jordan

If you have a problem, you deal with all the causes - you can't just cherry-pick.

eg if you have high blood pressure, you may note you don't do enough exercise, eat too much salt, eat fast food daily.

So let's say you believe you have a right to that fast food...and maybe you do.  You decide to deal with your high blood pressure by dealings with the causes, so you do more exercise, stop using salt in your cooking...but you don't give up the fast food.  Now you may notice over time that no matter what you do to address all those other causes, your blood pressure stays high, but refuse to realise that your daily fast food habit is a KEY factor in the problem.

Equally, society can and should address mental health issues.  There should be greater awareness amongst authorities about people with suspected problems - and proper treatment for them.  There should be greater screening of students.  There should be all sorts of things.

But at the end of the day, you're still going to get nutjobs out there...and if those nutjobs can conveniently go and get an effective killing tool such as a gun, then you're going to get plenty of dead people.

It's just plain dishonest imho to start addressing what happened here by trying to put the easy access to guns off the table for discussion.

Regarding the Dennis Miller Quote   

I had hoped, with sensitivity Hero, that ( from an earlier post)

 "Given, I don't have the full details and scenario of the second building but, too bad more of the victims in the second attack couldn't organize an ad hoc defense of some kind a la Flight 93. Perhaps that was not posssible under the circumstances."

Bleep you, & bleep the establishment, and bleep all of you who are trying to make me part of the unestablished establishment.

     
“Half a truth is often a great lie.”

Ben Franklin

     
“Half a truth is often a great lie.”

Ben Franklin

Susan

Most of those interviewed were French speakers...meaning retreat, surrender and other acts of cowardice are in their blood!  And you're surprised these guys escaped to let the women get shot?

 But seriously - I'm guessing the guys didn't know the girls were about to be shot.  Just as likely the gunman was going to spare the girls, but shoot the guys outside.  Hard to know unless you were there.

I agree with your earlier comment - you really don't know what you'll do until you're faced with that situation.  Some people talk big, but when the crunch comes retreat with cowardice and self-preservation.  Others mightn't say much, but stand up with real character when it counts.

But at the end of the day, you're still going to get nutjobs out there...and if those nutjobs can conveniently go and get an effective killing tool such as a gun, then you're going to get plenty of dead people.

It's just plain dishonest imho to start addressing what happened here by trying to put the easy access to guns off the table for discussion.

Because that's ignoring the fact that people on a mission to kill will get whatever they want to kill. If they want a gun, they'll get a gun. If they want to make a bomb, they'll Google the plans and make a bomb. If they just want to stab a couple of people in the hallway, they'll do that too. The reality is that people on a mission to kill will ALWAYS find a way to kill. The problem is NOT the tools that are used.

Here's what is funny. Anytime there is a tragedy like this people want to blame guns. But when information comes out that else was used, everyone ignores those items. Example - I remember years ago on this very message board, after Columbine, people started talking about gun control and needing more control. But when the info came out that video games were used to "train", the discussion turned to "well, I play video games and don't kill anyone - no one should ban vidoe games." Anytime a story comes up about how someone liked a certain music, and someone suggests that this specific music helped kill someone else, people will immediately defend the music and throw out first amendment, and then say, "I listen to that msuic and I haven't killed anyone." Are you beginning to see my point now?

ANYTHING can be used to kill. Some tools are more useful in the crime than others - like a gun. People have no problems talking about banning something the second amendment allows you to have, but the moment we start talking about what else was used in the planning, the argument suddenly shifts to "we can't ban those items because of the first amendment" or some other reason. If we're going to talk about gun control, then let's also talk about all the other elements too. But no one does -- they want to talk about the easy one -- the obvouis one, because that's politically correct.

If we're going to talk about gun control in this case, then we also need to discuss how and why he was able to do it. His excuses were because of rich kids and America's debauchery (that we know of so far -- sounds like a statement made by other people as of late, doesn't it?). Alright, let's get rid of all rich people and let's make this country a moral society by getting rid of freedoms. There you go, problem fixed, and we still have no new gun control laws. It's the same thing with Islamic facists - we all just convert to Islam and quit our debauchery, then we wouldn't be hated so much.

The CORE of the problem is not guns.

The CORE of the problem is something much bigger.

If we can get to the CORE of the problem, then we can discuss the real problem, rather than secondary things like gun control, or the use of a lock and chain to lock people in a room so they can't escape. I'm just wondering if we will ever be able to get to the CORE of the problem -- I have a feeling there's more to this story that we will never hear.

Jordan .

Making a bomb is not a major challenge. Observe the world-wide prevalence of these simple killing devices. Attach them to a fuel-laden source and up the lethality. It's probably harder to use a bomb for a stick-up or a bank robbery but if mere carnage is the goal, they'll do just fine.

Were the fantasy of removing guns from private citizens even possible, the next evolution might be simple bombs. Since 75% of rage mass killings end with the death of the perpetrator as well, a good old-fashioned suicide car/truck bomb could just as easily take the place of the now extinct gun. Even that isn't a given though as Timothy McVeigh demonstrated with a driver-less Ryder truck loaded with explosives and parked next to a tall building. Expect a growing Fertilizer Control movement to follow on the heels of every explosion. Expect the Pro-Fertilizer Rights lobby to argue, "Cow dung doesn't kill people; people kill people."

Chris Rock's suggestion was always my favorite. Keep gun sales just as they are but control ammunition. Make it $5000 a bullet. Unfortunately ammunition is pretty easy to get even over the Internet. From what I've heard, if you're the handy type, you can make your own.

I'm with Clinton here. Hit it from both ends -- law enforcement AND restrictions.  Go for it with ever more innovative ADDITIONAL gun controls, if you can think of them. Maybe another law will help stem the tide. I have no dog in this race and have no plans to go target shooting any time soon. Our guns are locked away somewhere. Our ammunition is locked away somewhere else out of sight since the Los Angeles riots in the early 90s.

What I STILL haven't heard is the Master Plan for preventing the once-a-decade mass murder like the one in Virginia. Or the one I mentioned from Canada. They banned a certain type of gun (not the one used by the killer) and instituted a white ribbon wearing program where participating men and boys promised to challenge any man or boy caught making a misogynist joke. Maybe it worked. Haven't heard about any other crazed Canadian anti-feminist shootings lately.

Myself, I'm a fan of computer data bases. How about a central national data base that catalogs every person who has confided their suicidal/homocidal thoughts to a mental health professional? Oops. You'll have difficulty with those medical privacy rights we instituted a few years back. It would need to be limited to that patient whose suicidal/homocidal thoughts were deemed SERIOUS enough to cause the psychologist/psychiatrist/social worker to believe the patient was an imminent danger to him/herself or others. That's the current criteria for 24-hour evaluation, right? Institutionalization should be included in that data base too as should ALL convicted felons. These are already current laws throughout the US but I don't believe there is a national data base with which to check out purchases. I see other problems with this plan, though. What about phony ID? Those are just about as easy to obtain as illegal drugs and illegal firearms.

But then you have to consider what to do with foreigners who arrive later. What if they were suicidal/homicidal/felonious back home? Do we have a 5 or 10 year waiting period for them? Or should they be banned until they have full citizenship?

But let's set up that database and forever block those individuals from gun purchases. I'm good with that. Make it a federal law. It's good by me.

I actually knew someone who bought his gun for the express purpose of blowing his brains out if his wife decided to go ahead with a divorce. She did. He planned it all out very carefully and had composed a series of notes for each family member, his law partners and each close friend. Then POW. He was probably 45 years old. Three young daughters. But he had made up his mind. Did I mention that when he was at Harvard Law School, he had struggled with depression? Would prohibiting him from buying a gun, because of a psychiatric intervention half a lifetime ago, have prevented his death? I can't say. I doubt it.

What's the plan, Cyba? What's the SERIOUS plan; not the fantasy of Americans becoming laid back Aussies.

Susan

     
“Half a truth is often a great lie.”

Ben Franklin

I'm gritting my teeth. Genuinely. I think I'm damaging enamel.

Cybacat, where do you get your numbers? Is it from American anti gun lobbies, or supporting organizations? Just curious.

For the record, just to put out bullshit statistics, lets count all of the people killed by guns in a year, and call that gun violence.

Lets, however, not differentiate accidental injuries caused by people who were indoctrinated with fear of guns, instead of knowledge about them, handling them dangerously.

And lets certainly not segregate self inflicted injuries. Injuries that were it not for fire arms very easily could have been inflicted with over the counter medications. And often are, in that circumstance.

We wouldnt want to take out justifiable defense shootings of assailants from that number. After all, young women lacing rounds through rapists in alleyways is still murder...

Military training accidents? Sure, Keep em.

Police shootings in the line of duty? Security and other armed persons inflicting fatal injuries in the defense of others? Absolutely. killing is killing, right?

Just lump them all together into a big impressive number that makes guns seem scary..... granted, not as scary as, say, cars, or allergic reactions to doctor proscribed medications, or influenza... but still pretty damned impressive.

And lets then make pretend that this means that guns leap into peoples hands, and turn them into killers. Lets make this number mean that guns kill with a will of their own.  (go ahead and argue that one with me, i dare anyone.  really.)

Maybe this helps us understand statistics a little better.


Sadly, most people I meet are motivated by fear. I might be so bold as to extrapolate that situation to include that majority of people I haven't met. This wouldn't be bad, but often its in denial of observable facts.

A 9mm bullet (.356 inch calibre) of 115grns weight at 1200 Feet per second produces 367 Ft/lbs of energy at the muzzle of the weapon, and begins dropping off immediately.

An "average" Sedan of 54.000 calibre (4.5 ft across) and 14,000,000grns weight (2000lbs) traveling at 88fps (60mph) produces 240,691 ft/lbs of energy... and maintains that as long as molly milquetoast has her high heeled foot on the gas, while arguing with Adam Average in the passenger seat.

For anyone not currently living in Bahrain, I'm guessing the number of sedans you deal with on a day to day basis out weighs the number of mid caliber handgun rounds by some substantial exponent.

But I watch people drive DRUNK... cross streets DRUNK... swerve in and out of traffic.... speed through SCHOOL ZONES...

Not a lot of people petitioning for cars to be banned though. Or booze. Or school zones, for all the difference it would make.

Now, lets hypothesize. Crazed gunman just saw a very disturbing episode of the family guy, buys a truck load of illegal guns from some greasy terrorist in an alley some where, loads up his full auto Glock 18 machine pistol, and decides to charge into a high school art class and kill all of the future cartoonists...

Situation one: Guns are illegal everywhere... no one has to deal with them unless they are a criminal, and so they freeze in terror at the sight of them, and the gunman happily dispatches immobile targets, one after another.

Situation two: CCW laws permit adults meeting the appropriate criteria, including staff and faculty, to carry concealed weapons with issued permits...even in schools. Gun fire breaks out. The womens studies teacher walking the hall hears it, pulls out her .380 pocket auto and dispatches the shooter from behind upon entering the room before the body count gets too high.

By contrast, a stressed out retail clerk at StarBuck's really needs to unwind after a day of slinging sugar free half-caf, 'skinny' vanilla latte's at annoying suburbanites. He gets in his large SUV, as is the current style (4000lbs/28,000,000grns, 88fps/60mph, 72.000 cal./6 foot across, 481,382 ft/lbs of energy), and pops off to the pub for a quick couple of pints. He sees a girl, he gets more pints to brave up, but over does it on the draught, and bolloxes his chances.... he cools his flaming heart with a few more pints, and stumbles out into the AFTERNOON sun, and hops behind the wheel.. on the way home, once he remembers it, he has to cross in front of an elementary school..... a few dozen tykes, crossing with the blaze orange adorned guard.... who can ... quickly erect a brick wall, or some tank stops to slow or deflect the vehical?

A motivated citizen, if appropriately armed, can stop a gunman. And if enough of them were so armed, being a gunman would probably sound a lot less appealing... the odds wouldn't be in ones favor, much as they aren't for using a car to kill, since every one has one.

A motivated citizen would probably need a V/LAW, A Barrett XM-109, or handy anti vehical mine to stop that truck.

Which would you rather deal with? I'll take my CCW and challenge a gunman any day. I know how people around here drive.

I have a good friend in Florida -Licensed-who gave firarm protection courses for years so folks down there, alot of them older citizens would be able to legally defend their homes and bodies from a pscho or criminal. He was an instructor.

(He is also a private eye, but that work consists 95 % of sitting in a car for 8-10 hours with a book, sandwiches, something to drink and a 7-11 BIg Gulp container for the need to urinate. Every 30 seconds he has to watch the place under surveillence to film -oh lets say a wayward husband. While he is licensed to carry, he really doesn't use that tool. It is boring work requiring he be alert for long periods of time. )

Point is he has instructed potential victims to have an answer to an armed attempted assault. He believed in his work. 

He is not so enthused about the private eye work.

Before we come up with new gun laws, we should probably see how the ones we already have work.

When I was in school, I worked for a discount department store, often covering the sporting goods department.  People (hunters, I assume) would come in for ammunition.  I knew the laws--buyers had to be at least 21 years old, and buyers of shotgun shells had to be registered in a log.  Trouble was, I was 19 or 20 years old at the time.  It always seemed strange that I could sell and record sales of ammunition, but couldn't legally buy it myself.

Does that mean since your an australian, we should assume your a gibberish talking, beer swilling, bigoted idiot? A decendant of some unwanted english criminal?

I mean, hell, according to you, between jesus and psychologists you've got the answer to everything. All we have to do is love god, fear the differences of everyone else (because if we don't understand them, they could explode into violent nut cases), and live in a religiously guided police state where everything is made safe for us, and all dangerous things are removed, or controlled by outside entities (never mind that they also are human). Is that your theory in a nut shell?

Has anybody else gotten the "1984" feel from all of this? With Jesus replacing big brother?

Maybe its just me. 

Nope you got Cybacat, in a nutshell.

x-ray
if your back's against the wall, turn around and write on it...

firemoth, jordan

The bottom line is more guns in the community - more gun deaths.  You can attempt to muddy the issue by slicing and dicing the numbers, trying to explain away some sectors, a bit of razzle-dazzle logic.  (you may even deliberately misquote the 2nd amendment if you aren't ashamed to vandalise your own constitution).  But the number of people dead - due to guns - is the same...and it's ridiculously high in the US.

Following your argument Jordan, I assume then that you'd have no problem selling bazzokas in stores?  Landmines?  Nuclear missiles?  Where is the line?  Because as you say - if someone really wants to get a weapon - they will!  So why stop them you ask?  A bazooka, landmine, missile - they're just tools...

I agree.  If you're going to allow automatic machine guns, then why not bazookas?  Why not nukes?

Where is the line where you decide that the utility value of a weapon is more important than the risk it poses to public safety?  How lethal a weapon does it need to be before you ban it...or does anything go?

Take a knife for example.  Lethal - yes.  But it has 100 different peaceful and necessary purposes which justify it's use.  And you can't go and kill 30 people with a knife - you will be stopped before you get that far.

What about a car?  Necessary - essential for our travel, economy etc.  Plenty die in cars, but that are rarely used as a killing tool, and unlikely to take out a classroom of people in 1 hit.

So we get to guns.  They have a necessary role in the military, and in law enforcement.  But what about the public?  Aside from farmers who may need them on the land, the average American has them either for 1. shooting people in self defence, 2. shooting at a range for entertainment, or 3. hunting for entertainment.  In the majority of cases - it's a piece of entertainment, and I agree they're a lot of fun. 

But does that fun justify 30,000 dead Americans each year?  I say no.

Susan

Firstly it needs to be a federal, not state initiative.

There is no need in the community for handguns/pistols, automatic weapons, semi-automatic weapons etc - these should be completely outlawed.  Restrict sale of other mass-killing tools such as explosives, Compound bows etc.

A national gun buy-back scheme whereby owners are compensated for turning in their weapons to be scrapped.  This to run for 1-2 years.

Very strict tightening of the rules for issuing weapons to law enforcement.

Finally, follow the buyback with an amnesty turn-in of weapons for the next 2-3 years.  Combine this with blanket advertising across the country.

Now, several years down the track the country has had their chance to turn in their weapons.  Law enforcement begins - backed up with mandatory jail sentences for anyone found with an illegal weapon.

It would take time - a couple of decades - but eventually you'll end up with a fraction - maybe 1% of the guns in US society today...and as a result you'll end up far, far fewer gun deaths.  You'll look back on the past few decades like people were living in a lawless age of anarchy and probably shake your head in disbelief.

THE WINNERS - most of the 30,000 people who would have been dead due to guns, but are alive because the American people decided that AMERICAN PEOPLE come first - not guns.  Not only them, but their friends, family, relatives - all who suffer a big impact when someone dies needlessly.

THE LOSERS - insecure people who feel they need to carry a gun around because they can't defend themselves and feel paranoia about crime, hunters - who I sympathise with because almost all of them are just law abiding sport lovers.

firemoth

If you're starting to grate off enamel, do what you do in times of stress.  Just grab that Glock, cradle it to your cheek, rock it gently and feel all your anger just melt away...   (I'm picturing Tackleberry off Police Academy at this point)

Sorry - I just read your last post.  Wow - you must be desperate to find an argument buddy!

Having failed in all other tactics, your brilliant retort to my call for better gun control is that:

1.  cybacaT is Australian

2.  cybacaT is a Christian.

Therefore, cybacaT's arguments are invalid!

Hmmm - yes...a compelling, well thought-out argument there...   

~ Amanda

"Just fear me, love me, do as I say and I will be your slave..."

  Amanda, every year I am here I like you more and more ! Damn, you administer theTPG, you have a responsible job, you continue to educate yourself, you put on a TP festival, AND you obviously know how to party.

What a fully functioning gal you are my dear !

Oh brother.....yes, let's also sell bazukas and ready made bombs (Islamic facists wouldn't have to make their own anymore). that's absurd - we're talking about guns, not massive military weapons.

I know for non-Americans, this is a very hard thing to understand, but the US has something called the Second Amendment. This little amendment gives Americans the ability to have firearms in order to protect themselves from foreign forces and their own govt (you'll hear some talk about militas and written at a time when hunting was important, but this is due to a lack of reading from the papers of our forefathers). Like the First Amendment which offers freedom of speech, the second gives us the ability to carry arms. That's the critical point here. If you want to get rid of this amendment, then you have to go through an entire process of getting rid of which includes voting, etc. It's not going to happen. You just can't create a law banning guns. It's not that easy --- nor should we, IMO.

So that leaves us to the next step - what do we do in the end? If we can't get rid of firearms, then we need to have more control of them, but like any Amendment, you can't take full control of it because of the Constitution. The Courts have said that Congress can legislate the usage of guns in a reasonable manner, so as a result, we have laws that have been placed on the books to help reduce the potential for problems.

The reality is that LAWS WILL NOT STOP A CRIMINAL if they are wanting to do something. In any killing spree, you'll find other laws were broken besides murder.

Let's say we had a law on the books that stopped any non-citizen from owning a gun. Maybe that would've stopped Cho or would he have found other means? I bet he would've found other means. Maybe he was the guy calling in bomb threats for 2 weeks - maybe his first intention was to bomb the place, and then realized that shooting a gun was easier, or more fun. In any case, he was going to do what he wanted to do however he could do it.

So since any tool can be used as a weapon to kill, that leads us to the next step - why does someone want to kill. Maybe instead of banning the use of guns, we should just find a better way to deal with the real problem - by identifying people who have a history of illness that may lead them to using a gun to kill others. Banning weapons won't fix the proble because you can still get your hands on things, but society becoming more proactive in determining potential problems (somehow) could help alleviate things like this, and would get to the ROOT of the problem - not just banning freedoms.

Cybaca - your argument of "Americans come first" also would lend ittself to banning the use of driving cars since they cause 40,000+ deaths a year (more than your number). So if we really cared about Americans, maybe we should ban cars. OR better yet, maybe we should ban all junk food since heart disease kills more than 250,000 people a year.

Jordan .

Oh, I hadn't noticed that you had written your proposal, Cyba, so ignore my asking again for it on the other gun thread.  Your buy-back program has been instituted in several cities and has been a dismal failure.  One of the things that happened is gang members and criminals gave up their crappy out of date weapons and bought new illegal guns with the money from the old ones.  Anyway, I think we've reached an impasse on any further headway in the gun discussion.  You presume a 1% gun-holding public and I suggest a 1% who will have complied. The numbers of guns itself is mostly guess work since many gun owners are not inclined to describe their arsenals to pollsters.

I found this opinion in this morning's LA Times.  It comes from one of my main guys, Niall Ferguson, who always takes you down the road less traveled.  He is not one to squawk out a parrot-like arguments. It's interesting that he uses Australian black swans to explain the phenomenon.

Susan 

     
“Half a truth is often a great lie.”

Ben Franklin

Amanda

Actually, he was pointing out how your comment regarding French Canadians was assinine

Thanks for that - I did miss it.  Next time I'm making some tongue-in-cheek attempt at humour, I'll be sure to put a BOLD WARNING around it so that it's clear I'm not making a serious statement.   Sheesh!!

jordan

Oh brother.....yes, let's also sell bazukas and ready made bombs (Islamic facists wouldn't have to make their own anymore). that's absurd - we're talking about guns, not massive military weapons.

Where's the absurdity?  You have the right to bear arms.  Bazookas are arms, nukes are arms, claymour mines are arms - isn't it your right as an American to bear arms?  Or are you now going to contradict your own constitution?

As to the lethal capabilities of the arms - it is a matter of deciding how far is too far.  And that's something your society should be free to debate and discuss.  Do people need bazookas in their daily lives?  No.  Why would someone need a fully automatic weapon then?  What's the justification?  What about semi-autos?  Handguns?  What is the reason people need to carry around such weaponry? 

Mainly it's because:

1.  They need certain weapons for hunting.

2.  Because of the number of guns everywhere in the US, some people feel they need to carry guns for self defence.

3.  It's part of their job in security, military or policing.

So clearly those in category 3 have a right to bear appropriate weaponry.  But the others?  It's a matter of weighing up whether you feel 30,000 dead Americans is worth the privilege for some people to hunt or carry a weapon for self defence (largely because of the guns!).

So that leaves us to the next step - what do we do in the end? If we can't get rid of firearms, then we need to have more control of them, but like any Amendment, you can't take full control of it because of the Constitution. The Courts have said that Congress can legislate the usage of guns in a reasonable manner, so as a result, we have laws that have been placed on the books to help reduce the potential for problems.

Clearly you MUST have laws restricting the 2nd Amendment - because Americans aren't allowed "Bear Arms" such as bazookas etc.  So yes - control is the issue.  If you have a line already, the argument is about where that line should be.  What sort of weapons are needed in your society? 

Should you move the gun to more leniency, and just allow a free-for-all?  Land mines?  Missiles?  Nukes?  Complete freedom to bear arms?  After all, aren't you "killing freedom" or "banning freedoms" by restricting access to these arms?

OR  Is the status quo ok with 30,000 Americans dying gun deaths each year?

OR  Perhaps...as I'm advocating, some stricter national gun restrictions could be brought into place to try and get that 30,000 down to a more sane number given your population.

I'm for balance - not extremist approaches either way.  I just think you have way too many people being killed unnecessarily by guns each year - and I know that can be drastically reduced by modifying the controls you already have in place to make them more effective.

Let's say we had a law on the books that stopped any non-citizen from owning a gun. Maybe that would've stopped Cho or would he have found other means? I bet he would've found other means.

Possibly, but how effective would he have been?  Depends on what's available to him.  Make RPGs legal for sale in stores, and you've just increased how many people a nutjob can kill quite easily.  Have semi-auto weapons for sale, as you do now - and people can take out 30 people easily.  Make weapons of mass killing very difficult to obtain and use...and you've just greatly minimised the risk.  Cho may have gone on a hunting knife spree and killed 3 people before being stopped.

Cybaca - your argument of "Americans come first" also would lend ittself to banning the use of driving cars since they cause 40,000+ deaths a year (more than your number). So if we really cared about Americans, maybe we should ban cars. OR better yet, maybe we should ban all junk food since heart disease kills more than 250,000 people a year.

Covered this already Jordan - it's a matter of weighing up the value to society of the object, the nature and intention of the object, and the risk it poses to society.

Cars are not made to kill people - in fact most are heavily equipped with devices to prevent them killing someone.  They have a huge, necessary role to play in society - in the hands of most citizens.  Do you ban them?  No.  But you restrict them such that mentally ill, frail, blind, etc people can't have free and easy access to them.

Guns are made to kill things.  Period.

Clearly there's a pattern developing of complete gun-toting nutters having a beef with us Sharps...