Capital High teacher shot at school board meeting

[CO Liberal]

Yet another "law-abiding" gun owner that we don't have to worry about...... - Wayne

* * * * * * * * * *

Capital High teacher shot at school board meeting

Kanawha schools worker allegedly douses boss with gas

A disgruntled Kanawha County school employee walked into a school board meeting Thursday night, threw a bucket of gasoline on his supervisor, pulled out an assault rifle and shot a teacher, police said.

Three Kanawha County school administrators subdued the man and wrestled the rifle from him after he fired three shots and tried to set his supervisor on fire with a charcoal lighter.

Richard Dean “Rusty” Bright, 58, of Rand was charged with malicious wounding in the shooting of Karen Taylor, a Capital High School teacher, and with wanton endangerment for spraying gasoline on several people at the board meeting.

Police said Bright shot Taylor with an AK-47 assault rifle, which, in its original Russian design, is a fully automatic battlefield weapon.

<more>

http://wvgazette.com/section/News/200307187

[Goldust]

1. Sue Kingsford!

How dare they sell lighter fluid to criminals without so much as a background check or waiting period?

[CO Liberal]

2. I Think I Went to High School With a "Sue Kingsford"

She was a cheerleader, if I remember corectly.......

:-)

[CO Liberal]

5. Actually, It Was Gasoline

Even more flammable than lighter fluid, I believe.

[Superfly]

3. At least nobody was killed

I hope she pulls through this safely.

As for the other fucker, I hope they throw the book at him. Actually, since e shot a librarian, maybe they should throw every book at him.

B

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[slackmaster]

6. ABC says it was a Chinese SKS "assault-style rifle"

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/US/ap20030718_693.html

Amazing how the press keeps coming up with new terms for types of firearms. Since an SKS is neither an assault weapon nor an assault rifle, they had to come up with some way to stigmatize it.

"Do these shoes make me look fat with my assault-style rifle, dear?"

[CO Liberal]

7. And CBS Radio News Just Reported He Had More Guns In His Trunk

Which he needed to law-abidingly exercise his Second Amendment rights, right????

[slackmaster]

23. They ALWAYS have more guns in their car

Something I've never understood. People who shoot up workplaces, government offices, schools, etc. never make it back to their car.

[Name removed]

8. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[CO Liberal]

9. Link to Story On Faux News Web Site

Man Opens Fire at School Board Meeting

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Police found a second rifle and two handguns in the truck of a school maintenance worker accused of shooting a teacher and dousing two other people with gasoline at a county school board meeting.

Several members of the audience at Thursday night's meeting of the Kanawha County Board of Education (search) grabbed the suspect and knocked him to the ground.

Richard Dean "Rusty" Bright, 58, of Rand was jailed on charges of malicious wounding and wanton endangerment, both felonies, and faces a July 25 court hearing.

"He told us he was upset because some of the school board employees had been smoking around him," Police Chief Jerry Pauley said Friday. "The school board said they had taken some minor disciplinary action against him."

Capital High teacher Karen Taylor, 56, was in satisfactory condition at Charleston Area Medical Center's General Division after suffering a gunshot wound to the lower abdomen.

Maintenance supervisor Jeffery A. Allred and personnel official Karen Williams, who were doused with gasoline, were treated at the scene and released, police said.

"That was kind of shocking," said school board member John Luoni. "I immediately began to smell gasoline."

Bright had been on sick leave when he entered the board meeting shortly after it started. Witnesses said Bright was carrying three large plastic buckets.

After splashing Allred and Williams with the gasoline and trying without success to ignite it, Bright pulled from his overcoat a rifle wrapped in a black trash bag, police and witnesses said.

Charleston police Lt. R.E. Ingram said Friday the weapon was an AK-47 assault rifle (search).

<more>

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,92267,00.html

[Emoto]

10. And Your Point Is?

Time and again, I have seen you post a story about some deranged person who goes off the deep end and does bad deeds (or tries to) with a gun. What exactly is your point? There will always be guns and there will always be nut-jobs, and inevitably the two sets will intersect periodically.

[CO Liberal]

11. Here's My Point

Time and time again, pro-gunners state emphatically that those of us who favor reasonable gun control measures have nothing to fear from law-abiding gun owners. Stories like this show that we just may have something to fear. This guy went off the deep end because his co-workers were smoking - could you imagine how he might have reacted if something more serious happened to him???

There will always be guns and there will always be nut-jobs, and inevitably the two sets will intersect periodically.

And anything we can do to reduce the intersections as much as humanly possible is a step in the right direction.

[wildsexcrazedweasel]

12. it's interesting....

that it looks like he didn't want to shoot anybody, he wanted to set them on fire. (insert Dead Milkmen joke here) The article says he shot the woman while the others were trying to wrestle him to the ground.

Is it somehow better for a person to burn people to death as this guy intended, and somehow worse to shoot somebody, as happened here apparently unintentionally?

[CO Liberal]

14. It's Also Interesting.......

....that he was subdued WITHOUT the need for someone else with a gun. So much for the "If-one-of-the-teachers-had-a-gun-Columbine-never-would-have-happened" argument.

[wildsexcrazedweasel]

25. yeah, but isn't that how...

the librarian got shot, in the tussle of people trying to wrestle him to the ground? That's what the article said happened. Don't you think that if a cop had been there with a gun and pulled it on him, the guy would probably have been arrested without incident? Then there would have been no serious injuries, just people cleaning out their shorts...

[CO Liberal]

29. I Wasn't Talking About Cops

I was referring to many of the pro-gun folks who believe that having more people carrying concealed weapons would prevent episodes like this. I think that if a handful of people at that meeting DID have concealed weapons on them, they's be so excited about finally having a chance to use their guns that more than one person would have been shot.

More Guns = More Deaths

[wildsexcrazedweasel]

41. do you have evidence of that?

"I think that if a handful of people at that meeting DID have concealed weapons on them, they's be so excited about finally having a chance to use their guns that more than one person would have been shot."

I know it's hard to find studies that show this kind of thing, so how about even one case of anecdotal evidence where a permit holder opened fire on a bad guy to try and prevent a crime and killed more than one person?

[CO Liberal]

45. It Just Stands to Reason

In the heat of the moment when emotions are high, the potential for one or more guns to accidentally fire seems to be greater.

[wildsexcrazedweasel]

46. well, then, considering how many states have CCW laws...

and how many CCW permit holders there are out there, you should be able to come up with just one anecdotal example where it happened, shouldn't you?

[CO Liberal]

47. I'm Sure I Could, If I Had the Time

I just don't believe that our society becomes safer through the introduction of more guns, that's all.

[wildsexcrazedweasel]

49. OK...

I'd just think that if there was even a single case like you describe happening, it would be all over the media, and places like the VPC and Bradys would have it on their front web pages.

[jody]

52. In 1999, over one million law enforcement personnel were employed

in police protection, about 10% each in federal and state positions and the rest at local levels. Of those, 5 were accidentally shot and killed in 2001.

If the number of CCW holders is greater than one million and the number of "carry days" is greater for CCW holders, then what is the number of CCW holders accidentally killed by firearms?

I don't know but I take comfort in believing if the number was large, then the Scary Brady Bunch would have widely publicized that statistic.

What is the source of the belief that a person legally carrying a handgun is more likely to accidentially kill an innocent bystander than a law enforcement officer?

[Township75]

35. Did you notice...

that not one teacher or bystander here had a gun and someone got shot anyway? So if an innocent bystander gets shot while wrestling a crazed madman to the ground without the use of a gun that refutes the arguement that an armed teacher/bystander using a gun could have solved this with only the madman possible getting hurt?

Please explain that to me.

Also, I would like to know the pro gun control solution to this, since it is illegal to possess a firearm on school grounds in WV, much less have mental problems and possess a firearm.

[iverglas]

26. quite the debut

"it's interesting....
that it looks like he didn't want to shoot anybody, he wanted to set them on fire."

And if you too will forgive me for peeking into the real world for just a moment -- I just have to wonder why someone who wanted to set someone on fire would be carrying a firearm. Despite the similarity in the words, the two things really are quite different.

"The article says he shot the woman while the others were trying to wrestle him to the ground."

Isn't this kinda one of those "crimes" that people are always talking about firearms being used in?

If this had been a bank robber who shot someone while others were trying to wrestle him to the ground, wouldn't we be hearing all about how if only criminals have guns then only criminals have guns, or however the hell it goes?

He carried a firearm in the commission of a serious criminal offence -- setting somebody on fire -- and the firearm was fired (by whom? Santa Claus?) in the commission of that offence. Dag nab it, he looks pretty much like one of those non-law-abiding bank robbers, to me.

"Is it somehow better for a person to burn people to death as this guy intended, and somehow worse to shoot somebody, as happened here apparently unintentionally?"

Is that kinda like St. Paul's "it is better to marry than to burn"?

Don't we have some other choice of scenario? Like, how about -- the scenario that actually would have happened if he hadn't been carrying a firearm -- NOBODY would have burned to death (which nobody did), and NOBODY would have been shot. Gosh, I think I'll take that one; door number 3 please.

NOT TO MENTION door number 4 -- the one behind which, IF HE HAD NOT HAD A FIREARM, there's very good reason to believe he would never have attempted to set someone on fire. Just like only stupid people try to rob banks with their bare fingers. They, and he, quite reasonably expect someone to RESIST their criminal actions, and forearm themselves against that eventuality -- they carry guns TO MAKE SURE that their other crime goes as planned and they don't get wrestled to the ground and captured when they're committing it. Without the gun, they, and he, might have just decided the whole thing was a bad idea.

And ... "unintentionally"? I ask again. You carry your trusty gun along with you when you set off to commit a serious criminal offence, and when someone tries to stop you from committing that offence, your gun "goes off". Does the law -- or any sane person -- regard this as an "unintentional" shooting?

C'mon, guys. The useless foreign ex-lawyer won't attempt to answer that question. But I'll bet I could make a pretty accurate guess.

This guy was AN ARMED FELON (assuming that he had the mental capacity to form the intent to set somebody on fire, which it seems quite apparent he did). He USED A FIREARM IN THE COMMISSION OF AN OFFENCE, and he quite plainly had that firearm with him for precisely that purpose. So what's with all the bleeding-heart criminal-hugging I'm seeing?

Poor guy ... the smoke just drove him around the bend and we mustn't blame him for SHOOTING SOMEONE. We're going to have to have this recognized as a whole new defence now. Won't the Rush Limbaughs be happy to hear about it?

All I can say is that we're going to have to be extra careful not to let people who are allergic to cigarette smoke get hold of firearms, if that's the case. Was that what you were thinking too?

.

[wildsexcrazedweasel]

32. Well, fella, hate to disagree with you...

"Don't we have some other choice of scenario? Like, how about -- the scenario that actually would have happened if he hadn't been carrying a firearm -- NOBODY would have burned to death (which nobody did), and NOBODY would have been shot. Gosh, I think I'll take that one; door number 3 please.

NOT TO MENTION door number 4 -- the one behind which, IF HE HAD NOT HAD A FIREARM, there's very good reason to believe he would never have attempted to set someone on fire. Just like only stupid people try to rob banks with their bare fingers. They, and he, quite reasonably expect someone to RESIST their criminal actions, and forearm themselves against that eventuality -- they carry guns TO MAKE SURE that their other crime goes as planned and they don't get wrestled to the ground and captured when they're committing it. Without the gun, they, and he, might have just decided the whole thing was a bad idea."

but the guy obviously planned things to some extent. If he hadn't had a gun, what on earth makes you think he wouldn't have done something like make molotov cocktails and started lobbing them around? After all, it's kind of doubtful that he carried the gas into the building in buckets, it's far more likely that he got a gas can, filled it up, brought it into the building, and then put it in the buckets. It's hard to drive gas around in open containers...it sloshes and stuff.

Regarding this guy's intellegence and only stupid people robbing banks with their fingers, this guy was obviously a blithering idiot. You don't do stuff like this is you aren't.

I suppose, by your line of reasoning, that if Tim McVeigh hadn't had access to a handgun, he wouldn't have blown up the OKC Federal building? It's the same basic idea...

[acerbic]

34. Quite a non sequitur there...

I suppose, by your line of reasoning, that if Tim McVeigh hadn't had access to a handgun, he wouldn't have blown up the OKC Federal building? It's the same basic idea...

No, it's pretty obviously not: what McVeigh did didn't require confronting and subduing anyone, so in just that case having a gun or not made no difference. Can you tell some more about what kind of person wouldn't understand that? :-)

[wildsexcrazedweasel]

42. how would lobbing molotov cocktails....

be "confronting" or "subduing" somebody? If somebody is trying to hurt others, there's really not a whole lot you can do about it, is there? Look at the Happy Lamp Social Club fire...what are you going to do, ban gasoline?

[acerbic]

48. "How would blue be heavy?"

You're not making much sense, only desperately mixing and misconnecting replys to your "arguments" related to what actually happened in this case and your different hypotheticals. :eyes:

[wildsexcrazedweasel]

50. If this guy didn't have a rifle...

and instead just threw molotov cocktails at the city council members, how many people was he likely to injure or kill? Or, since he was a janitor, couldn't he have made a "Ragnar's Special" flamethrower by putting the gas in a pump spray-canister like people use for weeds?

Why was a gun necessary at all?

[acerbic]

51. That's getting again pretty close to

If this guy didn't have a rifle and instead just threw molotov cocktails at the city council members, how many people was he likely to injure or kill?

..."giving criminals guns reduces violence". :crazy: :crazy: :crazy: :crazy: :crazy:

[gotin]

53. What kind of person wouldn't understand that

if somebody wants to harm people he will find the means to do so?

[acerbic]

54. Same old, same old...

if somebody wants to harm people he will find the means to do so?

...and therefore we should make it really easy for that somebody to find the most effective means to do so, eh? :crazy: :crazy: :crazy: :crazy: :crazy: :crazy:

[gotin]

59. Nothing new, nothing new…

Does it make sense to make it really difficult for his victims to have an access to the most effective way to stop him? Stupid, stupid, stupid.....

[acerbic]

65. I don't mind answering your question:

Does it make sense to make it really difficult for his victims to have an access to the most effective way to stop him?

Answer: No. Did somebody say or imply it does? Who, when, where?

Now can you answer my question which was in reply to your

"if somebody wants to harm people he will find the means to do so"

...and therefore we should make it really easy for that somebody to find the most effective means to do so, eh?

[gotin]

75. That’s a start.

As for the answer to your question – I simply don’t understand how you can make it difficult for the bad people to have access to guns without making it difficult for their victims too. Especially when there were not previous convictions and/or serious mental problems.
Can you explain to me how this will work? When was the last time when ANY restriction worked? After decades of “War on Drugs” is it more difficult to find them? Was it more difficult to buy booze during the prohibition? Please, enlighten me how to make it work now?
The way I see it, gun education and harsher penalties are the answer to these problems. Now tell me about your proposals, instead of just attacking only pro-gun people and then claiming that you are not anti-gun. Or probably I missed your answers to Benchley’s posts?

[acerbic]

78. Well, if you don't understand

...how e.g. requiring background checks for gun purchases makes it more difficult for criminals to get guns than for their victims to get them, what can anyone say to you... :shrug:

I simply don’t understand how you can make it difficult for the bad people to have access to guns without making it difficult for their victims too.

[gotin]

80. Well, if you believe that “Minority Report” is based on true story…..

And background checks can prevent people with clean record from committing future crimes….
Don’t get me wrong – I’m for background checks. And everybody should be able to call and check if a weapon is stolen. But in this case none of those would have helped – the man just went crazy! Can you predict this?
Despite the lows prohibiting guns in schools the BG didn’t hesitate to bring one (assuming the meeting was on school grounds). I wander how many mass killings happened in police stations and why crazy people always choose gun-free places?

[acerbic]

82. Hey, you said already that you SIMPLY don’t understand

"how you can make it difficult for the bad people to have access to guns without making it difficult for their victims too"

so you don't understand how background checks might do it either. No further straw men necessary. :-)

[gotin]

83. Call me stupid

but how BACKground check can show future intentions? Please, tell me how?
We are still talking about the school employee, do we?
P.S. My english is not very good and I don’t understand this “straw men” thing. What does it mean?

[acerbic]

84. Well, if you insist... :-)

but how BACKground check can show future intentions? Please, tell me how?
...
P.S. My english is not very good and I don’t understand this “straw men” thing. What does it mean?

The definition of "straw man" argument:

The author attacks an argument which is different from, and usually weaker than, the opposition's best argument.
http://www.datanation.com/fallacies/straw.htm

A really lame debater tries to replace the opponent's argument with something totally imagined, even reversed. Example: I mention background checks as a way to make access to guns more difficult for criminals than for their victims and you "reply" to it pretending that I said something about "background checks can prevent people with clean record from committing future crimes".

We are still talking about the school employee, do we?

No. We are talking about what you started talking about: how you generally don't understand that anything could ever be done to make it difficult for the "bad people" to have access to guns without making it difficult for their victims too. By adding this "Especially when" clarification you make it clear that the previous sentence wasn't only about this one case:

I simply don’t understand how you can make it difficult for the bad people to have access to guns without making itdifficult for their victims too. Especially when there were not previous convictions and/or serious mental problems.

...but perhaps you just sincerely forget what you say, instead of trying to desperately flip and spin when you're confronted by how meaningless your arguments are.

[gotin]

85. Its probably my bad english....

Your post was “should make it really easy for that somebody to find”. You never said criminal. If you read my posts, you will see that I am for background checks. Violent criminals should not have guns. And they should be put in jail for a long time if caught with one.
Because you never mentioned that we are talking about criminals, I assumed that the “somebody” really means somebody i.e. regular, non-convicted citizen. From this point of view, the background check is meaningless.
My generalization came from your use of “somebody”. And yes, I’m still waiting to hear from you how we can limit BG’s access to guns. We can try, but when any restriction worked? The only thing we can do is to make it more difficult for them to live AFTER they use guns. They may be crazy, stupid, under influence but most of them can put 2 and 2 together… As for the rest – they will do their thing with or without restrictions.
What is the average sentence for use of a gun in a crime? And what is the average time they really spend in jail?
But if for some reason (my bad English) I didn’t understand that “somebody” means a criminal – yes, you are right, in this case background check would have prevented him from buying a gun from a dealer. If this is the case – my bad, I’m sorry!
As for the straw men thing – thanks! But now I’m confused. The original post was about a deranged employee, who went to burn and/or shoot his supervisor. From this simple story you went arguing if the background checks are good or bad thing. If this is not a straw men by your definition ….

[iverglas]

38. don't be silly now

I suppose, by your line of reasoning, that if Tim McVeigh hadn't had access to a handgun, he wouldn't have blown up the OKC Federal building? It's the same basic idea...

Oh, lordy, there's just a bottomless well of nonsense around here, isn't there?

I don't know; DID TIM McVEIGH USE A HANDGUN in the commission of his offence?

If he didn't, what the hell are you asking me this question for, and why the hell would you say that your statement is "the same basic idea" as mine?

And let's not get confused here -- the moronic statement about Tim McVeigh is YOUR line of reasoning, not mine. I couldn't come up with something that dumb in a million years.

And given that, I'd have to say, oh: "by your line of reasoning, if I hadn't had access to a computer, I wouldn't have gone fishing." Your reasoning.

Tripe and more tripe. And the foregoing is the substantiation for that characterization.

What I actually said was

<i>Without the gun, they, and he, might have just decided the whole thing was a bad idea.</i>

If you want to demonstrate that my characterization of your purported Tim McVeigh analogy is inaccurate, kindly demonstrate how what I said is remotely like your statement about Tim McVeigh. That is, demonstrate that there is some reason to believe -- AS THERE IS such a reason, and as I established there to be in my earlier post, in the case in point -- that without a gun, McVeigh would not have blown up whatever it was he blew up.

Please.

"If he hadn't had a gun, what on earth makes you think he wouldn't have done something like make molotov cocktails and started lobbing them around?"

How about EXPERIENCE and COMMON SENSE?

Do many people rob banks by lobbing molotov cocktails around? What is the method of choice, among people setting out to commit crimes, of ensuring that the are able to complete the commission of the crime without interference? (If you have another theory about why our subject chose to carry a handgun on his person-burning mission, do tell.) Could it be A FIREARM?

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE between this criminal and ANY OTHER CRIMINAL who sets out to commit a criminal offence and TAKES ALONG A FIREARM as insurance against getting caught or otherwise failing in his/her criminal mission?

They were all law-abiding at one time, y'know.

"Regarding this guy's intellegence and only stupid people robbing banks with their fingers, this guy was obviously a blithering idiot. You don't do stuff like this is you aren't."

Never, never confuse insanity or evil with stupidity. This advice will stand you in good stead around here, I think.

If his plan had worked -- if his firearm had staved off anyone trying to wrestle him to the ground long enough for him to escape after setting someone on fire, would you then call him stupid?

Remember, he DID set someone on fire, and yup, he did it without shooting anyone. Just as many bank robbers successfully rob banks without firing the firearm in their hand. He was a criminal, and his criminal plan didn't work, but really neither of those facts necessarily makes him stupid.

"After all, it's kind of doubtful that he carried the gas into the building in buckets, it's far more likely that he got a gas can, filled it up, brought it into the building, and then put it in the buckets. It's hard to drive gas around in open containers...it sloshes and stuff."

Yada yada, and it might have been raining bright red herrings that day. The relevance escapes me.

As does your reasoning, or your point.

.

[wildsexcrazedweasel]

44. He set somebody on fire? Really?

"Remember, he DID set someone on fire, and yup, he did it without shooting anyone."

what do you base that upon? The news report says he threw gasoline on somebody, not that he ignited it and somebody was burned.

"Do many people rob banks by lobbing molotov cocktails around? What is the method of choice, among people setting out to commit crimes, of ensuring that the are able to complete the commission of the crime without interference? (If you have another theory about why our subject chose to carry a handgun on his person-burning mission, do tell.) Could it be A FIREARM?"

that would be interesting to see....I do know that the media regularly reports cases of bank robberies where the robber doesn't display a firearm, they hand the teller a note, claiming to either have a firearm or a bomb or something along those lines. Should we ban notes because they allow people to commit crimes?

"I don't know; DID TIM McVEIGH USE A HANDGUN in the commission of his offence?"

He sure did...he was arrested while fleeing OKC with a Glock pistol in a shoulder holster. If he hadn't had a handgun to subdue people while parking the truck, do you think he'd have not done it?

In both cases, the gun was a "backup" weapon. And I really don't think that people who would pull this kind of crap would stop because they didn't have a gun. That's like saying the September 11th hijackers wouldn't have done what they did because they couldn't smuggle guns on board the plane. History says otherwise.

[jody]

13. In this case, you posted a quote from the article

"employees had been smoking around him".

The fact that guns were involved is not the issue. The person was mentally disturbed and continued smoking by others in in his presence apparently triggered his attack. He should be condemned no more or less because guns were involved. One might speculate that he wanted others to experience via their own burning, the same affect he felt when others smoked in his presence.

We don't have any facts, but what if he had an acute respiratory condition exacerbated by breathing cigarette smoke and had made numerous complains to management? :shrug:

The fact that guns were involved may be much less sigificant than the fact that cigarettes were involved.

[CO Liberal]

15. I Think It's More Important.......

...that he looked upon gasoline and guns as a solution to his "problem". We need a means of weeding out those who guve all gun owners a black eye. Any suggestions would be appreciated, other than throwing our collective hands up and saying there's nothing we can do.......

[jody]

18. I agree. As I understand things, states have drastically reduced

funds for mental health. I wonder whether the person arrested had health coverage that included mental health? Even then, our society has demeaned the notion of mental problems so that most people are unwilling to seek care.

I'm with you CO, I'll put my shoulder to the wheel, but where's the wheel?

Perhaps the Bible has it right. "And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart." (Gen 6:6)

If an Omni-God can't get man to do right, we're in for one helluva future.

[Emoto]

19. I'm not throwing my hand up, but...

I too would love to weed out these wackos. I don't know how, though. Almost invariably, someone wants to throw up more bureaucratic barriers to firearms possession, which I fail to see the logic in. I mean, if a person with no prior criminal record jumps through the hoops and gets a gun, then goes crazy a year down the road, what have we gained?

[CO Liberal]

21. I Have to Defer to Those in the Mental Health Field

As a Certified Hypnotherapist, I know that the human brain is an incredibly complex organism. Perhaps those in the mental health sector can develop a set of marker traits that are common to those who go crazy a year down the road.

[wildsexcrazedweasel]

27. So, then we'd be denying people their civil rights...

based on "marker traits" that could, possibly, maybe cause them to lose it at a later time?

How is this different from Phrenology?

Wouldn't this put mental health professionals in the position of being the "future police"?

[iverglas]

22. there are none so visually impaired

... as those who refuse to admit that their eyes are open.

"The fact that guns were involved is not the issue."

Okay. The individual who was shot WAS NOT SHOT. Are you happy now? I'll pretend my eyes are closed too, and we can all go walk into walls.

"The person was mentally disturbed and continued smoking by others in in his presence apparently triggered his attack."

Right. And he DIDN'T SHOOT ANYBODY. I'm cool with that.

"He should be condemned no more or less because guns were involved."

Right. Because he DIDN'T SHOOT ANYBODY.

"One might speculate that he wanted others to experience via their own burning, the same affect he felt when others smoked in his presence."

One might also wonder why he took a firearm along for that purpose.

OOPS. I lose. I opened my eyes and forgot to pretend they were closed.

"We don't have any facts, but what if he had an acute respiratory condition exacerbated by breathing cigarette smoke and had made numerous complains to management? :shrug:"

Never mind the shrug -- tell us "what if". What if he had? THEN it was okay to try to kill a few of 'em? THEN it was okay for him to have access to firearms? I don't know. I'm asking.

"The fact that guns were involved may be much less sigificant than the fact that cigarettes were involved."

Yeah -- IF what you're trying to do is figure out is why he was all upset, and even prevent him from getting all upset. Most likely more easily said than done, I'd say.

If what you're trying to do is make sure that crazy people don't kill people, or people who are perfectly sane and have decided that for some reason they are entitled to kill people don't kill people, the fact that cigarettes were involved would probably be pretty insignificant.

Of course, someone could always propose that the sale of cigarettes be banned as a solution to this problem. Then you'd just watch out for the nut jobs who don't like the colour of your shirt ... and have a gun.

Oops, I peeked again. The problem in that scenario would OBVIOUSLY be garment dyes, NOT GUNS. Forgive me, and I'll go back to pretending my eyes are closed.


.

[jody]

28. You do use a lot of words to say nothing. I said what I meant to say

and your twist of them is very childish.

[iverglas]

33. and you manage to say a lot in so few words!

I'd express my admiration, if only what you actually said were ever anything but unsubstantiated or incomprehensible.

Oh, by the way, was there a point to your post other than to make yet another unsubstantiated assertion about moi and moi's words?

If you want to comment on me or my words, feel free. By "comment on", I mean "respond to", not "characterize". A negative characterization of a person and/or his/her words is an ad personam argument, no more nor less. In the absence of any substantive comment on your part, I will continue to treat what you say as precisely that: ad personam argument.

However, for the purpose of this post and because I'm just so insatiably curious, I'll ask: what on earth DID you "mean to say"? If it wasn't what I heard you saying, you just owe it to yourself to clarify it.

Of course what you actually owe and to whom is this: you owe it to your interlocutors, in the context of a discussion of a public policy issue, to substantiate what you say. If you want to allege that I "twist" your words, demonstrate that I have twisted your words. Or retract the allegation. Or sit there with your bare ad personam hanging out.

.

[jody]

43. You have a lot in common with balloons, I guess that gives you the

ability to arise above issues and see the "big picture." :-)

[Emoto]

16. Why didn't you say so?

Time and time again, pro-gunners state emphatically that those of us who favor reasonable gun control measures have nothing to fear from law-abiding gun owners. Stories like this show that we just may have something to fear.

That's it? Take guns out of the equation to look at your postion, which as near as I can tell is this:

We must fear the law-abiding, because sometimes they go crazy.

That's what it boils down to, isn't it?

This guy went off the deep end because his co-workers were smoking - could you imagine how he might have reacted if something more serious happened to him???

No, he went off the deep end because he was deranged. He was a ticking bomb waiting to go off. The smoking just happened to be that day's particular trigger for his insanity. It might have just as easily been that the diner forgot the cream to his coffee, or that he didn't like somebody's shoes, or that his chewing gum lost it's flavor on the bedpost overnight.

There will always be guns and there will always be nut-jobs, and inevitably the two sets will intersect periodically.

And anything we can do to reduce the intersections as much as humanly possible is a step in the right direction.

You know me well enough to know that I also want to keep guns out of the hands of those who shouldn't have them. But how? Was this man even legally entitled to own the guns? We don't know.

How can any type of licensing or registration scheme filter out a person who is sane today, but is going to go crazy three years from now, when he hears the "wrong" song on the radio? I'm all ears.

[CO Liberal]

17. Here's What It Boils Down To

The centuries-old concept of unfettered acces to firearms is antiquated. Those who are prone to violence or those with histories of criminal behavior or mental instability should be kept as far away from guns as possible.

This story is still developing, so we don't know this guy's history yet. We'll have to keep watching this story as it develops.

[jody]

20. You pose an interesting issue. If scientists are able to identify

the gene(s) that indicate a predispposition to "criminal behavior or mental instability", then what should society do with that knowledge.

Perhaps we should test in the womb and force abortion of any fetus with a probability of "criminal behavior or mental instability" above some threshold. What about cancer, diabetes, ingrown toenails, etc?

Do we give government that authority again? In some states, people with mental problems were sterilized in the early part of the 20th century?

[acerbic]

24. What CO Liberal actually wrote:

"Those who are prone to violence or those with histories of criminal behavior or mental instability should be kept as far away from guns as possible."

...and "jody" twists it into forced abortions and sterilizations. :crazy: Why was the fitting avatar forgotten this time? :-)

[Emoto]

30. I'm not sure about that

The centuries-old concept of unfettered acces to firearms is antiquated.

Why do you say this? Haven't people always gone crazy and hurt each other throughout the course of history?

Also, "unfettered access" is not exactly what we have today, and anyone who thinks it is has not bought a gun lately.

Those who are prone to violence or those with histories of criminal behavior or mental instability should be kept as far away from guns as possible.

I'll assume that by "prone to violence" you mean people who have been violent? If so, one must reasonably ask where the line should be drawn. Obviously, spitballs in 5th grade are not a disqualifyer. However, currently you cannot pass the NICS check with either a felony conviction or doestic violence, or a restraining order, so we're doing this to some extent right now. I think it equates to our justice system's philosophy of "innocent until proven guilty", in other words, you have all of your constitutional rights until you prove unworthy of them, and circling back to our justice system, we know that it probably lets some guilty people escape, but we prefer that to depriving the innocent of their rights.

[CO Liberal]

31. But By Keeping Gun Access As Unfettered As It Is......

...many of the innocent are deprived of their lives.

[Emoto]

36. a couple of points

By Keeping Gun Access As Unfettered As It Is...many of the innocent are deprived of their lives.

1. What % of the guns used in killing innocents were legally acquired and what % were stolen black market guns?

2. Many many more people are kept out of harm's way because they are armed.

[acerbic]

39. Logical Fallacies: Fallacies of Distraction: False Dilemma

1. What % of the guns used in killing innocents were legally acquired and what % were stolen black market guns?

"A limited number of options (usually two) is given, while in reality there are more options" (in this case bought, not stolen, black market guns)
http://www.datanation.com/fallacies/distract/fd.htm

[Emoto]

63. Sheesh...

I guess I must spell everything out? Note that I said "A couple of points", not "these are the only points one should ever consider".

By asking "What % of the guns used in killing innocents were legally acquired and what % were stolen (or) black market guns", I was commenting on the assertion that "unfettered access" was a primary issue. The implication was that we ought to generalize and make decisions for the entire population based upon a single or a handful of anecdotes. I am trying to get at the bigger picture to see the trends and understand the flow. It is relevant because it is one thing if the guns used in crime are used by people who obtained them by legal means, and quite another if the guns used in crime are obtained illegally. The point being that if they were obtained through illegal means, we are dealing with people who are acting outside the law and therefore would be unaffected or only marginally affected by changing the law about unfettered access (which is hardly the case anyway.). OTOH, if they were bought and held legally, then a;tering a law might help.

[jody]

64. Emoto, are you trying to use the scientific method to establish

good policy?

Now you know that won't work if someone already has their mind made up. Facts just get in the way. :-)

[acerbic]

67. You continue using the same type of fallacy in your denial

...pretending again that these are the only cases that need to be considered:

The point being that if they were obtained through illegal means, we are dealing with people who are acting outside the law and therefore would be unaffected or only marginally affected by changing the law about unfettered access (which is hardly the case anyway.). OTOH, if they were bought and held legally, then a;tering a law might help.

As "pro-RKBA" spinners absolutely always do, you try to desperately ignore that the current law allows gun sales that are legal for the seller although illegal for the buyer: private sales (with no background checks required) to felons without knowing that the buyer is a felon.

[Emoto]

69. No. No fallacy at all

...pretending again that these are the only cases that need to be considered:

Which part of my post that said "Note that I said "A couple of points", not "these are the only points one should ever consider". was unclear to you?

(me)The point being that if they were obtained through illegal means, we are dealing with people who are acting outside the law and therefore would be unaffected or only marginally affected by changing the law about unfettered access (which is hardly the case anyway.). OTOH, if they were bought and held legally, then a;tering a law might help.

(acerbic)As "pro-RKBA" spinners absolutely always do, you try to desperately ignore that the current law allows gun sales that are legal for the seller although illegal for the buyer: private sales (with no background checks required) to felons without knowing that the buyer is a felon.

You evidently have me confused with someone else. I am ignoring nothing, spinning nothing, and am far from desperate. Remember the part I wrote that said "I am trying to get at the bigger picture to see the trends and understand the flow. ? The point that apparently went sailing over your head was that I was seeking to learn how the guns used illegally make it to the hands that misuse them. With that knowledge, we could make informed decisions when suggesting policy. I prefer that approach to conjecture, don't you?

To respond to your other points, talk anout spin! Are you dizzy? Think back to that point of mine that eluded you before: finding the path these guns took would go a long way toward suggesting solutions. you can jump up and down about the current laws, but until and unless you have solid evidence that they are problematic, you do not have an argument, merely an unfounded assertion.

[acerbic]

72. You display your understanding of the current laws nicely

but until and unless you have solid evidence that they are problematic, you do not have an argument, merely an unfounded assertion.

So you don't believe that it's currently possible to sell a gun so that the seller doesn't break the law but the buyer does (that's what I asserted and you call it unfounded). I have earlier found some law texts to show to those who have made the same claim but I think I'll just leave you to your stubbornness this time...

[Emoto]

73. Again, you're too low to the ground...

...it went sailing over your head.

For those of you who may not know, what I think he is referring to is that you're not supposed to sell a gun to a prohibited person (I won't say felon because moren just felons are prohibited). But, you are not liable if you did not know that the person was prohibited (and there is no way for a private individual to do a NICS check, but there is another way to assure that a bad person doesn't get the gun that many people use).

But, you misunderstand what I said when I said "I was commenting on the assertion that "unfettered access" was a primary issue. The implication was that we ought to generalize and make decisions for the entire population based upon a single or a handful of anecdotes. I am trying to get at the bigger picture to see the trends and understand the flow. It is relevant because it is one thing if the guns used in crime are used by people who obtained them by legal means, and quite another if the guns used in crime are obtained illegally."

Again, I draw your attention to the idea of actually knowing how and where these crime guns came from before we change the law. Isn't that just plain old common sense? You are relying on assumption and conjecture to conclude that the current private sale laws are the problem. I keep asking if we have evidence. I believe that before making law that affects millions of people that we have a responsibility to base our decisions on fact, not assumption.

[jody]

74. Is the issue analogous to MJ in that it is illegal to possess and that

ban prevents citizens with legitimate medical needs from obtaining it. I know that physicians can prescribe THC but the pill method of taking the drug does not appear to produce the same beneficial results as smoking MJ. My observation is based upon medicinal users' statements at various pro-MJ sites.

[MrBenchley]

37. By the way

Nice to see this guy didn't let money problems keep him from having an illegal assault rifle.

[slackmaster]

40. A couple of points for you, Benchley

1. An SKS is not an assault rifle.

2. An SKS is not an assault weapon.

3. An SKS is not illegal. They are available in all 50 states.

4. An SKS is not expensive. Mine cost $129 brand new.

[MrBenchley]

55. Whoop-de-frigging do

Now read the article again.

[slackmaster]

56. Go re-read the link to ABC that I posted

My comments are based on it, not the Charleston Gazette version.

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/US/ap20030718_693.html

We'll probably never get a straight story about what kind of rifle was used. The press is notoriously uneducated about types of firearms and applicable laws, as are people in general. Whether or not the weapon was an "illegal assault rifle" does matter. Portraying a legal weapon as an illegal one distorts the gun control debate.

BTW even if the Gazette is correct and the rifle was a semiautomatic Kalashnikov variant, that still would not qualify as an "illegal assault rifle". It may or may not be a federal assault weapon, but it's certainly not an assault rifle as the term is commonly used.

[MrBenchley]

57. Perhaps it's that sane people

really don't give a crap about which assault rifle it was...

[slackmaster]

58. We have yet another version from AP this morning

"Charleston police Lt. R.E. Ingram said yesterday that the weapon was an AK-47 assault rifle." - See http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/uniontrib/sat/news/news_1n19shoot.html

A police officer, perceived by many people as an authority on firearms, making a statement that is probably erroneous. Or perhaps what the cop said got garbled by the reporter or an editor. We will probably never know the truth.

Three articles, three quite different types of weapon. The type of weapon and the suspect's ability to legally own it or not DOES matter in terms of what crimes the individual can be indicted for.

If no sane person cares about what kind of weapon was used, how are we as a society supposed to enact and enforce effective gun control laws, Benchley? If you really don't care about facts, the law, and the truth perhaps you have no business participating in this discussion, Benchley.

[jody]

60. Hear! Hear!

:toast:

[Paladin]

61. I Wonder If You Guys Will Ever Wise Up

Here we go again. Somebody gets slaughtered by a lunatic wielding a gun, and what do you RKBA Absolutists concentrate all your attention upon? Not the tragic incident itself, not some pragmatic discussion of how such killings might be prevented in the future, but instead a rigorous inquiry into whether the media got the description of the weapon just right, per NRA-approved standards. Sure, accuracy matters, but not to the complete and deliberate ignoring of the shameful blood-letting itself. It's obvious why you go through this drill every time something like this happens, but that doesn't make it any less distasteful.....

[slackmaster]

62. Paladin, PLEASE go back and read the article

Nobody got slaughtered. One person suffered minor wounds.

"...what do you RKBA Absolutists concentrate all your attention upon? Not the tragic incident itself, not some pragmatic discussion of how such killings might be prevented in the future, but instead a rigorous inquiry into whether the media got the description of the weapon just right..."

You're doing the same thing: Focusing on someone else's reaction rather than on the incident itself and how it might be prevented.

I'm concerned about inaccuracy of such reports because the little errors here and there add up to a broad pattern of mis-reporting that reinforce public misunderstandings about these incidents. Someone is bound to take this as an example of why we need to renew the federal assault weapon ban, when the weapon that was misused probably wasn't even an assault weapon. They'll bleat and bray about our streets being flooded with automatic Uzis and AK-47s, when a good chunk of the population doesn't understand that automatic weapons aren't covered by the AW ban, or that the weapon used in this incident wasn't automatic.

I see a collection of mostly unintentional misreporting being leveraged by people who want to ban any kind of weapon they can get banned, to deceive the public into thinking that laws like the AW ban could have prevented this incident. I can not allow misstatements of fact like that go unchallenged, even if some little fruitcake calls me insane for doing so.

Criminal misuse of a firearm requires either gross negligence or the will to cause harm. If either of those mental states are present, harm does not require use of any particular kind of firearm or even a firearm at all. To paraphrase Archie Bunker, would youse feel better if he'd used a shotgun? Or how would you like it if he'd concentrated instead on setting fire to people and not been distracted by a gun?

[slackmaster]

66. BTW - Another pair of law-abiding car owners

When these two men chose to race their cars down that road at ludicrous speeds, they turned their cars into deadly weapons, hurtling missiles, just as though they were shooting two bullets down the barrel of a gun, toward an unknown number of people in a public place. It's appalling," (the mother of two of the victims) said.

She and others said they hoped the tragedy might lead to a change in the law.

"I hope we can pull together as a community to send a strong message . . . that we're tired of our loved ones being slaughtered like road kill, just because some anti-social thrill seekers couldn't wait to take their 'sport' to a proper venue, and took it to the public streets instead, caring little for who might get in their way."...

See http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20030719-9999_6m19racer.html for the full copyrighted article.

<sarcasm on>

I'm sure Mr. Waller never intended to do anything illegal when he bought a souped-up 1968 Plymouth Barracuda.

<sarcasm off>

[iverglas]

87. and if somebody ...

... had been talking about "some anti-social thrill seekers" standing in a shopping mall and firing off bullets willy-nilly "toward an unknown number of people in a public place", you might have posted something relevant.

Nobody was. You didn't.

The person you quoted didn't compare drag racers (what I presume the people in question were) to someone who walked into somewhere with the express intention of injuring and/or killing someone else, so I don't know why you would. I mean, that's what you seem to me to be doing ...

Now, if they'd been drag racing in order to ensure that they were able to set someone on fire and thereby kill him/her, you might have a point. They apparently weren't. You don't.


"I'm sure Mr. Waller never intended to do anything illegal when he bought a souped-up 1968 Plymouth Barracuda."

Who knows? Who cares? Did he intend to use the car to kill someone with it or to use it to ensure the success of his plan to kill someone by another means?

Are you still trying to say that using a thing recklessly or carelessly and using a thing intentionally to cause injury or death (or to ensure, by threatening or causing injury or death, that one is able to commit another crime that one intends to commit) are the same?

Strange how some of us see such a difference. We must speak funny English.

.

[Paladin]

68. Glad The Person Survived......

...that's my error. I stand by my comments about your side's repeated concentration on gun descriptions rather than the shootings themselves. I understand why you guys do it; if I was on your side of the issue, I'd be trying to direct as much attention away from the actual incidents as possible.

If you newcomers want to see a stomach-turning example of this phenomenon in the extreme, check back to the J/PS threads dealing with the D.C. sniper incident. Lengthy, clinical discussions of why it wasn't a "sniper" doing all that killing, and how a real "sniper rifle" wasn't being used, because a .223 caliber "platform" wasn't what the pros preferred. Nauseating.....

[slackmaster]

70. You'll probably want to shoot me for saying this

The rifle allegedly used by the DC snipers was not an assault weapon.

:hippie:

[Paladin]

77. Not An Assault Weapon? Say, I'll Bet That's.....

... bound to be of great comfort to the families of those killed in that particular rampage. Ought to make all the difference in the world.

Let's cut to the chase here. Any high school debater can tell you that the control of definitions is a primary means of controlling the argument. I'm simply unwilling to let you and others on your side impose a set of gun rights-friendly definitions in this forum without at least calling attention to what you're attempting.

And I don't shoot people who happen to disagree with me. Not my style....

[slackmaster]

81. I know what I am attempting to do

Let's cut to the chase here. Any high school debater can tell you that the control of definitions is a primary means of controlling the argument. I'm simply unwilling to let you and others on your side impose a set of gun rights-friendly definitions in this forum without at least calling attention to what you're attempting.

Are you suggesting that attempting to get all participants to use standard legal and technical definitions for objects is a bad thing?

How can a productive debate occur when contributors are not all speaking the same language? I'm not talking about dialect or nuance here, rather hard, supportable usage for words. MrBenchley insists on using the term "assault rifle" for the weapon used in the school board incident in spite of the absence of any sound basis for using the term. Obviously MrBenchley is just trying to stir up peoples' chili, and surely you can see that is not a path to any kind of solution for the problem.

How would the families of the victims of the DC sniper shootings feel if a whole bunch of legislative energy was spent on a gun ban that would do nothing to prevent a similar rampage?

[Paladin]

86. Let's Not Be Falsely Naive, OK?

Imposing your definitions on this issue is a calculated move, designed to help you control the direction of the argument. Don't expect to take such actions without some criticism. For the record, I think that any definition of an "assault rifle" that excludes an AK-47 is laughable. Of course, I'm not wedded to the WWII Nazi definition that some on your side find so compelling; I didn't find the Nazis' definitions of racial purity to my tastes, either, but then again, I'm a life-long Democrat......

[slackmaster]

100. What's good for the goose is good for the gander

Imposing your definitions on this issue is a calculated move, designed to help you control the direction of the argument.

How is my desire to encourage use of standard, widely accepted definitions that are supported in black and white by written law and technical literature worse than Benchley trying to broaden the definition of assault rifle to include whatever he or she wants? I think I've taken the high road in this one. I can back up my definiitons with multiple sources, none of which come from the NRA or any other propaganda machines.

Don't expect to take such actions without some criticism. For the record, I think that any definition of an "assault rifle" that excludes an AK-47 is laughable.

So would I. My objection is the inclusion in the definition of "AK-47" a rifle that does not have selective-fire capability, without qualifying it as something like "a semiautomatic AK-47 variant" or other words that distinguish the civilian look-alikes from REAL AK-47s. The difference between the two is very real in terms of their destructive capacity and what laws apply.

Again, what is YOUR objection to using standard terminology? Any definition of "assault rifle" that includes a standard SKS rifle would be inflammatory, and not supportable by any credible authority.

Knowledge is power. Allow me and my fellow pro-RKBAers to share it with you. An amateur gun collector knows a lot more about the subject than any MMMer I've ever met. I can no longer sit back and allow the language, the agenda, and law to be written by people who don't know dick about the subject. Worse still, people who really do know better but pretend not to. Ignorance is nothing to be proud of.

[Paladin]

107. Spare Me The Patronizing Attitude

I happen to know a considerable amount about firearms, they used to be a hobby of mine. My opinions about gun ownership are not the product of inexperience, much as you'd obviously like them to be.

"Ignorance is nothing to be proud of." Yeah, right. Thanks so much for sticking to the high road.....

[slackmaster]

111. My criticism is not directed at you personally, Paladin

Sticking up for MrBenchley's intentional, inflammatory misstatements does not serve you well. I am sincere in my desire to inform and educate.

[Emoto]

71. bad assumption

Nobody was diverting attention from the incident itself, people were merely striving for an accurate account of what happened and how. We aim for accuracy! :)

It is also important because these sorts of incidents are used by the gun grabbers as political footballs to bolster ludicrous legislation like the assault weapon ban, even though the banned weapons are NOT what was used here.

If you newcomers want to see a stomach-turning example of this phenomenon in the extreme, check back to the J/PS threads dealing with the D.C. sniper incident. Lengthy, clinical discussions of why it wasn't a "sniper" doing all that killing, and how a real "sniper rifle" wasn't being used, because a .223 caliber "platform" wasn't what the pros preferred. Nauseating.....

Wrong again 'bic. It was a rather informative discussion. Well, at least for those of us seeking truth and knowledge.

[MrBenchley]

76. Amazing, isn't it?

AND disgraceful.

[Name removed]

79. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Paladin]

88. You Betcha

That's just what our country's schools, restaurants and airliners are in need of: more crossfire......

[Name removed]

90. Deleted message

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[Paladin]

91. I Think Not

A cursory look-see of Justice/Public Safety on any given day indicates that the Guns For Everybody, Everywhere crowd is the one that is over-exposed to TV, along with a whole lot of movies starring Stallone and Ahhnald. Mix that with a few decades of government hating and paranoia, courtesy of the gun lobby, and....well, you get the idea.

[Name removed]

92. Deleted message

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[iverglas]

89. "we'll never know"

"And finally how safe were the passengers on the hijacked flights on 9/11? That is perhaps the ultimate failure of gun-free zones. When decent people are stripped of their ability to defend themselves, they will be at the mercy of thugs with box cutters."

And how safe have millions of air travellers been because firearms are banned on board commercial aircraft? "We will never know", but we might hazard a pretty good guess.

"Our prison system is an example of the perfect gun-free zones. There are no guns, and cops on every corner. Yet violent crime including murder is rampant."

I'll be brief: ditto.

And I'll keep wondering what your point might have been.


I assume you're not suggesting that it should be legal for private individuals to carry firearms on board commercial aircraft, or for inmates to carry firearms inside prisons. Correct me if I'm assuming incorrectly.

If you *are* suggesting that it should be legal for private individuals to carry firearms on board commercial aircraft, or for inmates to carry firearms inside prisons, you might try hazarding your own guess as to how unsafe ... say, dead ... quite a lot of air travellers and prison guards might be today.

If you *aren't* suggesting this, then I'll assume it's because you think that denying access to firearms in those situations is an effective way of preventing the deaths that could be expected to occur if access to firearms were granted. Huh. Imagine that. But perhaps I assume wrongly.


"There are sometimes unfortunate deaths involving guns. However, there are a lot more deaths involving doctors. The reason we don't ban hospitals is because they do a lot more good than harm. So do guns."

Is that actually the governing consideration, in your mind? - that firearms "do a lot more good than harm"? I'd understood that the governing consideration, for USAmerican opponents of greater state interference in who may possess and carry firearms, was that second amendment thing.

But as long as you make the argument, which you just did, let's have a look at it.

You've made the bald assertion -- "So do guns <do a lot more good than harm>" -- apparently as argument for no more state interference in who may possess and carry firearms.

So I'll make one too: No they don't. And there we are. Of course, we could always do something a little better than fling unexplained opinions around.

As a preliminary matter, whether or not something "does more good than harm" really is not always the ONLY, let alone the GOVERNING, consideration in deciding what to do about it. Really. It isn't.

In many cases, it is indeed usually *a* consideration. And when it is, there obviously has to be a standard against which the thing in question may be measured in order to determine whether it "does good" or "does harm" -- i.e. what is "good" and what is "harm", to start with -- and the degree to which it does both.

By any conceivable standard that a rational person speaking in good faith would apply, hospitals do indeed "do more good than harm".

Large numbers, I'd confidently say most, of the people who die in hospitals were likely to die in any event, hospital or no hospital, of precisely what they did die of, or even of problems caused by efforts to prevent them from dying of that cause. Is a death on the operating table during surgery to correct a predictably fatal defect or injury a death involving a doctor/hospital in the sense that a death from a gunshot wound is a death involving a firearm? Only to the most disingenuous. How many of the people who have died of gunshot wounds were likely to die of gunshot wounds, firearm or no firearm? What sense does your purported analogy make?

"Deaths involving doctors", you say. Hmm. Would those be deaths in which someone threw a doctor at someone else and knocked the victim dead? In which someone poured doctors on someone else, and lit a doctor to set the person on fire? That's kinda what "deaths involving baseballs" or "deaths involving gas/matches" ... or "deaths involving firearms" ... might look like. What do "deaths involving doctors" look like, and how exactly do they look remotely the same as deaths involving firearms, or would banning hospitals be remotely the same as banning firearms?

Such bafflegab you speak.

Our country will be safest when all law-abiding citizens have the tools to ensure their own safety ... .

And the instant you can prove that none of those "law-abiding citizens" has ever injured or killed anyone with a firearm, I might agree that you have some foundation for the assertion that access to firearms on the part of all those law-abiders should not be restricted.

Of course, I'd be requiring that you apply the same statement to air travellers and prison inmates, too. After all, "Gun-free zones will never deter those bent on criminal intent", right? And inmates and air travellers ... and schoolchildren? ... are surely just as entitled to have "the tools to ensure their own safety" as anyone else.

.

[Name removed]

93. Deleted message

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[acerbic]

94. "Facts" from the Kooktarian Party? MUAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

"According to a report by the Institute of Medicine, 98,000 Americans are killed every year by medical errors. By contrast, 30,708 gun-related deaths occurred in 1998 -- meaning incompetent doctors are more than three times as deadly as guns."

So the Kooktarian Party kooks claim and like any kooks spewing made up claims, especially when claiming what someone else said or "reported", there's no reference to the claimed source which would make it possible to easily check the claims. It's seen in this forum all the time, with all the fake Clinton/Gore/Reno "quotes" and other wingnutzo propaganda bullshit. :eyes:

[Name removed]

96. Deleted message

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[acerbic]

97. When confronted with the truth about the Kooktarian Party,

you seem to collapse into a heap from which emanates nothing but faint, lame personal attacks. :-)

[Name removed]

99. Deleted message

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[maddog50]

102. What truth is that?

And may I ask what substance have you offered to the discussion?

[acerbic]

103. The truth about the Kooktarian Party: they are a bunch of lying kooks

...and touting any claims by them as proof of something is just ridiculous.

[Name removed]

104. Deleted message

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[iverglas]

106. asked and answered long ago

And it didn't even need to be. The thing speaks for itself: the "conclusion" stated by the loonytarians is not supported by the facts or by any reasonable person's understanding of the meaning of words and concepts involved.

What it said:

"According to a report by the Institute of Medicine, 98,000 Americans are killed every year by medical errors. By contrast, 30,708 gun-related deaths occurred in 1998 -- meaning incompetent doctors are more than three times as deadly as guns."

Now, let's break it down. This Institute of Medicine said that 98,000 (US)Americans are killed every year by medical errors. Kewl.

The claim (which I'll go with) is made that 30,709 gun-related deaths occurred in 1998. Kewl again.

Then we have one of those grammatical sleight-of-hand things: "-- meaning ...". What exactly does that dangling little participle modify, here? WHAT MEANS the "fact" that is stated in the clause following it: "<that> incompetent doctors are more than three times as deadly as guns"? I don't see anything at all that MEANS that. Not when I apply my favourite, and the normal and appropriate, meaning of "mean": "conveys or indicates". "It", whatever "it" is, doesn't convey or indicate "that" to me at all.

And: could "it" mean "that" according to anyone acting reasonably and in good faith? Not by me, it couldn't. The "fact" stated in that clause falls so far outside the realm of the reasonable and bona fide, in terms of conclusions from stated facts, that it sure as hell doesn't mean any such thing according to ME.

Not unless I thought that baby cribs (the cause of 35 deaths a year in the US: http://www.ul.com/consumers/child.html) are 3.5 to 7 times more dangerous than poisonous snakes (5 to 10 deaths a year in the US, cited in post below).

The thing is, I'm just not dim enough to think that baby cribs are 3.5 to 7 times more dangerous than poisonous snakes, or disingenuous enough to say it.

.

[maddog50]

108. The prostitution will rest, your honor

Kewl
Kewl again.

I rest my case.

[iverglas]

120. ... in peace ;)

Fitting last words.

Not as good as Aldous Huxley's. He, perhaps apocryphally, ingested his last dose of ... god, I've gotten so old I've forgotten the names of the drugs I used to take. Mescaline. And then at the end, he opened his eyes and said "I thought so".

The ones I fear I am most likely to emulate are Oscar Wilde's: "Either that wallpaper goes, or I do."

http://www.corsinet.com/braincandy/dying.html

[Name removed]

122. Deleted message

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[iverglas]

95. ack ack ack

I'm choking! Is it those "hard facts" making me gag? No!!! It's MORE STRAW!

"My point is that gun control cannot prevent violence because prisons are violent and there are no guns."

Okay then! My point is that sunflowers do not grow in the shade.

Are you asking why I'm telling you this? Well, I dunno. I just felt like it. Kinda like I assume you musta just felt like telling me that thing about gun control not being able to prevent violence.

WHO SAID IT COULD? To whom are you speaking? If you wish to speak to me, I would be greatly recognizant if you would make some attempt to speak ABOUT something that is relevant to the subject we might be thought by a reasonable observer to be discussing.


"No one is suggesting that school children or prison inmates should be allowed to carry guns."

WHY NOT? Surely you can appreciate that this is what I was asking. I anticipated your disagreement with my assertion that they should be permitted to do so. My assertion was based on WHAT YOU HAD SAID. Did you consider, just possibly, EXPLAINING why these persons should not be permitted to carry firearms? Bringing to light something that distinguishes them from anyone else whose life/safety is in constant danger from other people trying to harm them? Who more than prison inmates, living in one of the most dangerous/insecure environments known to people, should be entitled to carry firearms in self-defence??

"I am suggesting that it should be legal for private individuals to carry firearms on board commercial aircraft. In fact, it was legal for pilots to carry until July 2001.
(http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=27647) In fact several pilots have told me that until they started running pilots through the metal detectors in recent years, it was not uncommon for them to carry guns aboard commercial aircraft. Yet there was no widespread "blood in the skies"."

And how exactly did THAT answer my question regarding whether private individuals should be entitled to carry firearms on board commercial aircraft? Even if we regard pilots as some subset of "private individuals" (when plainly I would not have been including them in that set), whither all the rest? What about PASSENGERS -- the "air travellers" to whom I referred? They, in their thousands and millions, are in danger from plane hijackers and crashers, no?

"But I can hazard a guess as to how many lives could have been saved by the deterrence of guns on aircraft. Or the bullets of passengers."

That's lovely, the only problem being that YOU HAVE NOT ANSWERED THE QUESTION I ASKED YOU. I didn't ask you how many people might still be alive if air travellers were not prohibited from carrying firearms on commercial aircraft. I asked you how unsafe ... say, dead ... quite a lot of air travellers ... might be today if air travellers had not been prohibited from carrying firearms on board commercial aircraft.

See the difference? I know you do! But heck, go ahead and hazard a guess in answer to your own question anyhow. Then maybe we can compare it to some sort of sincere guess about how many people might be DEAD if the prohibition were not in place. Or you can just go ahead and say "fewer!" if you like. Nothing I can do to stop you from spouting nonsense.

"By your reasoning CCW laws should have resulted in widespread death and pandemonium. Quite the opposite is the case. The wild west argument does not hold water."

Ack, ack, a glass of water please! There are straw people disintegrating all around me.

"By definition anyone who has injured or killed anyone with a firearm under other than justifiable circumstances is not a "law-abiding" citizen."

Oh, Jesus H. Christ on a bike. We're going in that circle again.

They WERE "law-abiding" WHEN THEY ACQUIRED THE FIREARM, were they not? WERE THEY NOT one of your archetypal law-abiding citizens at that time? And at the instant they morphed into non-law-abiding cretins, THEY HAD ACCESS TO FIREARMS. What a good thing, eh?

"But it is false to suggest that most murderers were law-abiding citizens before they pulled the trigger."

Who said that??? I have poltergeists; this is the only reasonable explanation for why you would think that there was some reason to say this to me. The poltergeists must have said that most murderers wre law-abiding citizens before the pulled the trigger. I sure don't remember saying it.

"Studies show that 75% of murderers have adult criminal records before the murder and half of the remaining 25% are juveniles with no "adult" record."

"Murderers tend to be rather extreme aberrants with histories of violence, crime, and substance abuse.
Source of data: Bureau of Justice Statistics and U.S. Department of Justice."

Let's have the actual source, if you please; not someone else's spin of what it said.

I found the statement you quoted at two sites:

http://www.jpfo.org/data-docs.htm
"Jews For The Preservation of Firearms Ownership, Inc."
where it is cited to a secondary source that is said to have used a variety of other sources -- in fact, everything in that text is cited to the same article by someone named Don. B. Kates.

and

http://www.geocities.com/LadyLiberty_1776/RightBareArms.html
which is either the original source of that statement (ha, I think not), or plagiarizes it:

Argument: Most murderers were law-abiding citizens before they pulled the trigger.
<Oh look, the author of that site has met the same straw people you seem to consort with.>

Facts: Studies show that 75% of murderers have adult criminal records before the murder; half of the remaining 25% are juveniles with no "adult" record; murderers tend to be rather extreme aberrants with histories of violence & crime.

And yet ...

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5003a1.htm

Approximately one in three homicides of females is committed by current or former spouses or boyfriends, a group collectively referred to as intimate partners. Among male homicide victims, 5% are killed by intimate partners.

Hmm. Could you be distinguishing between "homicide" and "murder"? For some reason ... other than setting up a nice straw fella you can knock over?

Now, how many of the offenders had criminal records?

http://canada.justice.gc.ca/en/dept/pub/smir/ms_int_rel_report_intdat.html

- In Australia, 29% of the 75% of intimate-partner homicide records studied showed that the offender had a previous criminal record; even if ALL of the other 25% had a previous criminal record (it being of course more reasonable to assume that the same proportion did, or even that none did because if they did it would have been recorded), that comes to under 39%. (Here's the original study: http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/tandi/ti90.pdf)

- In the UK, 44% had a previous conviction for violence. (I know, a shoplifting conviction really should be considered to be relevant ...) (A source for the study: http://news.man.ac.uk/1020610359/index_html)

http://canada.justice.gc.ca/en/dept/pub/smir/ms_int_rel_report_litrev.html

- <In Canada> "Over half (53%) of all spousal homicides from 1991 to 2000 were committed by persons who had a prior criminal conviction, mostly for violent offences. Other intimate partner homicides involved an even higher percentage of accused with prior criminal convictions (64%)."

Here's an interesting one:

http://www.guncontrol.ca/Content/Temp/homicide2000.pdf

In 2000, two-thirds (67%) of persons accused of homicide had a Canadian criminal record, the majority (69%) of whom <i.e. 46% of all persons accused of homicide> had been previously convicted of violent crimes: 5 for homicide, 50 for robbery and 161 for other violent offences. All five accused with a previous homicide conviction had completed their sentence and were living in the community when the homicide charge was laid. At the same time, half (52%) of homicide victims over the age of 12 in 2000 had a Canadian criminal record, half (46%) of whom had been previously convicted of violent crimes: 5 for homicide, 25 for robbery, and 89 for other violent offences.

Find yrself some USAmerican statistics if you like.

Let's put 'em together, with a healthy dose of reasonableness, and see what we get.

Both homicide offenders and homicide victims are more likely than the general public to have criminal records for violent offences. (Now, not all of the victims in any of the groups referred to here were killed by killers using firearms. Thank you.)

It's a pretty good guess that the victims of killers who did not have criminal records were themselves among the victims who did not have criminal records. A lot of these incidents would likely be intimate-partner homicides.

And yet the killers still killed, and the victims are still dead.

And some of those killers still had firearms, and law-abiding as they were, used those firearms to kill people. And hey -- a bunch of those killers with criminal records somehow had firearms too.

"It's not my, how do you say... "bafflegab", it's the Institute of Medicine's: ... According to a report by the Institute of Medicine, 98,000 Americans are killed every year by medical errors. By contrast, 30,708 gun-related deaths occurred in 1998 -- meaning incompetent doctors are more than three times as deadly as guns."

Jesus H. Christ on a pink and purple ten-speed bike. Have you NO DECENCY?

The Institute of Medicine said NO SUCH FUCKING THING. Your disingenuous source said "incomptent doctors are three times more deadly as guns" (which isn't even grammatically decent). No one with a brain cell or a scintilla of honesty would say any such thing. And YOU KNOW why.

The Institute of Medicine apparently published figures concerning deaths from medical error. IT DID NOT say that doctors were any times more deadly than guns. What the Institute of Medicine said DOES NOT MEAN what this sickening demagogue has said, and what you apparently want me to believe the Institute of Medicine said.

It all amounts to about as much as your 18th century silliness. Do you often quote stuff from that era as guidance for sociopolitical issues of our day? Me, I'm pleased to belong to a much nicer and really much smarter world. Have you reached a conclusion on the question of how many angels can dance on the point of a pin recently? It's really a very important issue, you know, and I'm sure you can find the appropriate guidance if you look back a few hundred years.

Really, you know (and I know you know, or I really really hope you know); a dead guy's opinions aren't actually authority for much of anything. You may like 'em, I may not. And to the extent that this one's opinions aren't based on any more empirically sound foundation, or derived from any less self-interested considerations, than your own, I don't. You have essentially cited yourself -- Hey look, Joe Blow agrees with me! -- and I'm just not impressed.

.

[Name removed]

98. Deleted message

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[Name removed]

101. Deleted message

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[iverglas]

105. yap and ... how did that go?

It's very simple. Criminals lose their civil rights through 'due process'. Just as their right to travel freely is taken from them, so is their right to keep and bear arms in their own defense."

You try actually learning something about things like criminal sentencing theory and due process, rather than just parroting the words, and then maybe we can talk.

If a criminal "lost his/her civil rights through due process" and were sentenced to live for 10 years in a 6' by 4' by 3' underground cell, would that be just swell with you? Sentenced to have a hand cut off? Prohibited from practising his/her religion? No, maybe? Got some actual REASON for asserting that denying incarcerated criminals the right to defend themselves against homicidal assault is hunky dory?

Criminals do not "lose their civil rights through due process", sweetums -- especially not if by "civil rights" you are actually referring to fundamental rights, which you apparently think that "right" to defend one's life is one of. An incarcerated criminal really need not sit down and wait when someone comes at him/her with a shiv, eh?

"While children have a legitimate need for self-defense, they have to count on their parents to provide it for them much in the same way they rely on their parents for other basic human needs such as food and shelter. Parents who pawn that responsibility off on the government's hired guns are neglecting that duty to provide for their safety."

You're really in the dark about things like rights theory, aren't you? A rhetorical question.

When parents are supposed to exercise children's rights in the children's best interests and fail to do so, we generally do things like remove the children or issue orders for their care. (Well, in civilized societies we do.) If self-defence is this great big number one "right", how come children are quite evidently being denied ability to exercise it -- even through someone else?

If you are entitled to wander the streets or wherever else you go with a firearm so that you can exercise that "right", and you choose not to attend school every day with your child so that you can exercise that "right" on his/her behalf (which, of course, is one possible approach), can I assume that you are demanding that all teachers be appropriately armed, so that the people to whom you entrust your children are capable of exercising that "right" on their behalf? (Pretend you have children, if you don't, okay?) And if you don't, are you not just one of those people "who pawn that responsibility off on the government's hired guns <and who> are neglecting that duty to provide for their safety"? And should someone not do something about your failure to act in your children's interests?

Really, if this self-defence stuff is truly a "right" and the ability to exercise it demands the ability to wander around with a firearm, then somebody needs to do something about the denial of all these children's rights.

"... passengers should be armed if they choose. The right to self-defense is not magically suspended when they walk through security checkpoints."

Okay then, I think we've long since established that this is your considered opinion. Maybe you'll get around to answering what I asked you ... and hazard a guess at how many dead air travellers there might be by now if the carrying of firearms on board commercial aircraft had never been banned. Remember -- all those armed good guys (assuming at least some good-guy air travellers choose to carry firearms on board) could certainly, we'll say for the sake of argument, shoot down whatever armed hijackers etc. they might encounter on planes; but there's a damned good chance that the hijacker will also manage to put holes in a few passengers ... not to mention in the plane. Damned inconvenient, holes in a plane, as I understand it. Apart from the fabled Pennsylvania passengers, you got any estimates on how many undead of those dead there'd be now, vs. how many dead of those undead there'd be, if your wishes were horses?

"Smart, very smart. Let me guess: Gandhi, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Budha, Jesus, and Mohammed's opinions all mean far less to you than those of your favorite entertainers and sports figures."

Well now, let me guess. The options are: you didn't understand what I said, or you chose to misrepresent it. I'll keep my guess to myself, shall I?

What I said, as quoted by you, was:

a dead guy's opinions aren't actually authority for much of anything

Now, pop quiz. Explain the difference between

- "<their> opinions aren't actually authority for much of anything"
and
- "<their> opinions mean far less to you than those of your favorite entertainers and sports figures".

Can you do it? No time limit.

Here's your hint: is anyone's opinion authority for anything?

Hell yeah; some courts' opinions are authority for some things, eh? But I'm afraid that won't help you; you see, they have actually been appointed to exercise that authority. Your favourite old dead guy never was appointed as an authority on, what was it now, good vs. bad? And what about the little problem of how someone like, say, Gandhi, to whom you refer, would quite likely disagree with a huge bunch of what he said? The battle of the titans' opinions, I guess. You pick yours, and I'll pick mine, and nobody will really care unless s/he chooses to recognize the person in question as some kind of authority on good vs. bad, which no one is, of course.

So I have no reason to pay any attention to him. Unless I like him and feel like quoting him as someone who agrees with me. I don't.

"The Institute of Medicine apparently published figures concerning deaths from medical error."

"And that was what you had the most anxiety over when you posted, 'What do "deaths involving doctors" look like ... ?'"

Oh, you are just sooooo confused. And no, had I been at all anxious, it most certainly would not have been about "that". My concern was not with what this Institute of Medicine published; it was with the dishonest representation of what it published that you quoted. I kinda figure that you know this. I'm not the only one to have pointed it out.

But just for fun on the tangent, let's go back to first principles, shall we?

"Guns don't kill people; people kill people." Have I got it right?

Now how can we possibly compare "deaths involving doctors" and "deaths involving guns"?? Did the guns just walk out the door and start firing? I think not. Conversely, did someone hit someone over the head with a doctor? I think not.

What you and your disingenuous source were actually comparing were deaths caused by people practising medicine and deaths caused by people using firearms. Might we agree? And of course when we do that, the very least we have to do is establish the proportion of instances in which someone practised medicine and in which someone used firearms, so that we have a valid basis for comparison -- a rate. I'll bet you know that, too.

So your source is still engaging in the same dishonest representation of reality that we get when people call staircases "more dangerous" than firearms.

Let me play.

http://www.gearfactory.com/vending.php

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has stated a total of 37 deaths and 113 injuries resulting from malicious vending machines since 1978.

http://www.emedicinehealth.com/articles/10707-1.asp

Five to 10 deaths occur per year from snakebite in the United States.

Hmm, I guess rattlesnakes really are "more dangerous" than vending machines. But not by much, eh?

Let's try some others.

http://www.safechild.net/for_parents/clothes.html

The CPSC reports that from January 1985 through September 1995, it received reports of 17 deaths and 42 non-fatal incidents involving the entanglement of children's clothing drawstrings.

Clothing drawstrings are more dangerous than vending machines, or vice versa? (Different time frames.) Pretty close to a ... tie. Heh heh.

Finding this silly? Me too. Just as I find the assertion (corrected so that it makes some semblance of sense) that people practising medicine are more dangerous than people using guns.

"I've heard how successful <Canada's> gun registration eforts have been."

Yeah, eh?! By the deadline, 80% of firearms (or 80% of firearms owners -- the media reports were stupidly confused on that issue, and I could find no official figures yet) were registered (or had registered their firearms). Amazingly high rate of compliance. Just try getting that compliance rate with the speed limit on Highway 401 through Toronto!

"You don't seem to have much to say about Gary Kleck."

That could be because I've never heard of him, but who knows, eh? Do you actually think that I devote great tracts of my time to reading what people like you have to say about things like this? No need to know, my dear. But if you wish to provide some citations of material I can access, I might find a minute.

Well, from the little bit I've seen so far -- http://www.guncite.com/gcwhoGK.html -- I'm not overly interested. But I'd have to delve further to know how interested I might be. I see things like "the use of a gun in defense against a criminal perpetrator...", "a gun was used as a defensive measure against crime" ... but I'm not seeing a really clear-cut statement about the kinds of crimes that the use of firearms allegedly prevented.

I mean -- we're talking about that "right" to defend one's life, right? Or have we somehow come up with a "right" to use lethal violence to defend one's property? Hey, if you have that "right", you're welcome to it; I don't, and I don't want it. I don't even want the right to use lethal violence against a non-lethal assault, thank you very much. So those are all things I'd need cleared up before I was much interested in these facts & figures of yours.

And if I do delve, I'll keep in mind what I keep in mind when I read anyone's conclusions about anything: it just all depends on the criteria against which one is measuring whatever it is, don't it? So when I see things like (my emphasis):

... when aggressors have guns, they are (1) less likely to physically attack their victims, (2) less likely to injure the victim given an attack, but (3) more likely to kill the victim, given an injury.

... *I* look at that last one and think: wow, that's a really bad thing.

And when I see things like:

Further, when victims have guns, it is less likely aggressors will attack or injure them and less likely they will lose property in a robbery.

... *I* look at that last one and think: who the fuck cares?

But that's just me. And probably Gandhi, come to think of it.

.

[Name removed]

109. Deleted message

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[Romulus]

112. FYI: its MS. Pacifist

*

[CO Liberal]

113. Maddog50 Can't Respond to You, Romulus

He earned himself one of these after only 15 posts:



It's rather ironic that he used "pacifist" as a term to attack you, while he had a picture of Ghandi as his selected Avatar image........

[Romulus]

118. not me, CO - it was iverglas

I'm still a Mr. (AFAIK)

[CO Liberal]

119. My Mistake

Maddog50 was attacking so many people during his brief stint here at DU, it was hard to tell who he was attacking.......

:-)

[iverglas]

124. outed

Dang, I hate it when that happens! Fortunately, from the perspective of my entertainment, many will still fail to pay attention, and there will always be new assumers. And I will keep doing nothing to provide grounds for their assumptions.

So yup, if maddog## is still reading (or posting? surely not!): I've been sexually assaulted the regular old-fashioned way (in the course of which a life-threatening assault was committed, and at the conclusion of which a homicide was evidently planned). I didn't have a firearm, and neither did he. Had either of us had one, one or both of us would likely be dead now; no telling which, in either case. And I can hardly assume that I would have had one and he not, or that I would have successfully used mine and he not.

As it stands, we're both alive. The survival of individual members of society being pretty much a society's foremost purpose, and an aim that I certainly share, I see a successful outcome.

.

[Name removed]

129. Deleted message

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[iverglas]

131. yeah

And words are not for people who practise discourse this way.

Hell, I can do it too. You just said "Well I guess guns are not for people", right? So "I guess" you're a gun-grabber of the most extreme kind now. There's none so devout as the convert, after all.

.

(typo edited)

[Name removed]

132. Deleted message

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[CO Liberal]

110. Guns Also TAKE Lives

And no long-winded post you make will change that fact.......

[Name removed]

114. Deleted message

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[Emoto]

115. That's right...

...guns just leap out of the closet and attack people all by themselves.

Sorry for the sarcasm, but what you just wrote is the fundamental flaw that pervades the anti-gun constituency. PEOPLE are the problem. Guns are only a tool, an inanimate object, and are only as good or bad as the person holding them.

[CO Liberal]

116. True - The People Holding The Guns Are Both Good AND Bad

The trick is keeping the guns away from the bad guys while allowing those good guys who wish to own guns to have them.

And that's what "gun control" is all about.

[Emoto]

117. Yes and No :-)

The trick is keeping the guns away from the bad guys while allowing those good guys who wish to own guns to have them.

And that's what "gun control" is all about.

That is what gun control should be about, but it rarely is. CO, I know that you truly seek good solutions and have an open mind about what might work. On the other hand we have people like MrBenchley who appear to be completely over the top and seek to villify all gun owners, and people like Diane Feinstein who really do want to take everyone's guns away.

[Name removed]

121. Deleted message

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[CO Liberal]

123. Which Is Why We NEED Effective Gun Control

So people will keep their guns secured so bad guys can't steal them.

And stiffen the penalties for illegal gun purchases so people will be detered from selling guns to bad guys.

[Name removed]

126. Deleted message

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[jody]

127. CO, criminals rob banks. Do you mean pass a law requiring

law abiding citizens to have a bank vault in their homes to store guns? What about guns in automobiles?

As to stiffer penalities, local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies are not enforcing the laws already on the books.

Why do you think things will improve by passing more laws or amending current laws to stiffen penalities?

[CO Liberal]

133. Deterrence

Back during the Great Depression, bank robberies and kidnappings were quite common, the work of desperate people. Once bank robbery and kidnapping were made federal offenses, the number of these crimes dropped substantially.

[Name removed]

141. Deleted message

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[jody]

142. I understand, but what new items do you wish to add to the list

of federal crimes associated with guns?

It is widely recognized that federal laws are not being enforced. Enforcement could have been done by an order from Clinton and now by Bush.

I've asked this question before. Does gun control mean (a) more laws or (b) enforcing existing laws?

The first option is a legislative decision and the second is an executive decision unless limited budgets prevent enforcing existing laws.

[CO Liberal]

143. I Think It Will Take A Combination Of the Two

Enforce existing laws, and pass new laws as appropriate.

[jody]

146. I agree. Several recent threads provided an opportunity for

gun-control advocates to state their views regarding sentencing criminals convicted under federal laws for gun crimes. In a couple of them, I asked whether gun-control advocates supported giving convicted criminals the maximum sentence under federal law.

The absence of replies from gun-control advocates was significant. I believe a common ground for pro-RKBA types like me and gun-control types is lobbying congress for sufficient funds to enforce existing laws and then pressure the president to enforce existing laws. Coupled with that should be collecting detailed data that can be used to determine how effective are "enforced laws".

My personal opinion is that politicians don't want that to happen because it takes away one of their issues to campaign on.

[iverglas]

125. didn't you forget something?

Shouldn't that have read:

gun control has ended up restricting access to the good guys while bad guys just steal guns FROM THE GOOD GUYS or buy them illegally FROM THE GOOD GUYS?

I mean, from whom else??

And in what sense are we calling people who allow their firearms to be stolen, or who sell them illegally, "good guys"?

Beats me, I'm sure.

.

[Name removed]

128. Deleted message

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[iverglas]

130. "Sense"?

"And in what sense are we calling people who allow their firearms
to be stolen, or who sell them illegally, 'good guys'?"

"In the same sense that we call people who 'allow' themselves
to be raped the good guys (or good Ms.'s)."

Not seeing any sense there at all. Except in the sense that a fish is "the same" as a bicycle, maybe. I.e.: the nonsense sense.

I "allowed myself" to be assaulted by placing MYSELF in a position of vulnerability to an assault against ME. There were no consequences for anyone else -- except, of course, the consequence that by the time the incident was over, and given my skills and the way I exercised them and perhaps a little good fortune, I was able to provide the police with enough information that they very shortly apprehended the individual for both that assault and the others that same weekend for which he was already wanted. (Assaulted by a "good guy"? What good guy would that be??)

The act of a firearms owner who allows his/her firearm to be stolen creates consequences for OTHER PEOPLE.

Surely you are able to see the difference. And when things are demonstrably different, we always need to explain why they should be regarded and treated as the same, if that is what we propose to do.

The consequence of my placing myself in a position of vulnerability to assault DID NOT AFFECT OR ENDANGER ANYONE ELSE. Accordingly, there are no laws requiring that I not expose myself to assault, for instance by remaining indoors after dark or always travelling with a male companion. (Hell, I was. How 'bout that.)

The consequence of a firearms owner placing him/herself in a position of vulnerability to theft of the firearms AFFECTS AND ENDANGERS OTHERS. Accordingly, there are laws requiring that firearms owners not expose themselves to theft of their firearms and thereby expose other people to the harm that may result from the use of those firearms.

So my act was very arguably not a matter of concern to anyone else, and the firearms' owner's act very arguably is. They are different, and in my submission (and society's judgment), they should be treated differently. The reasons are pretty obvious to someone engaged in honest, sincere, good faith discussion of the facts, I'd say.

Sometimes there are differences, sometimes there aren't. I'm looking for another difference here ... other than in name ... and not seeing it.

[Emoto]

134. Oh right, it is the victim's fault???

Blame the victim. Is that what you're saying? Sure sounds like it. Thugs all over will be heartened by such thoughts. Taking the blame and responsibility away from the lowlife that actually perpetrated the criminal act is all the rage these days. Call me old-fashioned, but I think that is a crock.

Also, it is naive to imagine that an assault affects only the person assaulted. Friends, family, loved ones, police, the courts, medical institutions, and insurers, etc., are all affected to greater or lesser degrees depending on what happened.

Of course, if I wanted to lay the groundwork for blaming the victim of a theft for the actions of the thief, I too would want to create the impression that the victim is to blame.

[CO Liberal]

135. We're In Agreement Here, Emoto

I guess that according to Big-Chief, anyone who has their Mercedes stolen asked for it by buying a Mercedes, right??

[Name removed]

137. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[iverglas]

139. back so soon?

And another falsehood so soon? Is this some kind of record?

[CO Liberal]

145. And Gone Just as Quickly

Check his profile - see the shiny new tombstone.

[Emoto]

138. well, yes...

...but I kinda thought he was being sarcastic in his use of "allow".

[iverglas]

144. oh dear

Of course, the words being parodied here were mine, not "Big Chief's" (or the rose by any other name).

"I guess that according to Big-Chief, anyone who has their
Mercedes stolen asked for it by buying a Mercedes, right??"

Are you seriously accepting someone else's mischaracterization of something I said? Are you really wanting to do that?

Me, I couldn't care less whether someone who left his/her Mercedes running in the driveway was "asking for" it to be stolen, or just negligently creating an opportunity for it to be stolen. The issue is not the theft, which is purely his/her loss. The issue is the harm that results from the theft for other people.

That's because my interest in "blaming" someone for something is really a great deal lower than your average Jerry Springer audience's.

My interest is in preventing harm: death and injury, in particular.

I don't think that there needs to be a law that I keep my door locked to prevent my stuff being stolen -- because I don't have anything that anyone could use to cause death or injury (that s/he couldn't go to the dollar store and buy).

As a victim of sexual assault, do you really think that I would claim that sexual assault victims "asked for it"? Can you maybe guess how many times over the last few decades I have in fact challenged that claim, one which is in fact still made not infrequently, by inquiring whether rich people "asked for" their stuff to be stolen? Might you get an idea of how offensive I find this parody of what I do say and think?

People are responsible for the foreseeable consequences of their actions. There can be more than one person with responsibility for any event.

A person who fails to act in a way to avert a consequence, for him/herself or anyone else, that s/he was capable of foreseeing will bear some share of RESPONSIBILITY for it.

When the consequence is, say, the death or injury OF SOMEONE ELSE, measures just might need to be taken to ensure that anyone who might be tempted not to assume responsibility for his/her actions do so.

For instance, where I'm at (as I've mentioned) it is unlawful to leave the keys in your Mercedes in your driveway. This is regarded as an acceptable impairment of Mercedes' owners (like everyone else's) liberty to do whatever they hell they want, in the aim of preventing car theft and the personal injury and property damage that often accompanies it.

Are Mercedes owners "to blame" for that personal injury and property damage? Nope -- and they will quite properly not be charged or sentenced as a party to it. They are, however, "to blame" for failing to lock their car and remove their keys. The fact that their failure to do so created a situation in which property damage and personal injury were more likely to happen than if they had locked their car and removed the keys is why failing to do that is an offence.

But hey, I love a good caricature too, and complex things make the best subjects for the caricaturists.

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[iverglas]

136. "Oh, right"?

You seem to think you're agreeing with someone.

You might want to post these comments in reply to someone with whom you might be agreeing, even facetiously. It ain't me.

"Taking the blame and responsibility away from the lowlife that actually perpetrated the criminal act is all the rage these days."

Yeah, that would be what I was doing when I spent 12 hours with police as they investigated the crime, then months later travelled a few hundred miles to testify at the trial of other charges against the individual in question and spent several days sitting in a little room waiting to do it, and then a few months later repeated the trip to testify at the trial of the charges resulting from my complaint (which was obviated by a plea bargain) (and instead of studying for the law school exams happening that same week). That's what I was doing when I did everything in my power to have him sent to penitentiary, which he was.

But heck, if it "sounds like" that to you, who am I to say nay?

"Blame the victim. Is that what you're saying? Sure sounds like it."

What you sound suspiciously like is the Crown Attorney (prosecutor) who tried something similar out on me during my testimony (out of the jury's hearing that time). When I explained my line of work at the time the assault occurred, he said, "oh, so you study victimology -- the study of how victims caused crimes". Of course, that was not what I was studying, because victims don't generally "cause" crimes, so one can't study how they do.

What I was studying, as I had told him, was the connection between (a) the relationship between victims and offenders in homicides and sexual assaults in Canada and (b) the sentences imposed on the offenders. (A very long time ago, waaaay pre-internet in a previous occupation, so no point in trying to find me!) Not how victims cause their victimization. In fact, it was partly an investigation into whether judges might think that victims do that, and improperly reduce sentences as a result, actually.

And what I did say to you was that some people against whom crimes are committed -- me included -- have placed themselves in positions of vulnerability to crime. I was not aware of how vulnerable I was, so I don't by any means "blame" myself, have no worries. Even had I been aware, I would not have blamed anyone but the person who assaulted me, again, have no worries. But I had options and I made choices, and I therefore had some responsibility for what happened to me. I know how big so many USAmericans are on "personal responsibility", but since what they usually mean is "blame", I know it's hard for them to understand "personal responsibility" when it's properly used. (And no, where people do not have options and cannot make choices, I do not either blame them or regard them as responsible for what might happen to them.)

And what I did say to you, if you had chosen to "understand" what I was actually saying, was that when the people in question (at least when they are competent adults), who end up being victims, are going about their own business in a matter of no concern to someone else in which bad consequences for anyone else are extremely unlikely, it would be improper to restrict their actions to prevent them from being victimized. (Always allowing for the possibility that in some situations such restrictions might be justified.)

And what I did say to you was that when the people in question are going about a business with which the public IS legitimately concerned (possessing firearms) in which bad consequences for someone else are very possible, it would be quite proper to restrict their actions in order to prevent OTHERS from being victimized.

Pharmacists are going about a perfectly legitimate business and are in possession of things they are legally entitled to possess. Nonetheless, you will recall, they are required to take steps to ensure that someone does not unlawfully acquire the things that they lawfully possess.

Really; are YOU suggesting that a pharmacist who failed to lock up at night should not be called to account if someone broke in and stole the drugs that s/he then used to poison and kill a third person? I won't suggest that you are suggesting that, but I'd sure like to hear you distinguish between the two situations.

"Also, it is naive to imagine that an assault affects
only the person assaulted. Friends, family, loved ones,
police, the courts, medical institutions, and insurers, etc.,
are all affected to greater or lesser degrees depending on
what happened."

Blah blah. And it is beneath naive to suggest, as you must be doing, that most of those "effects" are anything that the law is legitimately concerned with.

Yup, the law can be legitimately concerned with things like costs to the health plan or the social security plan or the administration of justice. Maybe even with costs to insurers. And then, to put constitutional scrutiny simplistically, if the legislature could demonstrate that its interests and objectives were more pressing than the individual's interests and objectives in going about his/her business unimpeded, and required limitations on the individual's ability to do that, it could make a law to prevent the individual from doing just that.

The way things stand, there was plainly insufficient weight on the state's side to enable it to prevent me from going about the business I was going about, even though I was vulnerable to crime when I did it.

In my submission, there is plainly sufficient weight on the state's side to enable it to demand that if firearms owners are going to go about the business of possessing firearms, they do so in a manner that will prevent the theft of the firearms (not even to mention that they do so in a manner that does not involve transferring possession of the firearms to others without observing the required safeguards).

I have clearly laid out the differences between "wandering around the world as I please" (my own transgression) and "failing to store firearms in a manner that prevents them from being stolen", in terms of the CONSEQUENCES of the actions, regardless of the fact that both actions are expressions of individual preference. I have clearly stated that I regard those differences as valid basis for different treatment of the two actions in law.

And what you've done is pretend that I said something quite different.

Were you wanting a medal?

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[Name removed]

140. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Fuzzy Bunny]

148. hello

geez... look at all the deleted posts in here.

it looks like someone is trying to hide something.

could it be the TRUTH?

[Emoto]

147. I *do* enjoy your posts!

Really, I do. Even though I often disagree with much of the content. The fact that you put real effort into argument instead of cranking out a "peddle it somewhere else" is both appreciated and respected. At any rate...

"Taking the blame and responsibility away from the lowlife that actually perpetrated the criminal act is all the rage these days."

Yeah, that would be what I was doing when I spent 12 hours with police as they investigated the crime...

That is why I asked you explicitly if that was what you were doing. You have my sympathy for the ordeals you have experienced, but without knowing any of what you just posted, it sure looked like you were simply setting up your argument. I have seen that sort of thing too many times to not notice. Here in 'murrica there are some unscrupulous anti-gunners who take that tack. Apologies for misunderstanding.

And what I did say to you was that some people against whom crimes are committed -- me included -- have placed themselves in positions of vulnerability to crime. I was not aware of how vulnerable I was, so I don't by any means "blame" myself, have no worries. Even had I been aware, I would not have blamed anyone but the person who assaulted me, again, have no worries.

Ok, good!

And what I did say to you, if you had chosen to "understand" what I was actually saying, was that when the people..., who end up being victims

We cannot know in advance who will end up being a victim, so we cannot use that as a qualifier for control.

...are going about their own business in a matter of no concern to someone else in which bad consequences for anyone else are extremely unlikely, it would be improper to restrict their actions to prevent them from being victimized. (Always allowing for the possibility that in some situations such restrictions might be justified.)

Can you give me some other examples here where the potential for victimization should legitimately drive laws restricting the behavior of a *potential* victim? I am having a hard time with this. It sounds like an attempt to legislate away ignorance or stupidity, but it isn't, is it?

And what I did say to you was that when the people in question are going about a business with which the public IS legitimately concerned (possessing firearms) in which bad consequences for someone else are very possible, it would be quite proper to restrict their actions in order to prevent OTHERS from being victimized.

I think there is an important difference between possessing and using a firearm. For that individual who is minding her own business, where is the legitimate concern for the public? Particularly when any harm is only possible when a certain combination of criminal acts occur?

Pharmacists are going about a perfectly legitimate business and are in possession of things they are legally entitled to possess. Nonetheless, you will recall, they are required to take steps to ensure that someone does not unlawfully acquire the things that they lawfully possess.

Really; are YOU suggesting that a pharmacist who failed to lock up at night should not be called to account if someone broke in and stole the drugs that s/he then used to poison and kill a third person? I won't suggest that you are suggesting that, but I'd sure like to hear you distinguish between the two situations.

I believe that a business does not have the same rights and liberties as a private individual and that the standard for imposing specific behaviors is lower for a business, as it should be. Additionally, the pharmacy is an obvious target, because every thug knows that the pharmacy has oxycontin/morphine/whatever on the shelves, but how many thugs know that you have a pistol under the loose floorboard in your bedroom?

"Also, it is naive to imagine that an assault affects
only the person assaulted. Friends, family, loved ones,
police, the courts, medical institutions, and insurers, etc.,
are all affected to greater or lesser degrees depending on
what happened."

Blah blah. And it is beneath naive to suggest, as you must be doing, that most of those "effects" are anything that the law is legitimately concerned with.

I'll have to get back to you about the blah blah part, but as for the rest, what if you are assaulted and your children become wards of the state? Is their welfare of no concern?

The way things stand, there was plainly insufficient weight on the state's side to enable it to prevent me from going about the business I was going about, even though I was vulnerable to crime when I did it.

And the state could know that how exactly? See above.

In my submission, there is plainly sufficient weight on the state's side to enable it to demand that if firearms owners are going to go about the business of possessing firearms, they do so in a manner that will prevent the theft of the firearms (not even to mention that they do so in a manner that does not involve transferring possession of the firearms to others without observing the required safeguards).

I do not see data to support this assertion. Mind you, I do not disagree that it is a good idea to make it difficult for the crooks, but isn't it a bit of a pipe dream to imagine that "Sally Smith" can really do anything to prevent theft of anything she possesses, if a determined crook is after it? And, no, that is not the same as throwing up one's hands and walking away. However, like the rest of gun control, the devil is in the details; it is critical to leave unmolested the rights and abilities (like self defense) of the private citizen.

[iverglas]

149. and furthermore ...

"Can you give me some other examples here where the potential for victimization should legitimately drive laws restricting the behavior of a *potential* victim? I am having a hard time with this. It sounds like an attempt to legislate away ignorance or stupidity, but it isn't, is it?"

Sure. Although the laws are not "attempts to legislate away ignorance or stupidity", since that isn't possible. They are attempts to prevent some people from exploiting other people's ignorance or stupidity, or poverty, or youth, or infirmity, or what have you.

It is illegal to sell laetrile as a treatment for cancer. Why should people not just be free to buy any old thing they want if they have cancer? (Maybe you think they should; I dunno.) Well, because there is pretty conclusive evidence that laetrile is not a treatment for cancer. There is also our experience as a society, which tells us that if people can buy laetrile as a treatment for cancer, they may not seek real treatment (particularly when the laetrile-pushers tell them not to). Our experience as a society tells us, too, that people with cancer are vulnerable to exploitation in a way that healthy people aren't.

So we ban it. To protect the "ignorant and stupid" from themselves. Or, as we put it, to prevent snake oil merchants from profiting from other people's vulnerability.

How about minimum requirements for on-the-job safety? Should people not be allowed to take any job they want, no matter whether it involves working among toxic fumes without a respirator, or 10 storeys up without a safety harness?

We say no. We say that people who are desperately poor are vulnerable to being exploited by others, for a profit. We see no real reason to let that happen, and good reasons to prevent it from happening. So we ban it.

There are loads of other examples, probably.

That's all a tangent, which is why I didn't originally go into it. But because such situations exist, I didn't want to make the bald statement that in a matter of no concern to someone else in which bad consequences for anyone else are extremely unlikely, it would be improper to restrict <individuals'> actions to prevent them from being victimized.

And again, the severe restrictions (in the sense of severe punishment for not complying with the restrictions) that I believe should be placed on certain conduct on the part of individuals engaged in behaviour that could lead to harm to others are based not on their own potential for victimization, their loss of their firearm or Mercedes not being my concern. They are based on the foreseeable potential for harm to other people if those individuals are "victimized". We don't ban people from running red lights just to protect the speeders from their own stupidity; they may hurt themselves, but their actions may also cause two completely unrelated cars to crash.

"what if you are assaulted and your children become wards of the state? Is their welfare of no concern?"

There welfare is indeed of concern to the public, the state. That might be one reason why, where I'm at, we require the wearing of seatbelts and motorcycle helmets, prohibit bicycling on expressways, prohibit walking on railway bridges, and that sort of thing. There are instances where the interference with individual liberty has been balanced against the public interest at stake, and the decision has come down on the side of the public interest.

If, in order to avoid being assaulted, I had had to stay indoors after dark, would requiring me to do that be a justifiable interference in my liberty? Some societies have certainly thought so. Well, they've prohibited women from wandering abroad after dark; whether they did that to protect women is another question. In any event, most of us would not think so. Individuals assume risk in just about everything they do; that does not automatically mean that the state's interest in protecting life overrides their interest in doing what they want in every instance.

"I think there is an important difference between possessing and using a firearm. For that individual who is minding her own business, where is the legitimate concern for the public? Particularly when any harm is only possible when a certain combination of criminal acts occur?"

The legitimate concern for the public is, to my mind, quite obvious. A stolen firearm is a firearm very likely to be used to cause death or injury, or to enable the commission of another crime. Pretty much any firearm is vulnerable to theft. Reducing the risk of theft is likely to reduce theft, and reducing theft is likely to reduce harm.

In Canada's capital a very few years ago, a lawfully-owned but unlawfully-stored firearm was stolen from a private residence by a gaggle of punk teenagers, who then drove around downtown firing it out the window. They killed someone.

That harm could absolutely certainly have been prevented if the firearm had not been in the home they burglarized. That harm could very probably have been prevented if the firearm in the home they burglarized had been lawfully stored. And when it comes to good reasons for minimal impairment of someone's liberty, I just think that preventing deaths is one.

Criminal acts are NOT unforeseeable. The consequences of criminal acts are NOT unforeseeable. Thefts of firearms are not quite the same as lightning bolts from the sky.

But they're something like icebergs off a roof. ;) A few years back, a giant iceberg slid off my neighbour's roof onto my Toyota van. (That same year, a woman and a baby were killed in separate incidents of ice falling off roofs.) The neighbour didn't put the ice there. But the law still requires that my neighbour keep his roof clear of ice that might crush other people's windshields, because he has control of the property where the danger exists and no one else does, and the harm that could occur is foreseeable even if some intervening event must occur (say, a great big snowfall), and can be prevented by him and no one else.

I don't know why a person who owns a firearm should be held to a lower standard than a person with ice on his/her roof.

Strict requirements for the storage and use of firearms are one way of ensuring that firearms owners meet their responsibility not to allow their firearms to be used to cause harm. I completely fail to see how such requirements impair anyone's exercise of their rights a smidgen, let alone minimally.

"I believe that a business does not have the same rights and liberties as a private individual and that the standard for imposing specific behaviors is lower for a business, as it should be."

I'm smelling a red herring, and I can't even tell quite what it is.

Here we are, and here's the answer. It is not (or not just) the business that is subject to the requirements in the pharmacist case. Pharmacists as individuals are required to adhere to strict requirements in the handling of certain substances. For instance, that taking of inventory stuff (and, I'll confidently assume, all other rules regarding the handling of controlled substances) is a requirement imposed on pharmacists, not (or perhaps as well as, but by different laws) pharmacies.

I'm saying that the standard for imposing specific behaviours on firearms owners is quite amply met, in this case, of course.

Here's another one: I may not have a swimming pool in my back yard unless it is securely fenced and any entrance locked. (Matters not whether "I" am a private person or a corporation.) "Not my fault" if a 4-year-old wanders into my unfenced yard and drowns in my pool. "Not my fault" if someone takes the 4-year-old into my yard and drowns him/her in my pool. But also not an unjustified interference in the exercise of my rights and freedoms to require that I fence and lock my yard in order to avert the harm that could very foreseeably occur if I don't.

"The way things stand, there was plainly insufficient weight on the state's side to enable it to prevent me from going about the business I was going about, even though I was vulnerable to crime when I did it."

"And the state could know that how exactly? See above."

Here I'm genuinely not following you: the state could know what exactly? I'll take a guess or two, with no intent to misrepresent, just an effort to respond.

Could not know that I was vulnerable to crime when I wandered around the world within its borders? We're all vulnerable to crime all the time. We all, and the state, know this.

Could not know that there was insufficient weight on the side of preventing me from doing it? Well, that's not something anyone "knows", that's something that gets decided. By applying the relevant rules: the rules of constitutional scrutiny, in our cases.

Your Supreme Court recently decided that the state had insufficient weight on its side to prevent people from engaging in that fancy sexual conduct. Well, okay, it had absolutely no weight on its side, but I'm sure you know of situations in which there actually has been a balancing. Say, when my own Supreme Court decided that in the case of recidivist drunk drivers a mandatory minimum sentence was justified by the importance of the state's objectives, but that in other cases it is not, although the impairment of individual rights and freedoms was the same.

"In my submission, there is plainly sufficient weight on the state's side to enable it to demand that if firearms owners are going to go about the business of possessing firearms, they do so in a manner that will prevent the theft of the firearms ..."

"I do not see data to support this assertion. Mind you, I do not disagree that it is a good idea to make it difficult for the crooks, but isn't it a bit of a pipe dream to imagine that "Sally Smith" can really do anything to prevent theft of anything she possesses, if a determined crook is after it? And, no, that is not the same as throwing up one's hands and walking away. However, like the rest of gun control, the devil is in the details; it is critical to leave unmolested the rights and abilities (like self defense) of the private citizen."

It is "critical to leave unmolested the rights and abilities of the private citizen" unless justification for interfering in their exercise can be demonstrated. That's how it really goes.

You assert that there is insufficient justification, I assert that there is sufficient justification. There are plainly (given how articulate we have both been) several reasons for this.

I do not see strict requirements on the manner in which individuals possess firearms as any more than a minimal impairment of any rights that may be involved. You do.

You do not (as far as I can tell, but I may be wrong) see the reduction of the harm that can reasonably be foreseen as resulting from that impairment as being a sufficiently compelling "state interest" to justify the impairment. I do.

I see orangey-red, you see reddy-orange. You dislike red, I dislike orange. It may be possible to find a point at which the orange would be red enough to satisfy me (I really hate orange), and the red would be orange enough to satisfy you.

It's also possible that despite all the evidence and argument I can muster in an attempt to demonstrate the "minimal" nature of the impairment and the "compelling" nature of the state interest, you will still (speaking honestly, sincerely and in good faith, and not out of some motivation other than the principles we have agreed on) disagree. And vice versa for your argument and me.

But there truly are some objective factors that have to be taken into account by both of us. The one I prefer to ignore in my own arguments is your second amendment; if I could decipher it, I might attempt it, but I can't, and it is irrelevant to me. There is enough similarity between the Canadian and USAmerican constitutions, and their interpretation by the respective courts, that we can have enough general agreement as to the other principles to fruitfully discuss the issue in relation to them.

So I guess what I'd need to see next is something like a distinction between unfenced/unlocked swimming pools and firearms stored in such a way that they are vulnerable to theft. Unless, of course, you take the position that I cannot legitimately be required to fence and lock my swimming pool. ;)

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