For someone from the outside looking in, such a society is a twisted society, such a society is a mad society, such a society is not one worth living in.
Yeah, you can say that again !
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 115): How are you going to defend yourself and others?
Call the police, like everyone else would do in a civil society, that's why you have them.
Flown 905,468 kms or 2.356 times to the moon, 1296 hrs, Longest flight 10,524 kms
GDB From United Kingdom, joined May 2001, 12701 posts, RR: 80 Reply 121, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 4 hours ago) and read 2528 times:
Bitterly ironic that the mother of the mass killer, was so paranoid herself she had that arsenal on weapons against - whatever was in her head, was killed by those weapons.
Which is a rather common occurrence.
The NRA can be beaten.
Look at those SuperPacs run by Karl Rove in the election, half a billion $. But no success rate, at all.
But it is also about mindset.
The idea that probably the nation with the most heavily embedded and multiple layers of democracy, is under some kind of threat from a runaway, tyrannical government?
And even if it could, in some upside down universe happen, the idea that a bunch of paunchy suburbanites could resist the armed forces of the USA is laughable.
There are no Indian tribes to threaten the NRA types - though non Caucasians still do - witness the rush to buy guns after one of 'those people' was elected in 2008.
And citing other incidents in other countries, without following up on what was done about it, is typically dishonest.
Or, heaven forbid, what the rate of gun violence is in those countries compared to the US generally.
No one is going to take away the hunting rifle, the ranchers shotgun, nor handguns - though high magazine capacity modern military style pistols are used in all too many mass shooting.
What is the rational need for a weapon like a bushmaster? Or any other military style semi auto, high mag capacity weapon?
Revelation From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 10443 posts, RR: 20 Reply 122, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 4 hours ago) and read 2525 times:
Quoting BN747 (Reply 119): Except for you of course..you'd stand there with gun like John Wayne unflinched - of course that's in your mind.
Indeed many gun owners see themselves as a superior grade of human being whose superior preparation and training will save the day. Too bad they waste their time and money for such foolishness.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 119): they'll shoot their way to safety (somewhere).
One wonders exactly what government these folks would set up for themselves after the current one(s) are vanquished.
It's not clear that they've thought it through that far, which is probably a good thing.
brilondon From Canada, joined Aug 2005, 3163 posts, RR: 1 Reply 123, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 4 hours ago) and read 2522 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 41): "...the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."
Taking a long, tired, out of context quote just shows how antiquated and uninformed that line of thinking is. This is the thinking of the NRA. That organization is out of touch with societal goals of safety and security. More guns does not equal more security. It only means more of a chance to hurt or kill innocent people which there was enough of in Connecticut
ltbewr From United States of America, joined Jan 2004, 12328 posts, RR: 12 Reply 124, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 4 hours ago) and read 2503 times:
The statement of the NRA president on Friday has to be one of the worst public relations 'fails' I can remember, indeed, they literally shot themselves in the foot. Instead of accepting the need to limit access to military class 'assault' weapons and large bullet magazines, ending 'gun show' sales and other reasonable law changes, they went on a delusional and useless rant against the media and for posting police officers or 'volunteer' armed and trained security persons in all schools.
Yes, I don't like the high levels of gun and other weapon use in movies, TV shows and video games. I don't watch boxing or UFC as I no longer like to see such violence of one human to another. I choose not to watch violent movies and TV shows, or play violent video games and I think more parents and people need to reject with their money and eyeballs such media products. Some have also questioned connections those who seeing lots of violent media and becoming violent and use gunsWe already post armed police and security guards in some schools in urban areas due to the very real and established risk of guns entering those schools. We don't need the cost, limited effectiveness and unintended consequences of armed people in all schools. Indeed with several school shootings, bullying and other bad behaviors were more factors that like the Newton massacre and we need to develop more effective ways to really reduce all kinds of school based abusive behaviors that lead to some kids going ballistic. Reasonable security at businesses, improvements in personnal management (remember the 'going postal' incidents at US Postal facilities years ago and don't happen now)
There are many issues with massive gun use and possession from accidents, arguments going literally ballistic, 'road rage', gangs, drug dealers, robbers and other criminals, murder of too many women in hostile marriages and relationships. We do need to look at the issues of mental illness and mass gun crimes, the genetics and culture especially on men that causes far too many to have guns, improving policing and crime prevention and yes, go for some reasonable restrictions on gun possession and use. And no, I don't want government agents taking guns away unless the possessor is violating well established laws.
To me the NRA has reached a point of hubris, where their extreme view of the 2nd Amendment, which is protected by the 1st Amendment freedom of speech, is going lead to their demise or becoming a much smaller organization, losing ground to a shifting society as to violent gun use. Their statement was counterproductive to the overwhelming majority of responsible gun owners and users. I would be not be surprised if the NRA see significant declines in membership and becomes less of an influence on our politicians.
Long story short: The decline in violent crimes started before a lot of the loosened gun restrictions took effect, and, when controlled for other factors, was not appreciably different than in areas that did not loosen restrictions.
To be fair, he also says that tighter gun restrictions also had no effect, for many of the same reasons.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 119): In a total Gun Banned America, here is what we have.
Most you will dutifully turn in your weapons.
Many of you will not for 1 of 2 reasons.
...
Now the criminals (real, not the gun holdouts) who will not surrender their weapons.. some may think they'll see themselves as reigning supreme in a gun banned environ, but that's bogus. If anything, they'd realize that they must now be extra careful because they now really standout. If any relative or neighbor get's wind of their having a weapon..the next thing they know there is a knock at the door and away they go.
But there will be zero to virtually no school slaughter by gun...ever again
No mass Mall killings by guns
No mass Office/Work place killings
No restaurant hold ups at gun point - been in that one.
Virtually no 7-11 stick ups.
Cops the tv show....relegated to just car chases and domestic disputes.
I generally agree with you, but I think you're being a bit naive here. Criminals with guns won't "stand out" any more in a gun-banned society than they do today.
The inner-city street-corner shootings will still occur, at more or less the same rate as they do today (which is about half the rate of 20-30 years ago, on a per-capita basis). Who's going to tattle? Some folks in inner cities already live in fear, and already know who the criminals are, and could easily rat them out today for any of 1,000 different things, but for various reasons, they don't.
As for the mass shootings that appear to be occurring more and more (I say appear, because I haven't looked at any data to see what the rates are), some of those may be resolved with a gun ban. But they also represent not even a blip on the radar screen of gun deaths in the US each year. This, more than anything else, is the main reason I find the claim that we need to start arming every other person in the country to be absolute lunacy.
To put this in perspective, there are nearly 50 million students and over 3 million teachers in US public schools (source, I didn't find private school data immediately available, but you can probably add a few million students to that total). How many of them have died in a shooting at school? I don't have exact numbers, but the [url="http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/youthviolence/schoolviolence/data_stats.html"]CDC says[/url] "less than 1 percent of all homicides among school-age children happen on school grounds or on the way to and from school."
So, if we really want to cut the BS about protecting the children, we really should be more concerned about the other 99+% of kids. Arming teachers or staffing armed guards in schools will do ZERO to protect those kids. It *might* save SOME (the exact amount of which is unknown) of the less than 1% of kids who are killed in school. Still, this amounts to about a 1 in 1 million chance that a school-age child is murdered in school. And as a response we need to arm our schools?
tugger From United States of America, joined Apr 2006, 4629 posts, RR: 7 Reply 126, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 2 hours ago) and read 2445 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 93):
Quoting HoMsaR (Reply 90):
violent crime in the US has been on a declining trend since the early 1990s.
Coincidentally, the early 90's is when states began loosening restrictions on gun ownership and concealed carry.
Actually there is evidence that the reduction in crime is connected to the Roe v. Wade decision and the ability for women to control when and who's children they give birth to.
Tugg
I don’t know that I am unafraid to be myself, but it is hard to be somebody else. -W. Shatner
HoMsaR From United States of America, joined Jan 2010, 798 posts, RR: 0 Reply 127, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 2 hours ago) and read 2444 times:
Quoting tugger (Reply 126): Actually there is evidence that the reduction in crime is connected to the Roe v. Wade decision and the ability for women to control when and who's children they give birth to.
Indeed. See the paper that I linked to above in response to fr8mech's same comment.
seb146 From United States of America, joined Nov 1999, 9798 posts, RR: 17 Reply 128, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 2 hours ago) and read 2430 times:
Quoting flymia (Reply 109): the U.S. gives billions upon billions in foreign aid. Shouldn't we be able to take some of the money and use it to protect our children?
Or, take some of that money in foreign aid to pay for more teachers?
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 107): it is very difficult to amend The Constitution, as it should be. Else, we would amend it based on emotions, rather than sound rationale.
+1
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 98): Try looking at some budgets and what the money is spent on.
I grew up in Oregon. Trust me, I know the stupid sh*t they spend money on. How dare they hire more teachers when the football team needs new helments! How dare they buy new computers when the football team needs communications equipment! I know... believe me, I know...
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 97): We didn't know that until AFTER the fact. I don't see how this is relevant. Ganging up on the mother isn't a great idea. It's not her fault that her son killed her and shot up the elementary school.
All this talk about "blame the parents" and "where were the parents" but this had nothing to do with the mother? Parents need to take responsibility for what their kids do except when their kids shoot up a school.
Mir From United States of America, joined Jan 2004, 19687 posts, RR: 56 Reply 129, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 1 hour ago) and read 2428 times:
Quoting NoUFO (Reply 113): What are you going to do with the millions of guns that are already in the "wild"? Publish an official announcement that people need to return (some of) their guns until February 15?
Require registration of them by a certain date. Match them to their current owner by serial number (or other identifying information).
And for those that do have assault rifles, make it very clear to the owners that if they sell them to anyone but the government or an authorized dealer they will be in some serious trouble.
You're not going to get rid of all the guns in the wild, but that shouldn't be the objective (and nor should the objective be to prevent new guns from getting out into the wild either, with the possible exception of high-powered weapons).
-Mir
7 billion, one nation, imagination...it's a beautiful day
luv2fly From United States of America, joined May 2003, 11957 posts, RR: 51 Reply 130, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 1 hour ago) and read 2419 times:
Great article on yahoo pointing out failed facts from the recent NRa fail.
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 131, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days 1 hour ago) and read 2400 times:
Quoting HoMsaR (Reply 125): I generally agree with you, but I think you're being a bit naive here. Criminals with guns won't "stand out" any more in a gun-banned society than they do today.
Perhaps I should be a bit more clear on this.
First off, all criminals don't fall into one single category.
You have petty thugs, gangsters and nickel & dime Liquor Store knockover artist (the ignorant bunch).
And then there are the more professional criminal/mobsters contract types if you will.
at the moment with lax gun laws... neither gives a rats ass about who knows they have a gun - in fact they want you to know so that you steer very clear of them and don't go poking your nose where it doesn't belong.
Under my hypothetical Total Gun Ban America scenario...everything - including attitude changes.
The petty thug who likes 'flashing his piece' at parties, parks or anywhere out in public wherever he may be...will put a lid on his false bravado for fear of being ratted out simply over just that. Flashing that weapon now draws the response as if a serious crime is committed and he'd have no clue who dimed him out...not worth the risk!
The professional criminal is a world apart...he is for the most part very disciplined by comparison vs the petty thug.
He doesn't want anyone knowing his biz pre-gun ban... and damn sure wouldn't want anyone knowing anything under the post gun ban scenario..he tightens up his already secret world just a bit more.
Not all criminals are reckless and stupid... many are quite calculating, conniving and clever.
BN747
[Edited 2012-12-22 10:03:15]
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
Long story short: The decline in violent crimes started before a lot of the loosened gun restrictions took effect, and, when controlled for other factors, was not appreciably different than in areas that did not loosen restrictions.
To be fair, he also says that tighter gun restrictions also had no effect, for many of the same reasons.
There was another major factor which was the decline of the Crack Epidemic of the 80s which made such an impact in the inner cities. It was just around the early 90s when this started to happen.
"Look Lois, the two symbols of the Republican Party: an elephant, and a big fat white guy who is threatened by change."
Ken777 From United States of America, joined Mar 2004, 7438 posts, RR: 5 Reply 133, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days ago) and read 2364 times:
Quoting FlyDeltaJets (Reply 89): Guns were around for the Unibomber and Timpthy McVeigh so why didnt they shoot up a school.
You need to remember that McVey wanted to do more damage than a handful of automatic assault rifles could do.
You also need to remember that this pathetic coward didn't want to be there because he could be hurt - he set the timer and ran away.
The only thing we did wrong with putting McVey down was that we did it for killing federal employee. We should have tried him in state court and the first trial should have been for killing the babies kids in the day care. And that is what he should have been executed for. There are simply too many people who consider him a martyr because he was put down for killing "Feds".
In Texas a family of 3 makes TOO MUCH if they make $191 a month. That's 12% of the Federal Poverty Level. Louisiana and Alabama are worse at 11%. That's $175 a month. Fortunately for those in poverty in some of those states there is some hope as they are letting the federal government come in on the new health care laws. Medicaid will be 133% of the Federal Poverty Line - which is about where it should be.
At least with a federal program we will be able to have more trust than we would at the state level.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 33): in this state, a "no firearms sign" does not have the force of law
That just takes away the rights from small shop owners and the like. Looks like there are a lot of politicians in Kentucky who are total wussies when the NRA type folks yell at them. Personally I believe that it is the shop owner or restaurant owner who should have the absolute rights to keep guns out of their place of business.
Taking in a gun, or wasting their time arguing about it with them is simple intimidation and is unacceptable.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 104): I've posted in the past, that I have spoken to local business owners when I see one of those signs and have gotten mixed results.
Why try to shove your point of view down their throats? Maybe it is their family members who want the ban. Maybe it's other customers. If you don't want to leave you gun in the car then go to another store. When I was in retail (better men's wear) we did have a guy who would come in with a gun. He was an Assistant Prosecutor and had received more than a few threats over the years. We would take him downstairs (out of the public view) to try on clothes and to have them fitted in order to minimize the appearance.
Quoting flyingclrs727 (Reply 108): Not one state voted to ratify the ERA during the 3 year extension period.
Which shows how backward we were then.
Quoting flymia (Reply 109): the U.S. gives billions upon billions in foreign aid. Shouldn't we be able to take some of the money and use it to protect our children?
Budgets are a balance. There have been international needs for generations and they will continue. Give that up and you might a well tell China and Russia to be the world leaders.
Quoting flymia (Reply 109): Yet schools should not have uniformed police officers who carry a weapon? How in the world that makes sense is beyond me.
I don't have a problem with raising taxes (especially federal taxes on guns and ammunition) to pay for additional police. Probably two minimum, one man and one woman, as they will be involved with more than just the periodic madman.
So let's watch the politicians over the next few months to see if they deliver on the spending needed for upgrading school security. My bet is that the Republicans will skip this entirely.
kiwirob From New Zealand, joined Jun 2005, 5274 posts, RR: 3 Reply 134, posted (4 months 3 weeks 6 days ago) and read 2359 times:
Quoting flymia (Reply 109): As for a POLICE Officer in every school I see no problem with that. I feel that most cities have police in middle schools and high schools already anyway. Why not put them in elementary schools. These are police officers, people small children are taught at a very young age to trust. Police officers having a gun will have ZERO impact on a child's life.
Unless the cop was right where the shooting was talking place they would have ZERO impact on a school massacre.
I don't know how big the average school is in the US, but the school I went to in Auckland had 1500 students, someone could walk into a classroom block at one side of the school start shooting, by the time the cop heard the first shots (I guess the cops would be located in the admin area) he'd have to run anywhere from 20m for the closest block to several hundred meters to the most remote block, I'm pretty sure the nut job with the assault rifle could have easily killed a couple of dozen kids by the time plod arrived on the scene.
Having a cop on site ain't going to do squat, at best he'd maybe save a couple of lives, worst case he'd come up against nutjob with an assault rifle and end up dead himself.
If you really want to protect schools fence them with razor wire and have only a single entry exit point with a guard and metal detectors, but do you really want to send your kids to prison every day?
Quoting HoMsaR (Reply 125): But they also represent not even a blip on the radar screen of gun deaths in the US each year.
Lets be honest who (apart from family) gives a crap when gang members shot other gang members, most folks probably think great more filth off the streets. What we are shocked about is the senseless killing of kids in schools by nutjobs mostly armed with military style assault rifles.
Maverick623 From United States of America, joined Nov 2006, 4744 posts, RR: 6 Reply 135, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 23 hours ago) and read 2323 times:
Quoting Mir (Reply 129): Require registration of them by a certain date.
That would go over only slightly more well than a total ban... and would have done NOTHING to stop Sandy Hook.
HoMsaR From United States of America, joined Jan 2010, 798 posts, RR: 0 Reply 136, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 23 hours ago) and read 2316 times:
Quoting BN747 (Reply 131): The petty thug who likes 'flashing his piece' at parties, parks or anywhere out in public wherever he may be...will put a lid on his false bravado for fear of being ratted out simply over just that. Flashing that weapon now draws the response as if a serious crime is committed and he'd have no clue who dimed him out...not worth the risk!
I've lived in some pretty rough neighborhoods, and taken the bus late at night through some other such places. Only once did I see some random thug just pull out a gun and flash it around. And it was in a city where carrying handguns is illegal. Didn't stop him then.
Again, I think you're naive if you really believe that the criminal mindset is going to change.
As for mafia types, well, they already take care not to attract too much attention, so I don't see how that would change at all.
Quoting kiwirob (Reply 134): Lets be honest who (apart from family) gives a crap when gang members shot other gang members, most folks probably think great more filth off the streets. What we are shocked about is the senseless killing of kids in schools by nutjobs mostly armed with military style assault rifles.
Not sure if you're being serious here, but most victims aren't gang members shot by other gang members. The only real difference between them and the kids in Connecticut (besides skin color in most cases) is that they're shot one or two at a time, rather than 20-30 at once.
Yes, it's shocking to have someone shoot up a school, but that's not the real problem with guns and violence in the US.
Look back at what I wrote in the post you quoted. Less than 1% of school-aged murder victims are killed in schools. What about the other 99% of kids?
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 137, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 23 hours ago) and read 2303 times:
Quoting HoMsaR (Reply 136): Quoting BN747 (Reply 131):
The petty thug who likes 'flashing his piece' at parties, parks or anywhere out in public wherever he may be...will put a lid on his false bravado for fear of being ratted out simply over just that. Flashing that weapon now draws the response as if a serious crime is committed and he'd have no clue who dimed him out...not worth the risk!
I've lived in some pretty rough neighborhoods, and taken the bus late at night through some other such places. Only once did I see some random thug just pull out a gun and flash it around. And it was in a city where carrying handguns is illegal. Didn't stop him then.
Again, I think you're naive if you really believe that the criminal mindset is going to change.
I still do go into these areas (South Central LA)... and places where many of my peers dare not venture. I do know how they (hood thuds) think why they do the things they do. You're free to believe the naive statements you make, but I know for fact you could not be further from the truth on this.
BN747
[Edited 2012-12-22 12:26:47]
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
Mir From United States of America, joined Jan 2004, 19687 posts, RR: 56 Reply 138, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 22 hours ago) and read 2279 times:
Quoting Maverick623 (Reply 135): That would go over only slightly more well than a total ban...
Which is a sign that the gun lobby has lost their sanity.
Quoting Maverick623 (Reply 135): and would have done NOTHING to stop Sandy Hook.
This is about more than Sandy Hook. As tragic as Sandy Hook was, it was 27 people, and that's a fraction of a percent of the innocent people we lose to gun violence each year. And a lot of those people were killed with guns that were bought legally and then sold illegally, getting lost in the system and dropping out of sight. The way to better stop that from happening is to keep better track of where guns go, and that means mandatory registration. You'll save more lives that way per year than you'd save by stopping many more Sandy Hook shootings.
-Mir
7 billion, one nation, imagination...it's a beautiful day
Maverick623 From United States of America, joined Nov 2006, 4744 posts, RR: 6 Reply 139, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 21 hours ago) and read 2249 times:
Quoting Mir (Reply 138): Which is a sign that the gun lobby has lost their sanity.
No, it means the anti-gun lobby has.
Quoting Mir (Reply 138): And a lot of those people were killed with guns that were bought legally and then sold illegally, getting lost in the system and dropping out of sight. The way to better stop that from happening is to keep better track of where guns go, and that means mandatory registration.
That worked out so well for Fast and Furious....
Also, it's crazy to think that a criminal who has broken one gun control law will suddenly obey another.
If you can't see the wide difference between a registration program and an outright ban, that's a problem.
A registration database would let legal gun owners keep their guns. It would help quickly track down and catch people who either use guns in crimes (example: http://www.freep.com/article/2012120...se-used-96-corridor-shootings-case ) as well as people who let guns slip onto the black market. And it would be relatively inexpensive to set up and maintain.
If you're going to have me believe that reasonable people can object to all of those things, you're going to have to offer a better explanation than "we're not crazy, you're crazy".
Quoting Maverick623 (Reply 139): That worked out so well for Fast and Furious....
False comparison. The problem people had with Fast and Furious (rightfully so) was that guns were being sold to people who shouldn't have them. I'm not suggesting we should keep doing that, obviously - in fact, I'm suggesting we should step up our efforts to make sure that doesn't happen. I haven't heard the same suggestion from the NRA, who seems to be interested in making it more difficult to figure who should be buying a gun and who shouldn't.
Quoting Maverick623 (Reply 139): Also, it's crazy to think that a criminal who has broken one gun control law will suddenly obey another.
Which is why it's so important to make sure that when someone does break a gun law, they can be identified and prosecuted for it to make sure that they don't do it again.
-Mir
[Edited 2012-12-22 15:39:58]
7 billion, one nation, imagination...it's a beautiful day
StarAC17 From Canada, joined Aug 2003, 3211 posts, RR: 9 Reply 141, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 19 hours ago) and read 2175 times:
Quoting cptkrell (Reply 101): Point? Problem isn't patticularly new or exclusive to the U.S., but "gun control" in the extreme forms being advocated by a lot of the naive, or more politely recognised as the uninformed, isn't the answer. My late night ramblings...jack
It is much more prevalent in the US than in other industrial countries. Yes there have been mass shootings in Canada and other rich countries but I can count the ones in Canada on one hand since 1989 which compares with Sandy Hook.
You listed 5 shootings in a 16 year period (1996 to this year) and in the US there have been four I can recall since Aurora in July.
Quoting greaser (Reply 103): Yup, Columbine had an armed guard. Adam Lanza was trained to shoot...he had a good deal of practice, and you never know what collateral damage may occur in a shootout with school staff. Can you imagine the repercussions if a teacher accidentally shoots and kills students while aiming for the gunman in the midst of the worst and most stressful moment in his/her life.
That is the biggest risk and regarding Aurora the shooter used smoke grenades and had armor. Add in a dark environment also, it would be nice if someone could have taken him out but in reality if you had 10% of the people in that cinema armed this would have only increased the panic and if would create many more victims that there was.
IIRC in Tuscon there were people who had guns at the time but those people didn't try to shoot Jared Loughner because it would have made things much worse.
GDB From United Kingdom, joined May 2001, 12701 posts, RR: 80 Reply 142, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 19 hours ago) and read 2159 times:
More on the NRA chief and a piece on the wider picture;
(While of course there will be a lobbyist group for gun owners, the NRA though, reinforced by their PR offensive and some of their actions against those who question them, seem to have become a bunch of sociopaths. They'll likely be shedding more moderate, that is not bonkers, membership).
EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12556 posts, RR: 64 Reply 143, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 19 hours ago) and read 2145 times:
Quoting Ken777 (Reply 91): Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 74):Sorry, but depriving EVERYONE of rights because a handful abuse them is too high a price to pay. Full-stop.
I guess those6 and 7 year old kids really didn't have rights.
What happened to those kids is beyond tragic, but again, stripping rights from 99.9999% percent of the population because 0.0001% of the population chose to abuse a particular right absolutely cannot be permitted to happen.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 114): How some of you can so easily sign off while looking squarely in the eyes of escalating violence..and be okay with it .. is completely baffling.
And equally baffling is your wilingness to assume you have the right to deprive others of theirs simply because it's contrary to your worldview.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 119): Now the criminals (real, not the gun holdouts) who will not surrender their weapons.. some may think they'll see themselves as reigning supreme in a gun banned environ, but that's bogus.
Hogwash, if anything they'll be emboldened.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 119): If anything, they'd realize that they must now be extra careful because they now really standout. If any relative or neighbor get's wind of their having a weapon..the next thing they know there is a knock at the door and away they go.
How? "Your neighbor says they think you have a gun," isn't going to result in a search warrant, ever. Criminals know that and won't care.
Quoting Ken777 (Reply 133): Why try to shove your point of view down their throats?
Because people like you are trying to do precisely that, so we have to push back.
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 144, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 16 hours ago) and read 2084 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143): Quoting BN747 (Reply 114):
How some of you can so easily sign off while looking squarely in the eyes of escalating violence..and be okay with it .. is completely baffling.
And equally baffling is your wilingness to assume you have the right to deprive others of theirs simply because it's contrary to your worldview.
But my view does not pose the escalating threat as your views and that of the NRA.
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143): Quoting BN747 (Reply 119):
Now the criminals (real, not the gun holdouts) who will not surrender their weapons.. some may think they'll see themselves as reigning supreme in a gun banned environ, but that's bogus.
Hogwash, if anything they'll be emboldened.
I see, you're one of those unique types who think criminals actually enjoy hanging out in jail.
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143): Quoting BN747 (Reply 119):
If anything, they'd realize that they must now be extra careful because they now really standout. If any relative or neighbor get's wind of their having a weapon..the next thing they know there is a knock at the door and away they go.
How? "Your neighbor says they think you have a gun," isn't going to result in a search warrant, ever. Criminals know that and won't care.
Now they do.. the above was a Total gun ban hypothetical.
Since you have this all figured out, indulge us... tell us your view of how things might play out in a hypothetical Total Gun Banned America.. let's hear it.
BN747
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
cerecl From Australia, joined Jul 2008, 646 posts, RR: 0 Reply 145, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 16 hours ago) and read 2084 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143): but again, stripping rights from 99.9999% percent of the population because 0.0001% of the population chose to abuse a particular right absolutely cannot be permitted to happen.
AS far as I can see, the current focus is not to strip your right to carry guns, it is about banning the sale of military grade weapons. One has to realise the right to carry firearm, like any other right, is not absolute. Justice Scalia acknowledged as much in his Heller opinion.
EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12556 posts, RR: 64 Reply 146, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 16 hours ago) and read 2067 times:
Quoting BN747 (Reply 144): Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143):Quoting BN747 (Reply 114):
How some of you can so easily sign off while looking squarely in the eyes of escalating violence..and be okay with it .. is completely baffling.
And equally baffling is your wilingness to assume you have the right to deprive others of theirs simply because it's contrary to your worldview.
But my view does not pose the escalating threat as your views and that of the NRA.
Your perception is irrelevant. You do not have the right to rescind my rights because you disagree with them. If you can't understand that, there's nothing I can do for you.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 144): Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143):Quoting BN747 (Reply 119):
Now the criminals (real, not the gun holdouts) who will not surrender their weapons.. some may think they'll see themselves as reigning supreme in a gun banned environ, but that's bogus.
Hogwash, if anything they'll be emboldened.
I see, you're one of those unique types who think criminals actually enjoy hanging out in jail.
Hardly; criminal activity is at its very core a risk vs. reward argument, and the risk a criminal faces for the "reward" of successfully engaging in behavior like armed robbery or murder doesn't increase due to the additional possible charge of firearm possession.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 144): Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143):Quoting BN747 (Reply 119):
If anything, they'd realize that they must now be extra careful because they now really standout. If any relative or neighbor get's wind of their having a weapon..the next thing they know there is a knock at the door and away they go.
How? "Your neighbor says they think you have a gun," isn't going to result in a search warrant, ever. Criminals know that and won't care.
Now they do.. the above was a Total gun ban hypothetical.
Meth is totally banned, yet "Hey, I think my neighbor is a meth dealer," won't result in a search warrant. Try again.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 144): Since you have this all figured out, indulge us... tell us your view of how things might play out in a hypothetical Total Gun Banned America.. let's hear it.
I never said I had it figured out; I don't need to have a better idea to say yours sucks, or that attempting to take away my rights because you disagree with them isn't wrong.
[Edited 2012-12-22 19:00:35]
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12556 posts, RR: 64 Reply 147, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 16 hours ago) and read 2066 times:
Quoting cerecl (Reply 145): Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143): but again, stripping rights from 99.9999% percent of the population because 0.0001% of the population chose to abuse a particular right absolutely cannot be permitted to happen.
AS far as I can see, the current focus is not to strip your right to carry guns, it is about banning the sale of military grade weapons.
You haven't been reading BN's posts; he's advocating that access to ALL firearms be restricted.
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
FlyDeltaJets From United States of America, joined Feb 2006, 1623 posts, RR: 3 Reply 148, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 15 hours ago) and read 2033 times:
I don't see how anyone could be against gun registration. It not only allows you to keep your guns but instills the "self-responsibility" gun owners say they are taking for their families safety. Registration of guns will go far to curbing illegal guns. If all guns being purchased had to be registered to an owner it would certainly curb many of the gun buys that occur in the south that fuels the gun black market in the tough gun urban cities. It will not have an overnight effect but over time will be more and more effective. Don't get me wrong there are ways around it and I'm certain criminals will work to subvert it. That doesn't mean that it shouldn't be enacted though.
seb146 From United States of America, joined Nov 1999, 9798 posts, RR: 17 Reply 149, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 15 hours ago) and read 2034 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 146): Quoting BN747 (Reply 144):Since you have this all figured out, indulge us... tell us your view of how things might play out in a hypothetical Total Gun Banned America.. let's hear it.
I never said I had it figured out; I don't need to have a better idea to say yours sucks, or that attempting to take away my rights because you disagree with them isn't wrong.
Woah, woah, woah... Both of you take it down a notch. These are all just hypothetical, first off. Second, NRA will do everything in their power to keep as many guns out there as possible.
There is no magic cure for this. What we will hear is "That side wants to ban *ALL* guns!" and "That side wants everyone to carry any gun they want!" both of which are not true. A majority of people want accountability and responsibility. But, the extremists will win for some stupid reason.
Quoting StarAC17 (Reply 141): in Tuscon there were people who had guns at the time but those people didn't try to shoot Jared Loughner because it would have made things much worse.
Right. That is the solution the NRA is proposing.
Let me be clear once more: I do not support a total ban on all guns. There are very good ways we can keep kids safe, responsible owners can have guns and a majority of people will be happy.
AirframeAS From United States of America, joined Feb 2004, 14150 posts, RR: 26 Reply 150, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 15 hours ago) and read 2022 times:
Because we cannot come to a mutual agreement or a solution to the "gun" debate before and after all the mudslinging, name calling and disrespect towards other members by each other, this is my very LAST post on this thread. Whether you agree with me or not is YOUR own damn problem. If you have nothing nice to say, then don't say it. I am appalled that the Mods are allowing these gun threads to keep on being put up knowing that it will not end well. But before I close, I must respond to some of these:
Unfortunately, they don't talk back so that boat has sailed.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 119): People (including YOU) are easily frightened panicky animals.
You don't know me. I don't own guns because of fear. I own guns because I like to shoot. I own rifles because I like to hunt. If that is something that you cannot accept, that is your own problem and not your business.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 119): Scene: scrambling rats in a full panic. That's us..just look an all the 9/11 footage of people fleeing lower Manhattan. Gun fire...and people scatter quickly. Except for you of course..you'd stand there with your gun like John Wayne unflinched by the mayhem - of course that's ALL in your mind.
Oh. My. God. Are you for real?! As for the rest of your post, I am not even going to bother responding because I don't have anything nice to say to you or about you, your opinion is a bit out of wack. So I am going to leave that as it is and move on.
Quoting TheCommodore (Reply 120): Call the police, like everyone else would do in a civil society, that's why you have them.
One flaw with that, and I have told you this many, many, many times before on other gun threads and you keep on ignoring it: The closest cop could be 30 minutes away. So what do you do then? Wait for the cop for 30 minutes? Well, that is one option....and that gets you killed before the cops arrive. Under your logic, nice, huh??
I don't think so. I am not waiting for a cop that is 30 minutes out while a guy is going gung-ho with a rifle in a crowded place.
Quoting seb146 (Reply 128): All this talk about "blame the parents" and "where were the parents" but this had nothing to do with the mother? Parents need to take responsibility for what their kids do except when their kids shoot up a school.
Uhm, this shooter was 20 years old. TWENTY!!!! This has nothing to do with "parenting". The guy was an adult (keyword here!!) and he was the one that chose to do this horrendous act. His mother could only do so much since the legal age in this country is 18, unfortunately. The responsibility does not fall on the mother because of that, period.
Quoting Mir (Reply 129): Require registration of them by a certain date. Match them to their current owner by serial number (or other identifying information).
Ain't ever gonna happen....ever. And that wouldn't accomplish anything because gun crimes by criminals will still happen.
Quoting cerecl (Reply 145): the current focus is not to strip your right to carry guns,
To the anti-gun folks on this thead, yes it is. Read the thread, especially BN747's posts.
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 146): You do not have the right to rescind my rights because you disagree with them. If you can't understand that, there's nothing I can do for you.
Having said that, I think the thread can now be closed and locked. We finally got somewhere and there is no more that can be done from here.
As I said before, my last post in this thread, and any future gun threads. Best of luck!
A Safe Flight Begins With Quality Maintenance On The Ground.
seb146 From United States of America, joined Nov 1999, 9798 posts, RR: 17 Reply 151, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 14 hours ago) and read 2005 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 150): this shooter was 20 years old. TWENTY!!!! This has nothing to do with "parenting".
So she did not teach him well. That is: every *life* is sacred. There is a grey area about life. But, she did not teach him about life being precious and how others' lives are sacred and precious.
I think we can all agree that she failed as a parent in teaching her son that, at 6 years old, he had no clue as to life being precious and sacred.
L-188 From United States of America, joined Jul 1999, 29349 posts, RR: 62 Reply 152, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 14 hours ago) and read 2004 times:
AirframeAS is right on a couple of accounts.
1. Shooting is fun.
2. Most of the anti-gun folks responding here are advocates of total bans
3.the shooter was twenty, not a teenager. Although in my opinion, it does sound like he was about as smothered by his mom as Norman Bates
4. I suggested this thread be locked days ago, the issue is too polarized.
OBAMA-WORST PRESIDENT EVER....Even SKOORB would be better.
Mir From United States of America, joined Jan 2004, 19687 posts, RR: 56 Reply 153, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 14 hours ago) and read 2002 times:
So far, the message I've heard from the pro-gun crowd (including some on this thread) boils down to "kids getting shot in schools is going to happen, there's not a whole lot we can do about it, and even if we could stop some of the murders we couldn't stop them all so it's not worth doing". No suggestions for steps that we could take that don't extend even close to banning guns entirely, no acknowledgement of the fact that a significant majority of Americans now support a ban on semi-automatic assault rifles, or of the fact that calls for more gun control do not automatically equal calls for a complete ban on guns. Just a shrug of the shoulders and a "oh well, that sucks for the kids and their families, but that's life, let me go buy some more guns now".
Take that message to the country. Go ahead, do it. See how far you get.
You'll lose.
-Mir
7 billion, one nation, imagination...it's a beautiful day
FlyDeltaJets From United States of America, joined Feb 2006, 1623 posts, RR: 3 Reply 154, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 14 hours ago) and read 1994 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 150): Ain't ever gonna happen....ever. And that wouldn't accomplish anything because gun crimes by criminals will still happen.
I don't think that registration would be such a bad idea. Who does it harm to ensure that all firearms have a registered owner. There are cities that already do it. Cars and boats have to be registered why not guns?
EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12556 posts, RR: 64 Reply 155, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 14 hours ago) and read 1993 times:
Quoting Mir (Reply 153): So far, the message I've heard from the pro-gun crowd (including some on this thread) boils down to "kids getting shot in schools is going to happen, there's not a whole lot we can do about it, and even if we could stop some of the murders we couldn't stop them all so it's not worth doing".
If that's what you're hearing in this thread, you haven't been paying attention. Go back and re-read it from start to finish and you'll see how wildly incorrect your statement is.
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
seb146 From United States of America, joined Nov 1999, 9798 posts, RR: 17 Reply 156, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 14 hours ago) and read 1988 times:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 152): 4. I suggested this thread be locked days ago, the issue is too polarized.
I think this thread is actually good. Not much "no, you are an idiot" in here. I think there has been a very good exchange of ideas. That could be why.
Quoting L-188 (Reply 152): 2. Most of the anti-gun folks responding here are advocates of total bans
I have not seen much call for it. I don't own guns and don't want guns in my house, but I do not agree with a total ban. Most "liberals" agree, from what I have heard. But, that could just be me living in the SF Bay Area and having grown up in gun crazy Oregon.
Quoting FlyDeltaJets (Reply 154): I don't think that registration would be such a bad idea. Who does it harm to ensure that all firearms have a registered owner. There
The problem is: NRA does not want much regulation at all. I would not have a problem with gun owners registering weapons every year for like $10 or whatever. Again: I do not want any automatic/semi-automatic weapons at all, but registering them would help, but not cure the problem.
L-188 From United States of America, joined Jul 1999, 29349 posts, RR: 62 Reply 157, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 13 hours ago) and read 1982 times:
Seb, let me ask a questIon, registration means in this day and age a database, electronic type.
With the lack of data security in this day and age how can you guarantee that data will not be stolen and then my house/ collection be targeted for robbery by people that need to secure weapons through nafarious means?
I remember when those two kids shot up their school back before the assault weapons ban they secured weapons from their grandfathers gun safe by taking his acetylene torch to it!
OBAMA-WORST PRESIDENT EVER....Even SKOORB would be better.
seb146 From United States of America, joined Nov 1999, 9798 posts, RR: 17 Reply 158, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 13 hours ago) and read 1979 times:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 157): With the lack of data security in this day and age how can you guarantee that data will not be stolen and then my house/ collection be targeted for robbery by people that need to secure weapons through nafarious means?
What I find interesting is that, more often than not, private corporations like BofA and FB and amazon.com are getting hacked and not doing much about it but government sites find risks and alert everyone. I don't trust the government either, but they seem a little more secure than private corporations. Not much, but still.
L-188 From United States of America, joined Jul 1999, 29349 posts, RR: 62 Reply 159, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 13 hours ago) and read 1975 times:
Well I am not so sure about that, but I will concede the government lacks a profit motive to downplay the effects of a breech.
But I think you can see where it is a legitimate concern
OBAMA-WORST PRESIDENT EVER....Even SKOORB would be better.
YVRLTN From Canada, joined Oct 2006, 2084 posts, RR: 0 Reply 160, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 13 hours ago) and read 1961 times:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 4): Yes the fix is to fix the mental health system in this country, not banning guns.
I agree. but how many years or decades will that take? Meanwhile make it harder for nutjobs to get guns and your rights or hobby will not be affected at all, other than maybe costing you a bit more.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 16): Why don't we harden schools much like we harden banks and airports?
Because people raid banks to steal money and aircraft are very vulnerable to terrorism.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 26): The idea of leaving hundreds of children with a few dozen unarmed (and mostly female) adults seems reckless in hindsight.
I survived 12 years of school without armed teachers. Seems you did too.
Quoting brilondon (Reply 29): Oh yeah lets arm the teachers and while were at it don't forget to arm the administrators and the janitor
And its not outside the realm of possibility that the teacher or administrator or janitor the state just armed is a nutjob too.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 31): People made similar criticisms about arming pilots
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 31): What makes volunteer teachers so different than volunteer pilots?
Pilots are now behind locked doors.
Quoting roswell41 (Reply 66): The side you would be negotiating with, the left and so-called 'moderates',
I know you will call me retarded for not understanding the fundamentals of the US constitution or whatever, but I really dont get why gun ownership is so categorized as a left wing / right wing thing. Im probably conservative in outlook, but I would like to see something done about gun deaths. So how many of those right wing hard liners are pro-life and anti-abortion? Pro-life is OK for embryos, but its no problem to have a right to shoot people or for the state to give them lethal injections or fry them in an old chair. Politics + pro-life + gun rights, just seems all rather mixed up down south of the border to me.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 81): Legislating from emotion is a terrible way to legislate.
No disrespect to you personally, as you are clearly a responsible gun owner, but this goes both ways - there is plenty of emotion about keeping your rights and your guns too. Emotion needs to be dropped on both sides. Dead innocent kids will generally pull on the heart strings a little harder for most humans I admit.
Quoting flymia (Reply 109): Supermarkets do usually have a off duty officer in them, at least down here in Florida.
Malls usually do have police or armed security.
Shoplifting and a public place for vagrants to meet.
Fans (fanatics) who hate each other and fuelled by emotion from the result or events of the game and often alcohol involved not to mention masses of people all moving at once which requires crowd control.
Quoting flymia (Reply 109): Banks have armed guards
Jewelry stores have armed guards
Bank trucks have armed guards
Obvious one, dealing with high value stuff vulnerable to theft.
Quoting flymia (Reply 109): Yet schools should not have uniformed police officers who carry a weapon? How in the world that makes sense is beyond me.
There is no high risk commodity attached to a school. It should be a place where kids are studying and having fun. In 12 years at school, not once did we face a situation where my teacher needed to be armed. That was in England though... whatever next, a personal body guard for everyone? Or a convoy system for shoppers or going out in public?
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 150): Because we cannot come to a mutual agreement or a solution to the "gun" debate
There can only be a solution if people have a common objective which requires accepting control is needed and gun owners doing that little bit extra to be responsible rather than just blaming mental health. I have offered many solutions in other threads which will not affect the law abiding gun owner, other than some $$$ outta your pocket to fund it, just like any other hobby or car / aircraft / boat ownership.
yyz717 From Canada, joined Sep 2001, 15989 posts, RR: 59 Reply 161, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 13 hours ago) and read 1962 times:
Quoting tugger (Thread starter): LaPierre pointed the finger not at gun proliferation but violent video games, the media and the absence of armed guards at schools.
Wow, well.....we have video games here in Canada, and no armed guards at schools, and yet, we don't have children being shot. How would hte NRA explaing that?
Until the US starts banning guns, children and adults will continue to due senselessly and needlessly.
Canada is a frontier society just like the US, and yet our murder rate by gunshot is about 5% of the US level on a per capita basis, due to our stronger gun laws......and yet, Canadians are still free people. I would argue we live FREER than Americans because we are free from gunshot aimed at us.
Panam, TWA, Ansett, Eastern.......AC next? Might be good for Canada.
"Put more guns in schools" (the prevailing sentiment on the thread among gun advocates, and of course the idea espoused by the NRA) is just another way of saying that you are helpless to do anything about the number of people who will be able to walk into a school with a gun and start shooting children, and that people have to fend for themselves. The extension of that logic, of course, is that the real reason that kids died at Sandy Hook is that the school wasn't fending for itself by not having armed personnel there, in essence putting the blood on the hands of the school district of Newtown rather than the guy who walked in with an assault rifle and pulled the trigger (whether people mean it that way or not, that's how it comes across).
The alternative idea is that you can, through effective legislation and policing, reduce the number of people who will be able to walk into a school with a gun and start shooting. You will never reduce that number to zero - even countries with very tight gun laws, tighter than those that could ever happen here, have had shootings. But those who propose that philosophy (including myself) believe that fewer people able to walk into schools with guns is likely to lead to fewer shootings. We also believe that if someone were forced to walk into a school with a pistol instead of an assault rifle (and again, you can never eliminate the possibility of someone going into a school with an assault rifle but you can reduce it), they would kill fewer people by virtue of not being able to dispense bullets as quickly.
So we have "you're on your own, we can't help you" (with the subtext of "and if your children get shot it's your own fault") and "we are going to try and keep guns out of the hands of those who would do harm with them, particularly the extremely deadly ones, with the understanding that we're not going to be perfect at it". Which of those messages do you think is going to play better to the general public?
I'm not discounting the idea of security guards in schools - in certain cases it could be useful. But if the NRA wants to be taken seriously, they're going to have to bring more than that to the table.
As for the part about it being pointless to take certain measures since they wouldn't be completely effective, that's been said numerous times on the thread.
Quoting L-188 (Reply 157): Seb, let me ask a questIon, registration means in this day and age a database, electronic type.
With the lack of data security in this day and age how can you guarantee that data will not be stolen and then my house/ collection be targeted for robbery by people that need to secure weapons through nafarious means?
Wouldn't that be even more of a deterrent to robbery? The argument generally goes that if criminals thought were was a gun in a house, they would be less inclined to try to break and enter. I don't see how that desire would decrease if they knew there was a gun in a house.
-Mir
7 billion, one nation, imagination...it's a beautiful day
L-188 From United States of America, joined Jul 1999, 29349 posts, RR: 62 Reply 163, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 12 hours ago) and read 1959 times:
Only if the person is home and has access to them. Otherwise you wait nil they go out for the evening.
OBAMA-WORST PRESIDENT EVER....Even SKOORB would be better.
tugger From United States of America, joined Apr 2006, 4629 posts, RR: 7 Reply 164, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 11 hours ago) and read 1948 times:
Quoting yyz717 (Reply 161): Wow, well.....we have video games here in Canada, and no armed guards at schools, and yet, we don't have children being shot. How would hte NRA explaing that?
The absolute stupidest thing about the NRA statement is they forever (and still) claim that "guns don't kill people" but here they are blaming video games and "the media". And I can tell you for certain that a person playing a video game or watching TV has not killed another person with only that items. It is just dumb beyond belief that the NRA is trying to blame a "thing" while saying their "thing" can't be blamed.
Dumb, dumb, dumb.
Tugg
I don’t know that I am unafraid to be myself, but it is hard to be somebody else. -W. Shatner
kiwirob From New Zealand, joined Jun 2005, 5274 posts, RR: 3 Reply 165, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 10 hours ago) and read 1928 times:
Quoting FlyDeltaJets (Reply 148): I don't see how anyone could be against gun registration. It not only allows you to keep your guns but instills the "self-responsibility" gun owners say they are taking for their families safety. Registration of guns will go far to curbing illegal guns.
As far as I can tell nobody has a problem registering their motorvehicles, even collectors who own dozens of them, when you sell or trade it you also transfer the ownership to the new owner, why shouldn't it be any different for firearms. Like motorvehicles different classes of vehicle have different licensing requirements, which would be the same for firearms.
It's really a nobrainer and no reason for certain backwards thinking types to get their panties in a knot.
RussianJet From Kazakhstan, joined Jul 2007, 6268 posts, RR: 23 Reply 166, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 10 hours ago) and read 1917 times:
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 150): Uhm, this shooter was 20 years old. TWENTY!!!! This has nothing to do with "parenting"
That's a nice theory, but there are a hell of a lot of 20-year-olds that hardly behave like adults. Is there something magic about those two years between 18 and 20 that suddenly mean that all upbringing is totally erased from the character of a person? In many cases clearly not - maturity levels at that particular age vary hugely!
EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12556 posts, RR: 64 Reply 167, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 9 hours ago) and read 1912 times:
Quoting Mir (Reply 162): "Put more guns in schools" (the prevailing sentiment on the thread among gun advocates, and of course the idea espoused by the NRA) is just another way of saying that you are helpless to do anything about the number of people who will be able to walk into a school with a gun and start shooting children, and that people have to fend for themselves
Nice-lookin' straw-man you've built there.
Quoting Mir (Reply 162): So we have "you're on your own, we can't help you" (with the subtext of "and if your children get shot it's your own fault")
No, we don't have that. Those are your words, and they're driven by your desire to frame the debate on those terms.
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
flipdewaf From United Kingdom, joined Jul 2006, 1522 posts, RR: 1 Reply 168, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 9 hours ago) and read 1899 times:
Quoting RussianJet (Reply 2): Did I read correctly that just at the point they started going on about better security, a protester burst in? Good job chaps, really good job.
lol, maybe get g4s on the job would be better.
Quoting airontario (Reply 15): So by extension would the world be a safer place if every country had Nuclear missiles as well?
haha, answering this one might be difficult.
Quoting Pu (Reply 30): Video games, violent movies, crazy people and unarmed teachers exist in Australia, Japan and Europe....yet somehow an American-style monthly shooting rampage almost never occurs.
strange?
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 39): One thing that has not been expanded upon very much is how this dickhead immediately killed himself when he realized there was an armed responds
Quoting kiwirob (Reply 165): As far as I can tell nobody has a problem registering their motorvehicles, even collectors who own dozens of them, when you sell or trade it you also transfer the ownership to the new owner, why shouldn't it be any different for firearms. Like motorvehicles different classes of vehicle have different licensing requirements, which would be the same for firearms.
It's really a nobrainer and no reason for certain backwards thinking types to get their panties in a knot.
seems totally logical to me but EA CO AS, tell us why you think this type of control is bad.
FlyDeltaJets From United States of America, joined Feb 2006, 1623 posts, RR: 3 Reply 169, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 9 hours ago) and read 1904 times:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 157): Seb, let me ask a questIon, registration means in this day and age a database, electronic type.
With the lack of data security in this day and age how can you guarantee that data will not be stolen and then my house/ collection be targeted for robbery by people that need to secure weapons through nafarious means?
I remember when those two kids shot up their school back before the assault weapons ban they secured weapons from their grandfathers gun safe by taking his acetylene torch to it!
There are no such things as guarantees in life we all know that. The DMV manages to keep the data about your car pretty safe, especially since the number in big font affixed to the back of your car links directly to your address. Im certain a system can be devised. Certainly people after guns wouldn't want to rob the house of a person that has a cache of guns, or at least that is what I read before on why many people have guns in their homes.
EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12556 posts, RR: 64 Reply 170, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 9 hours ago) and read 1900 times:
Quoting flipdewaf (Reply 168): Quoting kiwirob (Reply 165):As far as I can tell nobody has a problem registering their motorvehicles, even collectors who own dozens of them, when you sell or trade it you also transfer the ownership to the new owner, why shouldn't it be any different for firearms. Like motorvehicles different classes of vehicle have different licensing requirements, which would be the same for firearms.
It's really a nobrainer and no reason for certain backwards thinking types to get their panties in a knot.
seems totally logical to me but EA CO AS, tell us why you think this type of control is bad.
First off, can you tell me which amendment to the U.S. Constitution deals with car ownership?
I don't necessarily think registration of firearms is "bad" per se, however my issue - again, for those of you who keep misinterpreting what I write here - is with the extremist view taken by folks like BN747 who would argue an outright repeal of the Second Amendment is in order. And when he or others like him also advocate extreme measures such as a $1000.00 annual registration fee per firearm - clearly designed to limit ownership - I am simply pointing out that is in direct conflict with the portion of the Second Amendment which unambiguously states that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
Put another way, would you support the First Amendment right to free speech, but only if citizens wanting to exercise that right were first required to pay an annual "free speech fee" each year?
Or would you say that such a measure is unfairly infringing upon a citizen's ability to exercise that right?
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
kiwirob From New Zealand, joined Jun 2005, 5274 posts, RR: 3 Reply 171, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 8 hours ago) and read 1887 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 170): And when he or others like him also advocate extreme measures such as a $1000.00 annual registration fee per firearm
That's just daft, a registration fee should be a one off charge, a change of ownership fee would be mandatory, however assault weapons should be limited and owners of such weapons should require a special license and training, rather like getting a heavey vehicle license, it should also be renewed every so often.
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 170):
First off, can you tell me which amendment to the U.S. Constitution deals with car ownership?
I'm surprised it's not, I'd feel pretty confident stating that car ownership is vastly more important to the average American than the ability to purchase a weapon. I guarantee that if the govt banned private vehicle ownership in the US the stink raised would be far far greater than any ban on weapon ownership.
FlyDeltaJets From United States of America, joined Feb 2006, 1623 posts, RR: 3 Reply 172, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 8 hours ago) and read 1879 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 170): I don't necessarily think registration of firearms is "bad" per se, however my issue - again, for those of you who keep misinterpreting what I write here - is with the extremist view taken by folks like BN747 who would argue an outright repeal of the Second Amendment is in order. And when he or others like him also advocate extreme measures such as a $1000.00 annual registration fee per firearm - clearly designed to limit ownership - I am simply pointing out that is in direct conflict with the portion of the Second Amendment which unambiguously states that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
Put another way, would you support the First Amendment right to free speech, but only if citizens wanting to exercise that right were first required to pay an annual "free speech fee" each year?
Or would you say that such a measure is unfairly infringing upon a citizen's ability to exercise that right?
The point of registration should not be a deterring factor except for those that rather have no means of tracking firearms. Other than a the fee that you spoke of which I would disagree with as well, what realistic issues could one have that would like to legally and responsibly own a firearm have with registration. I believe that there shouldn't be a fee or if a fee a small one just to help the costs of operating the registration system. A really high fee wont deter people from buying firearms it would just deter them from registering them thus defeating the purpose of the entire mission.
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 174, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days 2 hours ago) and read 1810 times:
Hmmm, surprised this hasn't been locked and archived yet.
Quoting Ken777 (Reply 133): Taking in a gun, or wasting their time arguing about it with them is simple intimidation and is unacceptable.
How is it intimidation? I don't go in there waving my gun around. I don't charge into the manager's office and demand an audience. I obey the law in all matters concerning my firearms.
I won't deal with a national chain on this matter, because the local guy usually has no input on the matter. In fact, you'll find that many national chains will refer to local law on the issue.
As for local business owners (with which I prefer shopping), I already have an established business relationship with these folks and, I have no problem, broaching the subject. If the guy doesn't want to change his stance, I say "thank you for your time" and go away. I may or may not shop there again...and I let the owner know that also.
Quoting Ken777 (Reply 133): Why try to shove your point of view down their throats?
Talking to someone is not shoving my point of view down their throats. It's talking, discussing, opening a dialogue.
As for registration, I am generally not opposed to a registration, but I want full protections of privacy in such a registration. I want a court order for the police or government to view such a registry.
Looking at it a bit further, how would a transfer of firearms go. Would I now be responsible to ensure that the purchaser of one of my firearms is eligible? Right now, under federal law, I need to have a reasonable belief that the person I'm transferring to is not prohibited from owning a firearm.
kiwirob From New Zealand, joined Jun 2005, 5274 posts, RR: 3 Reply 175, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days ago) and read 1782 times:
Quoting FlyDeltaJets (Reply 172): A really high fee wont deter people from buying firearms it would just deter them from registering them thus defeating the purpose of the entire mission.
Ah don't you get it, you would have to register the weapon upon purchase, no registration, no purchase, simple.
L-188 From United States of America, joined Jul 1999, 29349 posts, RR: 62 Reply 176, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days ago) and read 1777 times:
So, what is to prevent gangs from manufacturing these weapons?
Just like pot or meth?
Most military weapons where designed to be manufactured with basic tools and unskilled labor. Which is exactly what has been happening up on the afghan-Pakistan border for a hundred years, first they started to build martini-Henry's and then moved onto Enfield Rifles and now for the last thirty years have been building AK's.
I will go so far as to say anybody who has taken auto, metal or welding shop has more than the needed skills to build a functional weapon like an AK.
Needless to say any underground manufactured weapon will not be serial numbered or registered.
OBAMA-WORST PRESIDENT EVER....Even SKOORB would be better.
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 177, posted (4 months 3 weeks 5 days ago) and read 1766 times:
Quoting cerecl (Reply 145): Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143):
but again, stripping rights from 99.9999% percent of the population because 0.0001% of the population chose to abuse a particular right absolutely cannot be permitted to happen.
AS far as I can see, the current focus is not to strip your right to carry guns, it is about banning the sale of military grade weapons.
Someone has problems with the concept of hypotheticals..ignore him//
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 146): Your perception is irrelevant. You do not have the right to rescind my rights because you disagree with them. If you can't understand that, there's nothing I can do for you.
The only thing to be understood is ..what hypothetical means.
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 146): Hardly; criminal activity is at its very core a risk vs. reward argument, and the risk a criminal faces for the "reward" of successfully engaging in behavior like armed robbery or murder doesn't increase due to the additional possible charge of firearm possession.
Criminals and criminal activity are not equal in any societal offense except they not legal or socially acceptable.
..a jaywalker is nor the same as liquor store robber nor a jewelry their or a Wall Street crook.. each are pursued very differently.
There are lines of psychiatrist dying to see how you come up with these off the deep end conclusions...
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 146): Meth is totally banned, yet "Hey, I think my neighbor is a meth dealer," won't result in a search warrant. Try again.
You try, go ahead...name the first time read about office staff getting killed by someone bursting in and hitting everyone in the head with a bag of Meth... this outta be good.
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 147): Quoting cerecl (Reply 145):
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143): but again, stripping rights from 99.9999% percent of the population because 0.0001% of the population chose to abuse a particular right absolutely cannot be permitted to happen.
AS far as I can see, the current focus is not to strip your right to carry guns, it is about banning the sale of military grade weapons.
You haven't been reading BN's posts; he's advocating that access to ALL firearms be restricted.
Quoting seb146 (Reply 149): These are all just hypothetical, first off
,,,ahhh relief, someone knows a hypothetical when they see one..
BN747
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
kiwirob From New Zealand, joined Jun 2005, 5274 posts, RR: 3 Reply 178, posted (4 months 3 weeks 4 days 23 hours ago) and read 1756 times:
Quoting L-188 (Reply 176): So, what is to prevent gangs from manufacturing these weapons?
It'd be illegal and if caught in your possession you'd get into serious trouble, would you want to shoot a homemade weapon? What's so difficult to understand about that?
JakeOrion From United States of America, joined Oct 2005, 1247 posts, RR: 2 Reply 179, posted (4 months 3 weeks 4 days 23 hours ago) and read 1745 times:
Quoting kiwirob (Reply 178): It'd be illegal and if caught in your possession you'd get into serious trouble, would you want to shoot a homemade weapon? What's so difficult to understand about that?
That in reality, criminals simply do not care about laws.
Quote: Since Jan. 1, Chicago police have recorded 2,364 shooting incidents and 487 homicides, 87 percent of them gun-related. Shootings have increased 12 percent this year and homicides are up 19 percent.
Quote: Since the early 1970s, Chicago and its suburban municipalities have taken a national lead in enacting firearms control legislation. Citizens' groups such as the Committee for Handgun Control, formed in 1973 and renamed Illinois Citizens for Handgun Control in 1982, have worked together with city politicians and police to pass some of the nation's toughest gun control laws.
Gun control only punishes the honest folk, not the criminals.
Every problem has a simple solution; finding the simple solution is the difficult problem.
cmf From United States of America, joined Jun 2011, 2474 posts, RR: 35 Reply 180, posted (4 months 3 weeks 4 days 22 hours ago) and read 1716 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 104):
Actually, I have the utmost respect for the property rights of others, but I have more respect for my right to defend myself. So long as I'm not breaking the law, I don't see an issue.
Quoting flymia (Reply 109): I just wrote an extensive law research paper on mass shootings and mental health confidentiality laws. It required a lot of research in past mass shooting cases. So so many of them had warning signs of the impending doom.
That is great but how do we catch them in time? And what do we do about the bigger problems? As horrible as mass murders are they are a tiny fraction of the innocent killed each year
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 115): Let me ask you all this: What are you going to do if a gunman comes into the crowded place you're at with pistols and rifles, shooting the place up if the second amendment is thrown out (for example)? How are you going to defend yourself and others? Just stand there and get killed as if this was no bug deal? Seriously?!
How frequently are you in a place where that happens? For most people in this country it is never. I want to keep it that way. I know there will be times when it happens and thus not everyone is able to say never but I want it as rare as possible. That is why anyone who plans to go shooting up a place should need to put a lot of effort into doing so. Not just go down to their gun dealer or send someone to do it for them. The two most common ways.
I certainty do not want to be in a room where one person starts shooting and then everyone else starts shooting too.
As to what I would to. Try to get the hell out.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 115): Ok, fine, if that's how you all anti-gun ban all guns folk feel, don't look at me after you are 1) injured, 2) psychologically traumatized or 3) killed by a madman gunman. You wanted guns banned, this is what YOU get. Not my problem.
I take it. And I have seen injured, accident at range. I have seen traumatized, guy who accidentally shoot the injured at the range. And I still think that shooting at range should be allowed so stop stating that the two extreme points are the only options.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 115): It's quite amazing how very few people uses their brains and common sense. Again, it's sad.
It is sad. Amazing how statistics is ignored to justify having guns in places they have no business being.
Quoting ltbewr (Reply 124): The statement of the NRA president on Friday has to be one of the worst public relations 'fails' I can remember, indeed, they literally shot themselves in the foot.
It has potential to be considered the moment NRA lost power.
Quoting seb146 (Reply 128): All this talk about "blame the parents" and "where were the parents" but this had nothing to do with the mother? Parents need to take responsibility for what their kids do except when their kids shoot up a school.
Brutally accurate.
Quoting Maverick623 (Reply 135): That would go over only slightly more well than a total ban... and would have done NOTHING to stop Sandy Hook.
The problem is bigger than Sandy Hook. Just because it wouldn't have helped there doesn't mean anything about the situations it can help.
But reality is that it may have helped in sandy Hook too. If owners are held responsible for the use of their guns it is possible she would have stored them so he could not get hold of them.
Quoting Maverick623 (Reply 139): That worked out so well for Fast and Furious....
Fast and Furious doesn't define the problem.
Quoting Maverick623 (Reply 139): Also, it's crazy to think that a criminal who has broken one gun control law will suddenly obey another.
How do criminals get guns? That is what we need to stop. The way to do that is tracking.
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143): What happened to those kids is beyond tragic, but again, stripping rights from 99.9999% percent of the population because 0.0001% of the population chose to abuse a particular right absolutely cannot be permitted to happen.
There is no suggestion to stripping your rights. There are suggestion to require to show proficiency and responsibly handling.
The closest you can get to stripping are the suggestions to ban assault weapons and large magazines. That is removing less than the 0.0001% of the legal gun experience.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 150): I am appalled that the Mods are allowing these gun threads to keep on being put up knowing that it will not end well. But before I close, I must respond to some of these:
I appealed by those who try to suppress discussion about something that many people find important.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 150): You don't know me. I don't own guns because of fear. I own guns because I like to shoot. I own rifles because I like to hunt.
There is nothing suggested that well prevent you from doing that.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 150): Ain't ever gonna happen....ever. And that wouldn't accomplish anything because gun crimes by criminals will still happen.
All the guns out there today has not been able to stop crime by criminals either.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 150): To the anti-gun folks on this thead, yes it is.
No it is not.
Quoting AirframeAS (Reply 150): As I said before, my last post in this thread, and any future gun threads. Best of luck!
If you can't defend your stance then don't be surprised when things change in a direction you don't like.
Quoting L-188 (Reply 152): 2. Most of the anti-gun folks responding here are advocates of total bans
No we don't. I've lost track on how many times I have responded to pro-gun people making that claim but you keep repeating it like a mantra.
Quoting L-188 (Reply 152): I suggested this thread be locked days ago, the issue is too polarized.
That it is polarized is a sign it needs to be discusses. As long as people want to discuss and follow the rules of the forum it is wrong to stop the discussion.
Quoting L-188 (Reply 157): With the lack of data security in this day and age how can you guarantee that data will not be stolen and then my house/ collection be targeted for robbery by people that need to secure weapons through nafarious means?
I'm confident there are a lot more people who already know you have guns than there are people who could hack such a database and then would decide to target you.
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 155): If that's what you're hearing in this thread, you haven't been paying attention. Go back and re-read it from start to finish and you'll see how wildly incorrect your statement is.
The below is from your first post on this thread. It doesn't mention kids but it does follow the underlying message about the pro-gun argument that nothing will stop.
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 74): Spare me. Most law-abiding people would see the sign and say, "Ok, guess I can't carry my firearm there," whereas would-be criminals wouldn't give two shits about the sign.
Quoting Mir (Reply 162): reduce the number of people who will be able to
The more accessible something is the more often it is used. That is why guns should be limited to ranges, hunting and a few cases where they can help with wild animals and similar. The places responsible owners use them. Not go for that 0.0001% chance that something will happen with a 0.0001% chance they would be able to make the outcome better.
Quoting tugger (Reply 164): The absolute stupidest thing about the NRA statement is they forever (and still) claim that "guns don't kill people" but here they are blaming video games and "the media". And I can tell you for certain that a person playing a video game or watching TV has not killed another person with only that items. It is just dumb beyond belief that the NRA is trying to blame a "thing" while saying their "thing" can't be blamed.
Right on.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 174): I am generally not opposed to a registration
After many threads I'm glad to see pro-gunners accept registration.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 174): Looking at it a bit further, how would a transfer of firearms go. Would I now be responsible to ensure that the purchaser of one of my firearms is eligible?
It would be crazy if you weren't. Of course there must be a process for doing so.
Quoting JakeOrion (Reply 179): Gun control only punishes the honest folk, not the criminals.
Wrong, gun control raises the bar dramatically as to what it takes. The most harden criminals will of course do what it takes but they are robbing the banks today too. They also rob gas stations despite knowing there are guns.
Not having loaded weapons will remove most impulsive use and it will stop several people who planned "bigger things" by either making it impossible for them or draw attention to them.
Don’t repeat earlier generations mistakes. Learn history for a better future.
itsjustme From United States of America, joined Apr 2004, 2765 posts, RR: 11 Reply 181, posted (4 months 3 weeks 4 days 21 hours ago) and read 1696 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 146): Meth is totally banned, yet "Hey, I think my neighbor is a meth dealer," won't result in a search warrant. Try again.
Maybe not immediately but I can guarantee it will result in law enforcement taking a closer look at that neighbor using pre-warrant means like surveillance and trash pulls.
I agree we need to make our schools safer and my thought is to put plain clothed, armed, sworn officers in schools on a rotating basis. Call them "teacher's aids", "interns", "student teachers, "fiscal monitors" or whatever so as not to alarm the kids. Put them in soft, business casual clothes and allow them to roam the halls and sit in on classes. And do it on a rotating basis. That would mean that today, schools A,B,C,D, and E in a district are covered. Tomorrow schools F,G,H,I, and J are covered, and so on. Another idea is to park fully marked "decoy" police vehicles at schools. I have to believe that had Adam Lanza seen a fully marked police car at Sandy Hook school when he arrived, he would have thought twice about his plan to kill kids that day. Or at least at that school.
We also need stricter punishment for illegally possessing a firearm and when using or possessing or inferring the possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime. Our current "enhanced sentencing" of those possessing a firearm during the commission of a crime is a joke. Tack on an automatic additional 10 years when someone illegally possesses, infers possession or uses a firearm when committing a crime and you'll see some positive results. That means if you get arrested for DUI or any other "minor" crime and we find you in possession of a firearm that violates state or federal firearm laws and instead of bonding out a few hours later and eventually paying a fine and being placed on probation, you now have to do a mandatory 10 year stint in prison. Think that wouldn't have an impact on people violating our firearm laws and getting not only repeat but first time offenders off the streets?
And here's the idea that a lot of you will take issue with which is fine, just keep it civil: Ban all private ownership and possession of automatic and semi-automatic firearms. You want a gun for personal or home protection? Fine. Buy a revolver. If you can't stop the threat of harm to you or a loved one with six .357 magnum rounds, then you have no business being in possession of a firearm in the first place. You want to get your fix and fire off a few thousand rounds from a semi or fully automatic weapon? Great. To satisfy that fix, I suggest each state provide x number of Federally owned and operated gun ranges and we give them a cache of automatic and semi-automatic firearms which you can rent and fire at the range until your heart's content. All you have to do is present a certified background check not more than 3 months old, a government issued picture ID (driver license, state ID card, or passport), and some cash and in return you're handed the weapon of your choice, as many rounds and targets as you care to purchase, and ear and eye protection and off you go to blast away until your heart's content. When you're done, you return all rented items, your ID and background check are returned to you and off you go.
Pu From Sweden, joined Dec 2011, 642 posts, RR: 12 Reply 183, posted (4 months 3 weeks 4 days 20 hours ago) and read 1673 times:
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 104): only after careful consideration of my own self-preservation.
...
but I have more respect for my right to defend myself
Besides all the other arguments, a basic reason why this is a Right versus Left issue is the standard Right view that the individual rights trump the needs of society, versus the Left's view that the overall good of society is more important than individual rights.
City people want to control guns, rural people don't....just as city people are Democrats and rurl people are Republicans.
When women and minorities decide gun control is good, it will happen: like the Presidential race this is largely a contest between angry white men and everyone else.
Quoting fr8mech (Reply 107): we would amend it based on emotions, rather than sound rationale
The emotional fear of getting killed while being unarmed, although factually invalid is whats driving your love of guns.
Quoting flymia (Reply 109): Why not put them in elementary schools
Why not armoured personnel carriers instead of school busses?
Why not replace Math and Science with Introduction to Assault Weaponry ?
It's no coincidence that the same mentality that brought you the triumphant Iraq War and greater defense spending is the same that loves guns - and, as in Iraq or America's 200 000 homicides since 9/11 - the misappropriation of funds away from what really matters speaks for itself in terms of bloody results.
EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12556 posts, RR: 64 Reply 184, posted (4 months 3 weeks 4 days 20 hours ago) and read 1670 times:
Quoting BN747 (Reply 177): Someone has problems with the concept of hypotheticals..
Only ones that are so ridiculously outside the realm of possibility that spending time considering them is a waste of my time.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 177): Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 146):Hardly; criminal activity is at its very core a risk vs. reward argument, and the risk a criminal faces for the "reward" of successfully engaging in behavior like armed robbery or murder doesn't increase due to the additional possible charge of firearm possession.
Criminals and criminal activity are not equal in any societal offense except they not legal or socially acceptable.
..a jaywalker is nor the same as liquor store robber nor a jewelry their or a Wall Street crook.. each are pursued very differently.
Nice try at clouding the issue, but I never said they're the same. I said that if someone were already prepared to commit a crime like assault or murder - crimes that already carry stiff criminal penalties - the added penalty of being found to have an illegal weapon in their possession in the course of committing those crimes would not deter such a person from either.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 177): Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 146):Meth is totally banned, yet "Hey, I think my neighbor is a meth dealer," won't result in a search warrant. Try again.
You try, go ahead...name the first time read about office staff getting killed by someone bursting in and hitting everyone in the head with a bag of Meth... this outta be good.
So meth doesn't kill anyone? Please come tell my cousin that; she'll be thrilled to know her son is actually alive somewhere instead of agonizing over thinking she somehow failed as a parent.
Or perhaps you can try your cute line on the families of the many innocent people killed in acts of drug-related violence each year.
The point - which once again, you're trying to deflect - is that merely tipping off the police that you "think" your neighbor has a gun won't result in a search warrant any more than telling them you "think" they deal drugs, run a meth lab, a human smuggling ring, etc. would without evidence to back that up.
Quoting cmf (Reply 180): ting EA CO AS (Reply 143):What happened to those kids is beyond tragic, but again, stripping rights from 99.9999% percent of the population because 0.0001% of the population chose to abuse a particular right absolutely cannot be permitted to happen.
There is no suggestion to stripping your rights.
Either you haven't been paying attention to BN's posts, you can't comprehend them, or you're in agreement with him and this is your attempt at throwing your support behind the cause. But when he says:
Quoting BN747 (Reply 35): Your hobby is costing us TOO MANY innocent lives. The tradeoff is simply not worth it. You're 'someone might break in and get me' maybe...is not worth scores of innocent people getting shot to death every freakin' week of the year. And those numbers aren't receding...they are increasing - week by week by week,
A price has to be paid.
So far it's been too many bodies and blood of the innocent.
So yes, bullet taxes, gun owner taxes and escalated it for multiple ownership...no one person can shoot 5 guns at once.
He's absolutely, positively advocating stripping or at least infringing on my ability to exercise my rights provided under the Second Amendment.
Y'know, the one that ends with "SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED" ?
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 185, posted (4 months 3 weeks 4 days 20 hours ago) and read 1667 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 147): Quoting cerecl (Reply 145):
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 143): but again, stripping rights from 99.9999% percent of the population because 0.0001% of the population chose to abuse a particular right absolutely cannot be permitted to happen.
AS far as I can see, the current focus is not to strip your right to carry guns, it is about banning the sale of military grade weapons.
You haven't been reading BN's posts; he's advocating that access to ALL firearms be restricted.
Since you have been reading my post...
..why is it you went all ape over the 'Total Gun Ban America' hypothetical (and took it as emphatic expressed opinion)
and
..completely avoided addressing the 'Fully Armed Locked and Loaded America' hypothetical?
That does look kinda like 'bias etched in stone' to some degree..
BN747
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12556 posts, RR: 64 Reply 186, posted (4 months 3 weeks 4 days 19 hours ago) and read 1648 times:
Quoting BN747 (Reply 185): why is it you went all ape over the 'Total Gun Ban America' hypothetical (and took it as emphatic expressed opinion)
The "Total Gun Ban" hypothetical you posed in reply 119 was followed up with your glowing, Pollyannaesque predictions:
Quoting BN747 (Reply 119): there will be zero to virtually no school slaughter by gun...ever again
No mass Mall killings by guns
No mass Office/Work place killings
No restaurant hold ups at gun point - been in that one.
Virtually no 7-11 stick ups.Cops the tv show....relegated to just car chases and domestic disputes.
Based on your words above, it's not unreasonable to draw the conclusion that this is what you'd wish for if you could snap your fingers and make a "Total Gun Ban America" a reality.
Tell me I'm wrong if that's the case, though. Go on record here, and tell all of us that your preference is NOT for a total gun ban. Can you do that?
Quoting BN747 (Reply 185): completely avoided addressing the 'Fully Armed Locked and Loaded America' hypothetical?
Once again, because it's so far-fetched and unlikely to happen (zero restrictions or regulations on firearms anywhere, anytime) that it doesn't merit serious discussion.
Quoting BN747 (Reply 185): That does look kinda like 'bias etched in stone' to some degree..
Pot. Kettle. Black.
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
BN747 From United States of America, joined Mar 2002, 5287 posts, RR: 52 Reply 187, posted (4 months 3 weeks 4 days 19 hours ago) and read 1634 times:
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 186): Tell me I'm wrong if that's the case, though. Go on record here, and tell all of us that your preference is NOT for a total gun ban. Can you do that?
Given the two hypotheticals -
Total Gun Ban America VS Totally Armed America
I wholeheartedly favor the former..no question about it. And favor the latter..no question about it.
..sooooo...what's your point?
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 186): Quoting BN747 (Reply 185):
completely avoided addressing the 'Fully Armed Locked and Loaded America' hypothetical?
Once again, because it's so far-fetched and unlikely to happen (zero restrictions or regulations on firearms anywhere, anytime) that it doesn't merit serious discussion.
One will win out... you're acting like this current situation (escalating gun violence can remain the same...forever)
it can not. Any happy median that is reached...will be very temporary. Americans are historically known not to learn their lessons and two, always push the envelop - in this arena, the gun dance...they really cannot leave it be. Add in our savage nature...gun violence is assured. And increasingly so.
Quoting EA CO AS (Reply 186): Quoting BN747 (Reply 185):
That does look kinda like 'bias etched in stone' to some degree..
Pot. Kettle. Black.
Again errant analogy. It would have merit if I only addressed one side of your argument and purposely evaded another segment of it. your bias is blatantly clear in how you chose a hypothetical position and 'made my' absolute stance period. And avoided discussing the counter proposal or worse case scenario - which your beliefs point towards. How have I done that to you?
I have no problem discussing a totally armed society..or a totally unarmed society. You only addressed one (the view you abhor) and won't go near the other.
After all, such societies are not silly..they are in fact real. Need a list?
BN747
[Edited 2012-12-23 16:11:49]
"Home of the Brave, made by the Slaves..Land of the Free, if you look like me.." T. Jefferson
fr8mech From United States of America, joined Sep 2005, 4238 posts, RR: 12 Reply 188, posted (4 months 3 weeks 4 days 17 hours ago) and read 1592 times:
Quoting cmf (Reply 180): It would be crazy if you weren't. Of course there must be a process for doing so.
Let's take the step: do you advocate that a private citizen, when transferring a firearm, take on the legal duty for ensuring that a potential purchaser is eligible? I thought we couldn't allow a private actor to take on government roles; i.e. ensuring the citizenship/immigration status of a potential employee.
Quoting Pu (Reply 183): The emotional fear of getting killed while being unarmed, although factually invalid is whats driving your love of guns.
I grew up in NY (a city with a longstanding tradition of gun control). I have been mugged at knife point. My father was mugged at gun point. My mother just barely fended off a home invasion. When I lived in Texas, there were 3 violent home invasions within 1 mile of my home (they ended when one of the intruders was shot dead by a homeowner).
But, you're still wrong. My affinity to firearms does not come from my "factually invalid" fear of being killed. It comes from my love of machines. It comes from my interest in all things mechanical. It comes from a desire to being able to see the results of my practice, I suck at sports, but I can put a bullet in the 'X' ring at 50 yards with a couple of my handguns. So, you can say my love (kind of strong word for an inanimate object, no?) comes from the self-satisfaction of being able to master (or attempt to master) a machine.
It's a bonus that the thing can help me defend myself.
Quoting AKiss20 (Reply 116): Quoting fr8mech (Reply 105): Can someone point me to a link that speaks to this armed guard?http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2000/columbine.cd/Pages/DEPUTIES_TEXT.htm
Hmm, as I read this, the deputy was not on campus when this occurred, but off campus and some way away from the initial scene of action. And, as I read this I see that he did engage one of the attackers...at a range of 60 yards...and distracted the attacker. How many survived because of the distraction?
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As for the rest of your post, I am not even going to bother responding because I don't have anything nice to say to you or about you, your opinion is a bit out of wack. So I am going to leave that as it is and move on.
