Cost of 2nd Amendment Freedoms

[caseymoz]

I'm not saying that there isn't a right to keep and bear arms, I am pointing out that freedom carries costs, and depending on how people choose to practice it, greater costs. I've been in an argument on the General Discussion Board about gun rights in the wake of the recent assassination attempt on Rep. Gifford. I said the attack wouldn't have been possible without a handgun, or at least, an attempt wouldn't have caused so many to be wounded. One of the people pointed out, and I don't know if this is true, that Gifford was actually carrying herself but didn't have a chance to draw.

They say that there are two kinds of people in a gunfight, those who knew there would be a gunfight, and those didn't. The latter almost always loses. It just happens too fast, and how about if she had been able to draw, nervously, in a crowd firing back wild? Or if anyone else had.

So, this demonstrates that carrying guns for general self-defense, out of paranoia when there's no specific threat present is of limited or no good.

Now, people have a right to keep and bear arms, and they have a right to defend themselves, but 2nd Amendment proponents are not extremely truthful about the consequences of this. Whatever its drawbacks, gun control does have some advantages based on facts.


Here's what I also think further gun control would do, contingent on good enforcement:

1) It will cut down on the number of assaults that result in homicides, simply because compared, say, to a wound from a knife assault, a wound from a firearm is five times more fatal, and a wound to a vital organ from a firearm is many times more fatal than that with a knife. Those are the statistics say.

2) It will would cut down drastically on the number of impulsive homicides resulting from a "bad moment" with a gun, since many gun homicides are not premeditated at all but result from bad decision over a split second. That decision takes place much too quickly and easily with a gun. With a knife you have to work at it, same with a car. Death isn't so push-button.

3) It would reduce mass deaths from school and public shootings. Nobody is going to kill thirty people in a few minutes without a firearm, or bomb.

4) It would reduce the number of gun accidents, particularly for children.

5) It would prevent at least some school shootings and workplace rampages.

6) It would prevent assassination like this, and those that result in mass deaths.


Here's what I know it won't do:

1) Cut down on the overall crime rate, violent crime or the assault rate. It would simply make them far less deadly;

2) Without extremely good enforcement, it won't suppress the number of illegal arms;

3) Get rid of guns. Civilians own about 200 million guns in the US. You're not going to confiscate that many weapons, you're not going to be able to try.


The last one makes any effective gun control a fantasy for our lifetimes. However, if Loughner could not buy his weapon an a Sports Authority, would he have been able to buy such a good one? One so capable of taking down a dozen people? Would he have had the money for such a good weapon on the black market? I don't know if he paid this way, but they don't generally take credit cards there. Would he have had the contacts to get one?

I would like to make a final point though, the best armed societies are not exactly known for their freedoms. Take a look at the Congo for instance.

[villager]

1. predictaby unrecc'd. Expect snark to follow. But little in the way of conversation.

Some good points there, though.

[TPaine7]

13. "Little in the way of conversation" is more your style, actually.

We have facts, logic and reason on our side; why wouldn't we engage in conversation?

Your perennial failure to engage is understandable, however.

[aikoaiko]

86. Your post is the perfect example of snark and little conversation.

[Abq_Sarah]

2. If you don't have the ability to defend your life

You're not really free.

[TPaine7]

3. Exactly.

[caseymoz]

5. I agree. So, what's a reasonable amount of self-defense?

Mace or a hydrogen bomb? Should you be armed enough to easily kill twenty unarmed people? And should they have the complete right to be armed the same? And if they're armed the same, can you really defend yourself against them? Do you trust their competence or ethics with that level of firepower? Not only that, how easily can you sleep if that were the case?

[TPaine7]

11. A hydrogen bomb. Really?

Mace or a hydrogen bomb?

Mace can be useful in typical self defense, hydrogen bombs not so much. If I try to mug you and you detonate your hydrogen bomb, have you really defended yourself? Think about it. Would your threat to use a nuclear weapon be remotely credible?

Mace is a weapon you apparently accept; a hydrogen bomb is not. I totally agree. But more to the point is the fact that guns are a more effective and surer tool of defense than mace. That's one reason why police are not armed with mace alone. Mace can be defeated by a strong will, or for that matter a strong breeze. Bullets are more reliable.

Should you be armed enough to easily kill twenty unarmed people?

Why not? There are many ways to kill twenty unarmed (or armed) people that have nothing to do with firearms.

If you were walking along and saw a child being attacked by a pack of feral dogs, would you not want as much ammunition as possible? Would you complain about having too much? What about if you got cornered by a gang of thugs (almost all of whom couldn't legally own guns due to age or felon status or both?) Would you worry about your ability to kill twenty people? Do you think this guy could have used the means to easily kill twenty unarmed people?

And should they have the complete right to be armed the same?

Of course, assuming they are mentally competent and not convicted of violent felonies, treason, or similar crimes. I don't think I'm special and get to exercise special rights.

And if they're armed the same, can you really defend yourself against them?

Maybe, maybe not. I might only manage to make their assault expensive.

Most people--and even most felons--don't like the idea of getting shot at. If they suspect a person may be armed, it decreases the odds of their attacking that person. (I'm not guessing; there's criminological evidence to back that up.)

In any event, would you rather have a fighting chance or depend entirely on the good graces of your attackers?

Do you trust their competence or ethics with that level of firepower?

Yes, actually. No less than I trust them not to floor the accelerator when I am in the crosswalk. The founders were far from perfect, but they were spot on regarding the superiority of a government willing to trust the people WITH ARMS.

Not only that, how easily can you sleep if that were the case?

Very well.

[reggie the dog]

23. i will be more direct

the 2nd amendment talks about bearing arms

where do we draw the line on arms we can have and arms that the army only can have? gernades? mines? rockets? guns? knives?

this is a serious question from someone who lives in France which has gun control and (though not automatically causal) far far far less gun crime and who has lived in chicago where i would have loved to have been allowed to carry my own gun for protection.

[TPaine7]

27. This deserves a serious answer,

which I plan to write--tomorrow.

I'm off to bed.

[reggie the dog]

28. fair enough

[badtoworse]

42. It goes back to the concept of a militia

When the 2nd Amendment was drafted, the militia was understood to mean all able-bodied men (I think between 18 and 45 years old, but I'm not sure). The members of the militia were expected to bring their own weapons. Consequently, the arms referred to in the 2nd Amendment refer to weapons normally carried by an individual militiaman. At the time, that weaponry included muskets, flint lock pistols, etc. Militiamen were not expected to have cannons, nortars and other crew served weapons because these were supplied by the government.

The concept still applies today although arms technology has advanced greatly since the BoR was drafted. You frequently see antigun people make the statement that the 2nd Amendment protects ownership of artillery, machine guns, nuclear weapons, etc., but courts have held that these are not the types of weapons (i.e.they are crew served) that militiamen would ever be expected to have. Today, you would reasonably expect an individual to carry a semi-automatic pistol, rifle or shotgun. You would not be expected to have a tank parked in the driveway.

I think that's it in a nutshell.

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

58. You are mostly correct...

However at the time of drafting the constution it was common that cannons, mortars, punt guns, and even entire naval vessels were privately owned.

Also tanks, warplanes, explosives, artillery, and machineguns are all legal to own if you:
a) Have enough money to play the game
b) Live in a state where those items are unrestricted
c) Fill out the proper ATF forms.

[Atypical Liberal]

52. On 2nd amendment arms

where do we draw the line on arms we can have and arms that the army only can have? gernades? mines? rockets? guns? knives?

this is a serious question from someone who lives in France which has gun control and (though not automatically causal) far far far less gun crime and who has lived in chicago where i would have loved to have been allowed to carry my own gun for protection.

In order to answer this question we have to answer the question, "What is the purpose of the militia?"

The second amendment reads as follows:

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

When the United States was founded, there was a sincere distrust and fear of a central government that had a standing army. They feared that such a central government would have the power and means to oppress the states, landing them right back in the situation of tyranny that they had just fought to escape. Our entire government was crafted as a series of checks and balances to prevent concentrations of power in any one branch of the government. This included military forces, as they would be the club used to beat other branches of government into submission.

The intent was to have the States each provide their own military forces, either to eliminate the need for a central, federal army, or at least to be able to counter it if it got out of control. These were the militias that the second amendment speaks of. They were to be composed of men from each respective state, and led by officers from each respective State. By so being, they were assumed to be beholden to the interests of their home states, and as would not be likely to engage in oppressive activities against their home State, and it was also assumed that it would be unlikely that they would team up together to oppress another state.

These militias were military forces, expected to act in a military capacity to protect their home states, and collectively, protect the interests of each other, from threats without or within. As such, the men of these forces were armed with small arms appropriate to infantry forces, so that they could perform the duties of infantry forces.

This was the intent of the second amendment.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), such a military system was inefficient (as well it may have been intended to be all along). It made extended military expeditions by The United States a difficult undertaking. First of all, not all the States were as diligent in maintaining their militias. In some cases they had become little more than social clubs, and militia training had devolved into little more than social gatherings. Also, many states tried to limit their militia expenditures, which resulted in different standards of readiness, equipment, and provisions across the States.

Thus, in 1903, with the passage of The Dick Act, the State militias were federalized, creating the Organized Militia (National Guard) and the Unorganized Militia. The Unorganized militia is all able-bodied men aged 17-45 not otherwise in the Organized Militia. One could argue, as I do that this was a huge dismantling of the intent of the founders to try and decentralize federal military power. Because now the military forces of the States, instead of serving as a counter to federal military power, now served to augment it as reserve forces.

You will note that the Founding Fathers probably foresaw this usurpation of power, and as such the second amendment is worded in such a away that the right of the people is enumerated, and not the right of the militias.

While this lead to the unparalleled military might of the United States, imagine how many wars in the last 50 years might have been avoided if it were required that all the States individually had to contribute military forces for United States military expeditions.

But I digress. The question was, "What was the purpose of militias", and that purpose was to have the men of the United States able to keep and bear arms such that they could function as infantry forces. What this means is that any arms that are appropriate for born individually for infantry use are protected under the second amendment. It is largely accepted that this does not apply to crew-served weaponry, such as tanks, or artillery, or ships, or planes. It is also largely accepted that this does not apply to non-discriminatory weapons such as explosives. One could argue, and many do, that this should protect fully-automatic weapons (machine guns), but I do not. If you wish my opinion on why I can convey that in another post.

[krispos42]

57. There are broadly two conditions that the line is drawn on

One, that the weapon is able to be carried and used by a single person. Shotgun, yes, howitzer, no.

Two, that the weapon is discriminate; i.e., it is able to be aimed at a discrete target. This does not include explosives (hand grenades, artillery shells, nukes) which are indiscriminate and have a significant and uncontrolled blast/fragmentation radius. This also precludes fully-automatic weapons, which are very difficult to aim accurately when being fired in fully-automatic mode. With a semi-automatic gun, the shooter has complete control over every shot fired; not so with a full automatic.

That's how I see it, at least, and it seems to hold up pretty well.

[TheWraith]

81. Would you like to know the difference between France and Chicago?

Chicago had far tougher anti-gun laws than anywhere in Europe. And at last estimate, they had more gang members in that city than the US did combat troops in Iraq during the height of the war.

But France has real, serious measures to alleviate poverty, and thereby to put a lid on the criminal organizations that prey on impoverished people, mostly young adults, for foot soldiers in their gang wars.

See which is more effective?

[TPaine7]

88. I agree with krispos42 in post 23

No need for me to say it in different words.

[caseymoz]

59. You talk about irony going over somebody's head.

About the mace vs. the hydrogen bomb, the defense of our entire country was based on our mutually assured destruction. But the hydrogen bomb example was meant to be hyperbole, something way beyond the imaginable.

If you're so relaxed with everybody armed to the teeth and you trust them so much with guns, why can't you trust them with less firepower? Your carrying a gun shows that to some degree, you don't trust the people, strangers, in your environment already, and you're saying that you find them trustworthy with guns then. Why would you arm yourself if you didn't think somebody was hostile or irresponsible? If people are, just ordinarily, armed with such weapons, you could expect criminals to be armed that well, just from stealing and selling the weapons. There's presumably nothing about putting guns into people's hands that makes them more responsible, or better people. One thing worse than being attacked by thugs, is being attacked by thugs who are as well armed as you, and the worst would be if they have the drop on you, too.

If they get the drop on you, it doesn't matter if you're armed or not. I've heard that Giffords was armed, too. In Arizona with such a crowd, I'm presuming at least several other people were armed. Did it really help?


"If you were walking along and saw a child being attacked by a pack of feral dogs, would you not want as much ammunition as possible? Would you complain about having too much?"

I don't know enough about where you live to say much about the packs of feral dogs, but if you live in an environment where they are really that much of a problem, then, yes, carry a good gun. However, if it's just another scenario you've imagined, then I might suggest that you actually carry a gun due to your marvelous imagination, or perhaps having a gun inspires such fantasies, like a drug. I'm sorry to say I'm not encouraged by your examples, especially when you give the impression that you should shoot into the melee and kill every one of them regardless of whether you might hit the child or not. It should take one bullet shot or one dog being killed to get them to run, it wouldn't be necessary to have a great amount of bullets. Though I would say while it's happening, you'll wish that you did.

Normally, your sanity comes back afterward.


"Why not? There are many ways to kill twenty unarmed (or armed) people that have nothing to do with firearms."

In just the sentence before this, you said "bullets are more reliable." In other words, you can't reliably kill 20 people without a gun. Yes, there are other ways of killing twenty other people, but would you bring a knife to a gunfight, really? No, you wouldn't because you know which one is better at killing people. Though gun people like yourself know this, they keep on claiming, from propaganda that guns don't kill people (and animals). Guns kill people the way a hammer drives nails, and if they don't, they're the only tool invented that has absolutely no use, despite their popularity. So, if they don't kill people, do I just presume that guns get you high?


"The founders were far from perfect, but they were spot on regarding the superiority of a government willing to trust the people WITH ARMS."

About the founders, one of the reasons for the Second Amendment was, as Hamilton said in the Federalist Papers, the country was surrounded by hostile Native Americans. So, in other words, it was part of the plan to annihilate the "hostile savages." You're right they were wise; this was very effective.

:sarcasm:

Try not to forget that was a large part of their reasoning.

Plus, the States wanted militias just to be sure they wouldn't actually be invaded by other States, which was also happening with disappointing frequency then, or, yes, downright invasion by the Federal government, in favor of other states.

Lastly, having an armed populace was seen as a way of preventing the formation and need of a standing army. This was stated explicitly by Jefferson in the Virginia Constitution, which has the precursor to the Second Amendment. That seems to have . . . not worked as planned. All right, it was a downright failure. Maybe those guys weren't as wise as your saying.

Gun technology has changed a lot since then. You definitely weren't going to kill twenty people on a spree . . . with a musket. I think what we have now goes a little beyond their wisdom.

[TPaine7]

92. Facts trump opinion, even honest opinion.

If you're so relaxed with everybody armed to the teeth and you trust them so much with guns, why can't you trust them with less firepower? Your carrying a gun shows that to some degree, you don't trust the people, strangers, in your environment already, and you're saying that you find them trustworthy with guns then. Why would you arm yourself if you didn't think somebody was hostile or irresponsible? If people are, just ordinarily, armed with such weapons, you could expect criminals to be armed that well, just from stealing and selling the weapons. There's presumably nothing about putting guns into people's hands that makes them more responsible, or better people.

I trust the people in general with guns. I don't trust violent convicted felons. I don't trust them to not keep and bear arms. I don't trust them to not attack me or others. The fact that I trust sane, non-criminal adults doesn't mean that I think the world is free of threats.

One thing worse than being attacked by thugs, is being attacked by thugs who are as well armed as you, and the worst would be if they have the drop on you, too.

In a world free of guns, thugs would be more sure of their prey than they are now. By their nature, thugs attack the smaller, the older, the weaker, the less numerous.

If they get the drop on you, it doesn't matter if you're armed or not.

That's simply not true. Your imagination is not as valid as actual reality. I have read many case stories, and posted many here. I've seen videotaped counterexamples on youtube. Here's one post of mine on "the bad guys always win" fallacy: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=118&topic_id=195218&mesg_id=195218

If they get the drop on you, it doesn't matter if you're armed or not. I've heard that Giffords was armed, too. In Arizona with such a crowd, I'm presuming at least several other people were armed. Did it really help?

I have no intention of impugning either your intelligence or your integrity; for all I know you're as honest and smart as they come. But you're making multiple, compound errors in reasoning.

1) You accept your counter-factual intuition as fact: "If they get the drop on you, it doesn't matter if you're armed or not."
2) You combine reported facts with supposition and use them in support of the first error: "I've heard that Giffords was armed, too. In Arizona with such a crowd, I'm presuming at least several other people were armed."
3) You draw draw a broad, general conclusion from a single anecdote and your intuition.

you give the impression that you should shoot into the melee and kill every one of them regardless of whether you might hit the child or not

No, I don't. You may have drawn that conclusion, but you were totally without justification. The reason I would want lots of ammunition in that situation is that it's hard to predict wild animal behavior.

It should take one bullet shot or one dog being killed to get them to run, it wouldn't be necessary to have a great amount of bullets. Though I would say while it's happening, you'll wish that you did.

If I may be so bold, it seems to me that you are very sure about things that you have nothing but your imagination to support. I actually know, from discussions with a cop and reading of dog attacks, that different dogs behave differently. Some run. Some attack. It probably never occurred to you that I might be a sane person who had the child's interest (and my own) at heart, but had a factual basis for my opinion, did it?

In just the sentence before this, you said "bullets are more reliable." In other words, you can't reliably kill 20 people without a gun.

What I actually said was that "guns are a more effective and surer tool of defense than mace." My whole argument had nothing whatsoever to do with killing anyone, it had only to do with defence--the death of the assailant is unnecessary and irrelevant. I'm trying not to doubt your honesty. Help me out, won't you?

About the founders, one of the reasons for the Second Amendment was, as Hamilton said in the Federalist Papers, the country was surrounded by hostile Native Americans. So, in other words, it was part of the plan to annihilate the "hostile savages." You're right they were wise; this was very effective.

:sarcasm:

Try not to forget that was a large part of their reasoning.

Ok. I was talking about the legitimate political reasoning, not the use of the right to keep and bear arms to illegitimate ends. I do not reject every belief, idea, or philosophy that has been twisted to evil ends.

Not all of the founders were pious hypocrites. Benjamin Franklin and my namesake opposed slavery, for instance. Jefferson's hypocrisy notwithstanding, I still believe that we are all (politically) equal.

Gun technology has changed a lot since then. You definitely weren't going to kill twenty people on a spree . . . with a musket. I think what we have now goes a little beyond their wisdom.

Your opinions should be more anchored in facts. Educate yourself. Lewis and Clark carried a repeating rifle in their exploration of the West. And the framers of the 14th Amendment clearly intended that guns of their time be protected by the Constitution. Repeating weapons were definitely common then. Muskets indeed.

[GreenStormCloud]

73. Yes, CCW permit holders have PROVEN themselves trustworthy.

There are now 41 states that are shall-issue with about 6 to 8 million CCW permit holders, and there are reams of statistics on them. They are extremely trustworthy.

[Abq_Sarah]

84. Reasonable?

A reasonable amount of self-defense is whatever it takes to stop an immediate threat to myself, family members, innocent bystanders, etc..

[Rainbow Wave]

6. There is little evidence owning a gun allows you to defend your life.

In fact, it's statistically more likely you will suffer gun violence if there's a gun in your home.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

8. As one whose personal experinence is to the contrary, I disagree

[Rainbow Wave]

46. I don't place much stock in personal anecdotes.

I prefer empirical evidence, and empirical evidence indicates guns do not keep people safe. They tend to do the opposite - put them in harm's way.

[GreenStormCloud]

74. The Kellerman study has long since been discredited.

If the gun owner has his gun illegally, then family may indeed be at hazard, or even himself. But for legal gun owners the statistics are that the guns serve us well and we use them responsibily.

[jazzhound]

10. "There is little evidence owning a gun allows you to

defend your life".

False.

Even pro-control researchers Philip Cook and Jens Ludwig came up with 1.5 million annual defensive gun uses. (NSPOF study) Other credible studies, including the NSDS have arrived at 2.5 million -- and some even higher. So by any credible estimate, defensive gun uses are at least as frequent as offensive uses:

http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles/165476.pdf

In fact, it's statistically more likely you will suffer gun violence if there's a gun in your home.

Could be true ---- but what your handlers have (very intentionally) failed to tell you is that this statement is only true if in addition to a gun in the home there is also a criminal in the home, or criminal activity taking place in the home.

Feel free to provide evidence to back up your claims.

[Rainbow Wave]

47. If you have a gun in your home

It is statistically far more likely that you will suffer gun violence. Ergo guns by definition do not keep you safe.

Those "studies" of violence that was supposedly stopped by guns are not empirically sound because they are mostly based on anecdotal evidence - the least reliable. Usually they contain incredibly high doses of macho bravado and barstool BS.

[X_Digger]

48. We have critiqued Kellerman et al. repeatedly.

Feel free to chime in here..

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=118&topic_id=334436&mesg_id=334436

[Rainbow Wave]

53. I doubt we'll ever agree

I've lived in LA for two decades. Not once in 20 years have I ever had the need to defend myself with a gun (I don't own one, never have and never will). I have never witnessed a situation in which anyone needed a gun to defend themselves. Somehow my gun enthusiast friends are always running into situations where they needed a gun to defend themselves, which they're always eager to share over a few beers. I love them dearly, but I know they're BSing. Either that or they're purposely going out and provoking situations in which to use a gun.

I have known several people throughout my life who had tragedy visited upon them because they had a gun in the home. So I have no doubt that the statistics are accurate. Having a gun makes you less safe. Hey, if I don't run into gun trouble ever but my gun toting friends do regularly, I'll continue my way.

[X_Digger]

61. Don't let facts get in the way of a good faith-based argument.

If you really want to understand the scholarship of guns, I can suggest a reading list.

If not, don't be surprised when folks don't agree with your faith-based belief in a discredited decade old 'study' by a handful of epidemiologists out of their depth trying to push an agenda.

[Rainbow Wave]

62. The facts are on my side.

That's my point. Sorry, but the evidence overwhelmingly shows that the presence of guns is more of a danger. All the other side has is anecdotal evidence that simply does not jive with the experience of most people.

[X_Digger]

63. That's just it.. it's not anecdote

I can give you a reading list if you'd like to actually look into it.

There are three studies from the 90s by the same five or so epidemiologists on one side.

There are at least 15 other studies indicating that guns are used more often for defense than for crime.

Consider the findings from two of the most widely cited studies in the field: McDowall et al. (1998), using the data from 1992 and 1994 waves of the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), found roughly 116,000 defensive gun uses per year, and Kleck and Gertz (1995), using data from the 1993 National Self-Defense Survey (NSDS), found around 2.5 million defensive gun uses each year.

Many other surveys provide information on the prevalence of defensive gun use. Using the original National Crime Survey, McDowall and Wiersema (1994) estimate 64,615 annual incidents from 1987 to 1990. At least 19 other surveys have resulted in estimated numbers of defensive gun uses that are similar (i.e., statistically indistinguishable) to the results founds by Kleck and Gertz. No other surveys have found numbers consistent with the NCVS (other gun use surveys are reviewed in Kleck and Gertz, 1995, and Kleck, 2001a).

For comparison, check the DOJ's BJS, which shows there are roughly 400,000 criminal uses of guns each year.


2.5M is greater than 400,000

Don't be a climate change denier, educate yourself.

[Rainbow Wave]

67. I'm not a climate change denier.

A survey is anecdotal.

Look, there's a gun lobby that puts out studies - most of them based on anecdotal evidence - and there's an anti-gun lobby that puts out studies saying the exact opposite. So who do you believe? Well, how about the hard evidence? How about looking at gun violence in countries with strict gun control versus that in the US? Well, that makes the gun lobby's studies highly suspect. How about looking at your own experience. Well, in my 50 years on the planet I have never owned a gun and have never been visited by gun violence. My neighbor did own a gun. His teenage son's friend died in their basement when they were playing Russian roulette with my neighbor's gun. A college classmate owned a gun. When he was going through a bad patch at work and some financial difficulties he got drunk and shot his brains out. And then there are all the other cases you read about or hear about. (Phil Hartman was a gun owner too. His wife used it to kill him.) Oh, and of course there are the stories my gun loving friends tell of when they "had" to use a gun to avert a crime. The thing is they usually tell these stories after consuming alcohol, and they hang around the same neighborhoods I do, and yet somehow I manage to survive without any gun play.

You can believe whatever studies you want to believe. I prefer to believe the studies that hold up to scrutiny.

[X_Digger]

68. Those anti-gun 'studies'? Were hased on surveys.. LOL!!!

At least be consistent and hold both sides to the same standard.

Let's look at gun violence in countries outside the US..

What country has had a decrease in violence after instituting gun control?

Countries that had low ownership of firearms before legislation, and low rates of gun violence (like the UK) -- wait, they've experienced a rise in gun violence and non-gun violence. Whoops.

[Rainbow Wave]

70. Um, no.

Anti-gun studies are based on actual incidents of gun deaths and injuries. They are quantifiable.

Look, I have gun loving friends so I know you'll never be convinced because you don't want to be. Let's just agree to disagree. I'm perfectly happy in my gunfree life. I'm sure you're perfectly happy deflecting all those crimes with your gun every day.

[X_Digger]

72. Please read the methodology-- it's a case-control study

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199310073291506

After each homicide, we obtained data from the police or medical examiner and interviewed a proxy for the victim. The proxies' answers were compared with those of control subjects who were matched to the victims according to neighborhood, sex, race, and age range. Crude and adjusted odds ratios were calculated with matched-pairs methods.
...
In addition to recording the details of the incident for law-enforcement purposes, investigators obtained the names of persons close to the victim who might provide us with an interview at a later date, thereby serving as proxies for the victim. These lists were supplemented with names obtained from newspaper accounts, obituaries, and calls to funeral homes.

Approximately three weeks after a victim's death, each proxy was sent a signed letter outlining the nature of the project. A $10 incentive was offered, and a follow-up telephone call was made a few days later to arrange a time and place for an interview. At the time of this meeting, informed consent was obtained.

[Rainbow Wave]

77. Like I said.

You will never be convinced. It is a known fact that countries with strict gun control laws - Canada, Japan, UK, etc. - have much fewer gun related deaths than the US. Incontrovertible fact. So what do gun enthusiasts do? They come up with some other excuse. "Well, the Japanese are more submissive than we are." (They're submissive? We're the ones submitting ourselves to unnecessary violence.) "Well, the British have a smaller population than we do." (Ummm... That's already accounted for in a rate of gun violence.) There is no amount of fact that will convince a gun lover that guns are really an entirely unnecessary and overwhelmingly destructive invention.

So, leave me in my happy, gunfree world, and I'll leave you to fight off crime with your guns every day. Although, I might suggest a change of residence. Like I said, I live in LA and I have never encountered any reason to have a gun ready. If you need yours so much, it might be time to move to a different zip code.

[X_Digger]

78. You're entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts..

It is a known fact that countries with strict gun control laws - Canada, Japan, UK, etc. - have much fewer gun related deaths than the US. Incontrovertible fact.

That's true. Now, how do you explain countries like Sweden? Or Mexico?

You're committing a 'post hoc ergo propter hoc' logical fallacy. Correlation isn't causation.

Do countries like Canada, Japan, and UK have a lower gun related death rate because of gun control laws? Was gun ownership and use in crime higher before their gun control laws were implemented? Or was gun ownership low, and their use in crime low before their gun control laws were put in place.

[Rainbow Wave]

85. Sweden?

Sweden has very low rates of gun violence and very strict gun control laws. I think you might be thinking of Switzerland, which has a large number of rifle owners - mostly for hunting - and a much less violence-worshipping population than we do. In any event, pointing to anomalies is not going to win the argument for you. The fact of the matter is that overwhelmingly the countries with the strictest gun control have the lowest rates of gun related deaths and injuries - and this is in fact something quantifiable. I know, though, that you will not accept this as valid proof because you do not want to, so let's agree to disagree. You keep your guns. I'll keep my peace. I know I win, so I'm not at all offended. Take care.

[X_Digger]

96. You're right, switzerland.. not enough caffeine

But my point stands..

Correlation does not equate to causation.

If I interviewed criminals in prison and found out that a majority of them smoke cigarettes, compared to non-criminals, and then claimed that smoking causes crime- that would be the same kind of false logic that you're using.

[GreenStormCloud]

75. Mexico has extremely strict gun control, and they have lots of gun violence.

And they aren't getting most of those guns from the U.S. You can't buy a full-auto AK-47 on the civilian market here.

[Name removed]

79. Deleted message

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

[GreenStormCloud]

80. Actually, only about 16% of their guns come from the U.S.

The Mexican gov't doesn't bother submitting for U.S. tracing guns that obviously come from a different country.

Further, many of the traced U.S. guns were given to the Mexican Army by the U.S. gov't and then were "lost" to the cartels.

The cartels simply have no need to pay U.S. prices for lots of guns that they can get cheaper and better somewhere else.

Your so-called facts are wrong.

[shadowrider]

83. In other words

Studies that hold up to scrutiny happen to agree with your belief.

[Name removed]

95. Deleted message

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

[Name removed]

94. Deleted message

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

[Atypical Liberal]

54. Exactly: They key is past or present CRIMINAL ACTIVITY

Could be true ---- but what your handlers have (very intentionally) failed to tell you is that this statement is only true if in addition to a gun in the home there is also a criminal in the home, or criminal activity taking place in the home.

This is exactly correct. The single largest predictor to future criminal firearm activity is past criminal history. Most firearm homicides, and almost certainly most firearm crimes in general, are committed by people with extensive prior criminal histories. Since such people almost invariably live on homes, it is no surprise that firearms in their homes would be used in crimes.

But if you have no ex-cons in your home, the odds of your firearms being used in crime are probably very low.

[Atypical Liberal]

51. this has been refuted many times.

>There is little evidence owning a gun allows you to defend your life.
>In fact, it's statistically more likely you will suffer gun violence if there's a gun in your home.

This has been refuted many times.

The single largest statistical indicator that predicts firearm violence is prior criminal history. Well over 90% of firearm homicides are committed by people with extensive prior criminal histories, including, on average, four felonies. Your statement does not take into account that ex-cons also live in homes.

http://www.cardozolawreview.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=138:kates201086&catid=20:firearmsinc&Itemid=20

[Abq_Sarah]

82. Uh-huh

Which explains why 80 million of us firearms owners are victims of gun violence.


Care to try again?

[Jenoch]

4. Because

of numbers 2 and 3 on your second list, none of the items on your first list will be possible in any manner.

[caseymoz]

7. You might have observed that I said that in closing.

Or did you stop reading before then?

I said, what I didn't like is that people will deny the costs of second amendment freedoms eluded to on the first lists are even real.

[TPaine7]

9. All rights have costs

The fact that police cannot (legally) torture detailed and verifiable confessions out of suspects has led to murderers remaining free. Freedom from
unreasonable searches and seizures protects child molesters, terrorists, rapists, murderers and every other brand of criminal.

We who respect the right to keep and to carry arms acknowledge that freedom costs--all freedom costs. We still prefer it to the alternative.

And calling people who carry weapons "paranoid" based on your personal estimation of reality is less than illuminating. Your points would be much stronger if they were tethered to a higher authority than your your imaginary "what if" implied statistics. Do you have FACTS that support your premises? You imagine the intended victim responding wildly. Apparently, you are unaware that civilians fare much better in defensive shootings than police officers do. (I've posted the details and references here many times; if you can't find them ask me and I'll look for them.)

You may be ever so honest, but positions based on one's (necessarily) biased imagination are naturally inferior to positions based in reality. I daresay you would not have posited a police officer responding wildly--it wouldn't fit your beliefs--but in the real, fact based world, police are 5.5 times more likely to shoot the wrong person due to mis-identification. They are also more likely to loose the gunfight and more likely to be wounded or killed (if memory serves). Based on actual statistics, I would rather be around a civilian defensive shooting than a police officer shooting.

[caseymoz]

65. And yes, rights carry costs. I'm glad you say this.

Automobiles cause so many deaths, but we choose to have them because the benefits outweigh the costs, or that's what we think. There are plenty of other examples. Fact is, over the last sixty years, we have learned how to make cars much safer. The same applies to guns. I just want people to be truthful about the cost we're bearing, and not sneer at it, and not quote pat, astroturf statements from conservative think tanks when confronted with them.

Now, that being said, which fact do you want me to verify for you?

The one you've criticized most is the fact that a person drawing their weapon while already under fire and/or wounded is very likely to fire wildly, and in a crowd, this will probably wound bystanders. You're skeptical and want me to provide evidence of this?

Is it the fact that an assault with a gun has a higher death rate than that of a knife? I'd provide that, but I would think that you'd be able to take that one as a given. Would you or wouldn't you bring a knife to a gunfight, instead of a gun? So, after I ask you that, do you still need to look at the statistics? So, swear to me that if I hustle and verify this, and it is a verifiable, undisputed fact, that I'm not telling you something you don't already know.

Maybe one that school and workplace shootings are more prevalent and deadlier due to the availability and quality of weapons? (Conversely that cutting down on this availability would arguably cut down on school violence.) Yes, that one's a bit speculative, but I believe it can be supported as well, if not actually verified.

Including all the others, which one do you need verification for?

I didn't postulate a police officer simply because 1) that example isn't topical; and 2) police officers have received training, above and beyond just shooting practice. I'm talking about armed civilians who haven't been in a gunfight before and aren't trained to handle one. Its not "inferior" to something based in reality. News was that Giffords was armed. This could have easily happened.

Your statistic on how often police kill due to mis-identification is absolutely irrelevant for reasons given above and for the fact that it says absolutely nothing about how likely somebody is to hit an innocent bystander while under fire in a crowd.

BTW, I would guess that police lose a lot because they don't draw first. In other words, he who knows that there's going to be a gunfight will usually win over somebody who doesn't. Your stats on police do support that.

About the word paranoid: carrying a gun without a particular reason is a lot like carrying a powered screw-driver because you can imagine that you might need one. People would see that as a little odd. What if instead of meeting thugs you locked your keys in your car, in the dead of a blizzard, and it has your house key on it, too? But, isn't it good that you carry a gun rather than a lock pick! Or say, you locked your infant in your car and its 107 degrees out. If you imagine being attacked by thugs, perhaps even in upper-middle class suburbia, why not imagine that? Or why not carry a first aid kit, because you're much more likely to have an accident than you are to be a victim of crime.

Why a gun? Why that particular tool anticipating that particular situation? If you live in a threatening environment, okay, that's not paranoid. Plus, a few gun owners have called themselves paranoid to me, and in fact, they and their non-paranoid friends acted like it, too. They seemed to be fairly typical. There's something else going on here besides rational argument.

[jazzhound]

12. In order for your points to be taken seriously, you

need to be more specific. The phrase "further gun control" is vague to the point where it is meaningless -- made yet more vague with the phrase "contingent on good enforcement". You haven't defined any of your terms at the outset.

The last one makes any effective gun control a fantasy for our lifetimes.

So exactly what was the point of the exercise? Lots of calisthenics to no avail, apparently.

[sharesunited]

14. 2nd Amendment "freedoms" amount to nothing more than the freedom to have bullets enter our bodies.

Such "freedom" is double speak.

A society in which you can be so conveniently killed upon the whim of others is a state of terror.

A society in which the living and the dead are distinguishable only by who can draw and fire first is a state of terror.

The 2nd was put in there as an appeasement toward those who were skeptical of a strong central government.

The Civil War has rendered the 2nd entirely moot.

So let's stop the charade that guns have anything to do with "rights" or "freedoms."

[TPaine7]

15. Because you claim the right to have bullets enter your body,

and because you claim that right repeatedly and stubbornly, I concede.

You, sharesunited, and you alone, poses that right. I support its enshrinement in the Constitution. We can call it Amendment 2.5:

The right of sharesunited to have bullets enter his body shall not be infringed, questioned, or abridged by any governmental entity or by any citizen or inhabitant of any state or territory of the United States of America.

I'll call my Senator if you'll call yours. Together we can win recognition for your rights!

[sharesunited]

16. Advocate instead for a mutual covenant to waive that "right" for the common good.

Unwillingness to do so reveals an unfitness to walk amongst the civilized.

[TPaine7]

19. See post 9. I will not advocate for the waiving of rights "for the common good"

Whether those rights be freedom from unreasonable search and seizure, freedom from coercive interrogation of suspects, freedom from self-incrimination, or the freedom to keep and bear arms.

If any of those positions make me unfit to walk among the civilized, so be it.

The "uncivilized" are better company anyway.


Waiving of rights "for the common good" is very creepy--fascist even.

[sharesunited]

22. What's creepy is your literal embrace of the right to have bullets enter our bodies is

How about the right to have a ton of bricks fall on our heads?

[TPaine7]

25. Not "our bodies" sharesunited,

Reread post 15:

You, sharesunited, and you alone, poses that right.

Get it straight.

How about the right to have a ton of bricks fall on our heads?

Once again, I will not support that right for the general populace. But if you insist, we can include it in Amendment 2.5--the special sharesunited amendment. I will support YOUR right to have a ton of bricks fall on YOUR head.

No one else claims such rights. I don't claim a right to be killed, thought it is necessarily easy to kill me in a free society. I do, however, lay a claim to the freedoms that make my murder easier than in a more controlled society. I recognize that freedom comes with risks and costs--it still beats the alternative.

[Straw Man]

26. Our bodies...

...are protected by the criminal code. Sound familiar? You've been told this before.

See "Rights and Responsibilities, Delineation Thereof: Swinging Fist vs. Jutting Jaw et al."

C'mon, this is elementary stuff...

[sharesunited]

29. Sure, Loughner will be punished. Whoop de frickin do. Very helpful to the dead and maimed.

Prevention through scarcity is the direction we need to go.

[gravity556]

33. scarcity?

Really? Well, civilian ownership of firearms in Mexico is essentially illegal, and it looks to be an absolutely safe society. Except for the whole massively corrupt government/police forces/federal police forces/army selling guns to the cartels thing. Oh, and the rolling shootouts between cartels, decapitated bodies, kidnappings, rapes and other nastiness is kind of a bummer too.

It works out really well-the cartels have free reign over these little towns because they come in and kill the cops. And the folks who replace the cops. Until no one wants to be a cop anymore. Then they can pretty much terrorize the little town-them, being criminals with their complete disregard for the law, being the only folks in town with guns. Machine guns that, contrary to what the media tells you, are not being bought at gun shows. Those machine guns and grenades and grenade launchers and RPGs are coming from other countries further south and being stolen (or sold) by army units. Sure, some guns do come from straw purchases in the US. But those are already illegal. And quite a few come from thefts-also, incredibly, illegal.

So explain how scarcity of arms for the law abiding population in Mexico has been a net gain for the people, please. Because for some strange reason, I can't see it...

[Katya Mullethov]

37. Ascencion aaaaaaalmost got retaken by the citizens

THere is a reason they wont allow an armed populace .

If the army hadnt shown up when they did , they likely would have strung up the kidnappers , the mayor , and the corrupt PD . And by the way they are going up against their guns anyway , I would venture there might have been a shoot out with the army too .

[Straw Man]

60. Crime and punishment.

Sure, Loughner will be punished. Whoop de frickin do. Very helpful to the dead and maimed.

Prevention through scarcity is the direction we need to go.

Well, there goes our legal system out the window. If only we had dedicated ourselves to the elimination of the opportunity to commit crime instead of this pesky punitive deterrence model... Scarcity of weapons? Why stop with guns? Let's move on the bats, kitchen knives, flammable liquids... How else could we address ability? Compulsory shackling at public events? 24-hour curfews?

Maybe we can work on motivation as well. Lobotomies? Preventive electro-shock? It would work.

[caseymoz]

99. You're not ever going to achieve scarcity in this society.

There are over two hundred million guns in this country. There is no way. You're not going to confiscate them. You might as well just talk about draining the Pacific Ocean.

If that's the direction need to go, you're trying to go north from the North Pole. There's no way to begin.

No, I think you might make reasonable limits on where guns can or can't be carried, or where they could be bought. Whatever happens, you're not going to cut guns by even a fifth of what we have now. Ever. And more than likely, the number will increase.

This is the society you live in.

[Straw Man]

17. A society in which you can be so conveniently killed...

...upon the whim of others is a state of terror.

Thank you for the excellent explanation of the need for the right to keep and bear arms.

[sharesunited]

18. Your remedy is the illness, tragically ironic as illustrated by events.

[Straw Man]

20. By what events?

Your remedy is the illness, tragically ironic as illustrated by events.

Unless you're trying to claim that Loughner was acting in self-defense, then nothing of the kind has been illustrated, ironically or otherwise.

[sharesunited]

21. Guns and ammo in the hands of the public. Literally obtained over the counter at a retail store.

Homicidal malice empowered as a Constitutional "right."

[Straw Man]

24. Still looking for that Constitutional right to homicide?

And yes, we know what you think of "the public": can't be trusted, must be controlled. Can't handle freedom, much less empowerment: every last one a barely-repressed killer.

[Euromutt]

38. I think I've lived in that state, or at least in the next zip code

It's a country where legal private ownership of firearms is tightly restricted, and their use in self-defense even more so, to wit my home country of the Netherlands. Back in the mid-1990s, when I was living in The Hague, I one arrived at my post office (at about 3:45 PM, as I recall) to find it closed because two gunmen had robbed the place about ten minutes before. A year or two later, I took a late-night tram home which passed through an intersection where, about fifteen minutes later, two drug dealers tried to settle a "business dispute" with a mutual exchange of high-velocity lead.

In November 1977, the Amsterdam municipal police (as it was then) ambushed two members of the German "Red Army Faction" (aka the Baader-Meinhof Gang) outside the apartment building where they were using a flat as a safe house, leading to a running gunfight. The apartment building was the one where my paternal grandparents lived at the time (and my grandfather still does). One of the assignments of the RAF members in Amsterdam was to acquire firearms. Yeah, in a country with some of the strictest gun laws in Europe; tighter than Germany's at the time.

Fast forward twenty years, and as my uncle and cousin are taking my grandfather to dinner at his favorite Italian restaurant (officially "La Galleria," colloquially "Luigi's" after the owner) when at the end of the block, one of a couple of guys having an argument pulls a gun and pursues the other around the corner.

Then there's the other fun stuff, like the maximum security courthouse known as the "Bunker"--in the same part of town as my grandfather's place and Luigi's--being fired on with a grenade launcher in 2007, and low-level marijuana dealer Hans van Geenen being murdered on the A73 highway by competitors firing sub-machine guns from a pursuing vehicle in 2008.

You can scoff at the slogan "when guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns," but I've lived there. The gun laws don't stop thugs from acquiring guns in any frigging country, even China, and as a law-abiding citizen, all you can do is hope/pray none of them decides to turn his gun on you.

[Remmah2]

36. Reflecting on your post.

Someone buy that guy a beer and a mop.

[Atypical Liberal]

55. How so?

The Civil War has rendered the 2nd entirely moot.

How so? Do you believe that armed rebellion will never again be necessary in the future of the United States? Do you believe that it could never again be successful?

[spin]

76. Not having second amendment rights does not stop bullets entering our bodies either ...

If owning a handgun was no longer legal and I was to find myself confronted by an individual who illegally had a gun and the intent to kill me, I would probably be shot.

you say:

"A society in which you can be so conveniently killed upon the whim of others is a state of terror."

In fact in such a society, It would be easier to kill me or others and might indeed turn into a state of terror like Mexico.

"A society in which the living and the dead are distinguishable only by who can draw and fire first is a state of terror".

Obviously you have little understand of gun fighting. It isn't who shoots first but who shoots best. If you beat me to the draw and miss or hit me in a non vital area, I can take the time to accurately place my shots and stop your attack.

"The 2nd was put in there as an appeasement toward those who were skeptical of a strong central government."

Agreed. It's still unusual even today for a government to trust its citizens with firearms. Most limit ownership to the rich and privileged.

"The Civil War has rendered the 2nd entirely moot."

In fact in the aftermath of the Civil War many blacks owned firearms for the first time.

After the Civil War, many white southerners feared that black freedmen would take bloody vengeance on their former masters. Fears of a black uprising were particularly intense in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina, where blacks outnumbered whites.

White southerners responded by creating a race-based caste system – a U.S. version of apartheid. Gun control was crucial to making it work. Southern whites tried to maintain their antebellum monopoly over firearms. Many states barred African Americans from owning guns.

Local police, state militias and Ku Klux Klansmen rode from house to house, demanding that blacks turn in their weapons. Once disarmed, they were helpless against lynch mobs.

***snip***

According to Halbrook, the Fourteenth Amendment temporarily stymied the gun-control efforts of southern whites. It forbade the states from passing any law that would deprive citizens of their constitutional rights, including the right to keep and bear arms.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/poe/poe3.html

[john donathon]

30. are you saying

that you believe you would have equal chance of survival if
A. You legally carry and are presented with a dangerous violent encounter.
or
B. You have no weapon to defend yourself and are presented with a dangerous violent encounter?
???????

[caseymoz]

93. No, but you also should weigh that against other risks inherent with a gun.

What's the risk of a gun accident in the meantime for you, for a family member, for anyone?

What's the risk of wounding an innocent bystander?

What's the risk of having the gun stolen or borrowed and then having it used in crimes?

This isn't a risk you'll calculate, but its one everyone else should: what's a risk that you'll go bad and commit crimes with a gun?

Now, a lot of this risk, you don't incur yourself but the people around you do. So, if you really want to be a bastard you could say, I don't care, as long as I feel safer. But just so you know, to an incremental degree, you add to everyone else's anxiety, and . . . perpetuate a civilian arms race.

One thing I'd like to ask you about carrying the gun, and I don't know the answer to this: does an insurance company give you a break on your life/health premiums for carrying a gun? Or do they raise them? If they do either, it's a good indication of what the actuarial tables actually say about how much a gun really contributes to your safety, or unsafety.

Somewhere buried by the gun industry and never seen by gun proponents, (joke) there have got to be actuarial tables on all this. Somehow, though, gun advocates never seem to know them or think their important to their decisions.

All this being said, a gun CAN help you against a criminal. I'm just saying, not as often as you may think, and it probably often doesn't outweigh the other risks you incur. If you carry a set of pliers with you every day, they might also be a life saver in a different situation, and there's hardly any risk to carrying them except looking like a dork.

[john donathon]

31. should nobody

Be aloud to own a dog, because of what Michael Vick has done? because alot of you sure do think that nobody should own a gun because of what Jared Lee Loughner did. right?

[LAGC]

32. What "reasonable regulations" would you propose?

We have a plethora of gun laws already on the books. They don't seem to be doing any good.

[bowens43]

35. A total and complete ban on private citizens owning hand guns would be a good start. nt

[LAGC]

40. How would you hope to achieve this goal? (n/t)

[Katya Mullethov]

44. You just declare war

And then declare victory every once in a while . I am tellin you , that shit works . The system worked .

Thoughts are what they are really after , just listen to the rhetoric . Guns are distraction ,attempting to control the internet is the goal .

[bowens43]

34. Outside of the framework of a well regulated militia

there is no right to keep and bear arms.

This is a perfect example of why the founding fathers, in their wisdom, spelled out this limitation in the Bill of Rights.

[oneshooter]

39. And your historical evidence of this is?

Or is this something that you have just pulled out of your ass?

Oneshooter
Armed and Livin in Texas

[Euromutt]

41. Snore.

Yeah, like we haven't heard that one before.

The prefatory clause to the Second Amendment doesn't limit the operative clause; rather, it explains why it is actively in the interest of the state not to infringe upon the right of the people (note: "the people," not "the militia") to keep and bear arms. Namely, that it benefits the state to have a recruiting pool of which a sizable number of individuals are already familiar with at least the basics of weapon handling and marksmanship.

I'm going to reiterate the operative clause: "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." Emphasis mine. The First Amendment does not restrict the right "peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances" to the militia, nor does the Fourth Amendment guarantee that the right "to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated" only for members of the militia. Those rights apply to all members of "the people" and so does the right to keep and bear arms.

The reason the Second has a prefatory clause is because there's a positive reason why securing the enumerated right to the people is in the interest of the state, unlike the rights to freedom of assembly, the petitioning for redress of grievances, and being secure against unreasonable searches and seizures, all of which make the state's job more difficult. But in the American model, the interests of the state are subordinate to the interests of the people, not vice-versa.

[Atypical Liberal]

56. Please explain...

The second amendment reads as follows:

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

Please explain why you think they wrote that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, and not the right of the militia?

[lawodevolution]

43. Like I've pointed out before, nations with low gun possession rates and strict gun control are more

dangerous (by 5 times) than nations with more relaxed gun control and higher civilian gun possession rates.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=118&topic_id=339915&mesg_id=339915

Try posting something to back gun control with statistical relevance please. I take the lack of refute to this finding (in the link) to be a kind of intellectual surrender to the debate on guns, now all you will be doing is pushing emotionalism.

The congo is not the most well armed society on earth. The most heavily armed societies are USA, yemen, Switzerland, Canada, France, Germany, Greece, Finland, Israel, wait, all the free nations. lol.

[X_Digger]

45. Lots of opinions asserted as fact..let's break this down..

They say that there are two kinds of people in a gunfight, those who knew there would be a gunfight, and those didn't. The latter almost always loses.

Then how about these..

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/12/16/ap/national/main7157952.shtml

As they were trying to tie up the store owner, he took out a handgun from his waistband and fatally shot one of the suspects, Smith said.

http://charlotte.news14.com/content/top_stories/628167/man-at-atm-fires-back-at-would-be-armed-robber

According to police, the man was attempting to use a Cash Points ATM on Eastway Drive at North Tryon Street around 11 p.m. A suspect seemingly saw that as an opportunity and tried to rob the victim at gunpoint.

However, that victim was also armed. He shot the suspect twice in the leg.

http://www.wxix.com/Global/story.asp?S=12299813

CINCINNATI, OH (FOX19) - Cincinnati Police are investigating a shooting where it appears a robber left the scene with the victim's cell-phone in his hand, and a slug from the victim's gun in his lower abdomen.

Police say the robber ran into someone with a concealed-carry permit, and at some point the would-be victim was able to get his gun out and shoot the suspect, who took off running from the shooting scene on Rosemont Avenue south of Glenway in West Price Hill.

1) It will cut down on the number of assaults that result in homicides, simply because compared, say, to a wound from a knife assault, a wound from a firearm is five times more fatal, and a wound to a vital organ from a firearm is many times more fatal than that with a knife. Those are the statistics say.

You're assuming that 'gun control' would remove guns from those who are likely to assault people.

2) It will would cut down drastically on the number of impulsive homicides resulting from a "bad moment" with a gun, since many gun homicides are not premeditated at all but result from bad decision over a split second. That decision takes place much too quickly and easily with a gun. With a knife you have to work at it, same with a car. Death isn't so push-button.

That 'snap' event? Is largely a myth. http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=118&topic_id=313308&mesg_id=313308

3) It would reduce mass deaths from school and public shootings. Nobody is going to kill thirty people in a few minutes without a firearm, or bomb.

See China and mass school stabbings, see Akihabara massacre.

4) It would reduce the number of gun accidents, particularly for children.

These have already been going down for the past 50 years. Rather rare right now, but I'll concede they could become even more rare.

6) It would prevent assassination like this, and those that result in mass deaths.

That's a bold opinion, have anything to back it up?

Let's ask one of our residents who is familiar with strong gun control-
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=118&topic_id=353577

Tell that to Pim Fortuyn

Firearms are tightly regulated in the Netherlands. That didn't stop Folkert van der Graaf buying an illegal Spanish-made Star Firestar M43 9mm pistol off a guy in a bar in Ede (a provincial town of about 67,000 people) and, in 2002, using it assassinate populist politician Pim Fortuyn. This was incidentally the first assassination of a politician in over 500 years of Dutch history, and the second in its history as an independent country, even though the first gun control laws weren't adopted until 1919.

Dutch gun control laws also didn't prevent Mohammed Bouyeri from acquiring a Croatian-made HS2000 and using it to murder film maker Theo van Gogh in 2004.

Ultimately, when some whackjob decides to murder a public figure, there's no legislation you can pass that is going to stop him. Hell, he's already decided to break the law prohibiting murder, and there isn't a country in the world--not even China--where it's impossible to illegally acquire a firearm.

[caseymoz]

90. I'll tell you what you need to show me to win this argument.

"http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/12/16/ap/national/m...
As they were trying to tie up the store owner, he took out a handgun from his waistband and fatally shot one of the suspects, Smith said."


. . . etc. So, I didn't rule out exceptions, or did you read that I said "the latter almost always loses." So, what do you do? You provide a list of exceptions. These stories don't present anything substantial, surprising or persuasive to me. At all. I don't care if you cite thousands.

What would be substantial? Answer me this question: how often is packing a gun a successful strategy for a victim of a crime vs. how often does it fail? That's the persuasive study/statistics you need to provide me.

That's what these anecdotes or case studies never present: the success/failure rate. Really, without that information, these stories are pointless, irrelevant, though inspirational. Show that to me, and if it's persuasive, I'll believe you and thank you.

And if you wanted to hit a grand slam for persuasion, provide this stat: how do the crime victims who carry guns fare against those who don't? Can you provide any information about that?

Now, how many people tell you exactly how you can win the argument?

Do those stats even exist? I haven't been able to find them. And I find that odd because they would seem to me to be the common sense statistics to gather on this issue, and they shouldn't be terribly difficult. One thing, no gun lover I've talked to has done that but they'll give me what you have, random anecdotes. It's very frustrating, because all gun advocates provide those anecdotes, and it always creeps me out, because it's almost like "the cult" has trained them to do exactly that.

You might also tell me what the crime rate is for people who are carrying guns vs. those who aren't. How often does each group actually suffer a crimes? That can also be of help. Because though it seems like it should common sense that carrying a gun actually prevents an assault, I notice it's not backed up by that type of study, and that would do it.

"'1) It will cut down on the number of assaults that result in homicides, simply because compared, say, to a wound from a knife assault, a wound from a firearm is five times more fatal, and a wound to a vital organ from a firearm is many times more fatal than that with a knife. Those are the statistics say.'"

"You're assuming that 'gun control' would remove guns from those who are likely to assault people."

Wrong. I'm sorry, you've completely misinterpreted that point. First please get this into your mind, I don't advocate gun control. I don't work for it; I don't argue it; I don't organize for it. Period.

Now I'll break the meaning of what I said down for you: imagine our world, and imagine an alternate reality where guns are more or less, successfully controlled. Compare the two worlds: our country now has such-and-such number of assaults. The alternate world, where guns are controlled will have an equal number of assaults. That's what I'm saying. In a successfully gun controlled society that's in every other way ours, you will have about an equal number of assaults.

But: in the alternate world assaults result in fewer deaths. In other words, fewer assaults end in homicide. Why? Fewer people can get a hold of the best assault tool available: a firearm. It just isn't available as often.

Lastly, a wound from a firearm from an assault has a fatality rate five times higher than with a knife. You didn't answer this, but I hope you won't demand that I source this. This is not even close to conjecture.

I'm exhausted. Now. Sorry I couldn't get to the other points. Maybe tomorrow. :)

[X_Digger]

97. You made a statement of opinion without fact..

. . etc. So, I didn't rule out exceptions, or did you read that I said "the latter almost always loses." So, what do you do? You provide a list of exceptions. These stories don't present anything substantial, surprising or persuasive to me. At all. I don't care if you cite thousands.

You made a statement of opinion, without any facts to back them up, I provided you with some data points that refute your opinion.

However, best guess about the defensive uses of guns are 1.5-2.5M per year.
http://www.guncite.com/kleckandgertztable1.html

This is a comparison of many surveys. Some are specific to handguns, some are all guns. The timeframe for these surveys, by different orgs, is 1977-1994.

And if you wanted to hit a grand slam for persuasion, provide this stat: how do the crime victims who carry guns fare against those who don't? Can you provide any information about that?

While not specifically CHL, the NCVS data (as interpreted by Zimring and Hawkins) does have a telling stat-

The gun-armed resister was actually much less likely to be injured than the non- resister, who was, in turn, much less likely to be injured than those who resisted without a gun. Only 12-17% of the gun armed resisters were injured. Those who submitted to the felons' demands were twice as likely to be injured (gratuitously); those resisting without guns were three times as likely to be injured as those with guns.{128}

F. Zimring & G. Hawkins, THE CITIZEN'S GUIDE TO GUN CONTROL (1987)

[caseymoz]

98. Thank you for info. I'll start studying it.

Not too substantial on the surface but it gives me a place to start. I sort of wished you had something other than progun sources, like actual studies by scientists, but hey, I could try to track down these sources.

The only time I'm required to provide facts is if I'm doing something other than giving an opinion. Like, trying to persuade. The facts I've provided, like guns are deadlier than knives, is that really disputed? I happened to get it from a

So, WTF is so offensive about giving an opinion and asking you for specific facts to persuade me? I mean, is it like you want to be persuaded to the anti-gun side anyway? Does it occur to you that maybe I'm the one who wants to be talked out of it, but that I keep on hearing the same frightfully stupid, and belligerent, things from gun advocates and I'm waiting for that one argument to impress me?

To be fair, I hear just as many stupid things from anti-gun people, but it's a different kind of stupidity, usually, and it usually doesn't nauseate me, and it lacks the chippy belligerence.

So, I'll tell you exactly where I stand on Gun Control, this is my whole agenda. And I rather think this is inevitable no matter what I, or anyone else does:

1) Allow people to buy as many guns as they want and as much ammo as they want. (Is that in conflict with your opinion?)

2) The US in the near future will then collapse into anarchy for social, economic and environmental reasons unrelated to guns.

3) After spending 70 years in an Afghanistan/Congo/Somalia type of anarchy, people will get very tired of the right to keep and bear arms.

4) Then: they will enact gun control, that is if it still matters given the environmental conditions.


There. That's my whole agenda. If I'm a little careless about having my opinion backed with facts and don't give a shit about persuading anyone about gun rights/gun control, that's why.

I don't think you have to worry anything about gun control. Even if they limit clip volume. I doubt it can even be passed and if it is, it'll expire in four years anyway.

[X_Digger]

100. Right, the sources linked in the table are non-positional.

Just happens that a criminologist is the one who pulled them together, and a pro-gun site is the one who posted it.

Re your prediction- crime has been decreasing for the last two decades. Even with all the financial instability, joblessness, and political vitriol- crime has continued to decline (the preliminary reports for 2010 just came out, see FBI's UCR- http://www2.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2009/index.html ).

In short, I don't see anything that would lead me to the same conclusions you appear to have reached.

eta: 2010 prelim numbers- http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2010/preliminary-crime-in-the-us-2009

[caseymoz]

101. One last thing: your stat on the number of defensive uses of guns?

1.5-2 million per year? Unbelievable. What are you going to tell me next? That the moon is 500 miles from the earth?

You've given a stat that immediately invites more skepticism than the argument you're trying to prove, and makes you less credible, if only for the fact that you don't think about what it would mean.

There's no way that's true. I don't care what the source is that's one 1 in 100 adults: per year! Think about that would mean: everybody would know somebody who fended off a crime with a gun, if not three or four people, and would know people who have done it repeatedly. Everybody would have a relative who did. Everybody.

You wouldn't have to inform people of how often guns fend off crimes. People like to talk about things like that, there's no way it would be under wraps. Families would know it, wouldn't forget it and wouldn't stop talking about it. If your stat is true, I would have three first cousins who fended off a crime with a gun.

Now, if you're still saying that there's still a chance it could be right, you would also have to fit that in with the rest of crime statistics: and it doesn't fit.

According to the FBI, about 3.5 people in 100 are victims of crimes. Okay, that means that, according to your statistics one quarter of all crimes are thwarted by citizens with guns. If that were the case, we wouldn't have criminals on the streets. Nobody would undertake it, and if you're a "career criminal," you're career would be over in a year. There's no way this is true! Zero chance, zilch, none.

I also notice that in my paper and every paper I've seen, reports of criminals being thwarted by guns are scarce. Now you could point out that this must be a conspiracy, the press doesn't want to report it, but look at the other two points I've made, and tell me if its more likely that the figures have been cooked to market guns, which is lucrative, or if stories of gun heroism that would sell papers and get people to watch the news are being suppressed? Which is more likely?

I'm supposing also that reports of crimes being thwarted can be verified somewhere, like they were reported first in the paper and clipped or dragged and dropped by gun organizations, right? Or is it all "self-reported" and taken as given, in this age of guerrilla marketing?

And it's what I talk about when I point to pro-gun stupidity. If that's the best stat of the defensive uses of guns on the pro-gun side, you need a better source.

[X_Digger]

102. You're comparing apples to oranges..

The 3.5 in 100 is for completed crimes.

If you confront a prowler in your back yard and scare him off by racking a shotgun, then call the police, what category does that incident get reported to the FBI?

None, because no crime was completed. Not assault, not robbery, not homicide, not rape, not property crime, not arson, not motor vehicle theft.

Hell, I've got a personal data point for this one. In the aftermath of a hurricane a couple of years ago, I was establishing emergency cell coverage in Galveston. I was all by myself, in one of those tiny little brick buildings with no windows. A rather odiferous panhandler approached me asking for change as I was hauling equipment in. I offered him some bottled water, or an energy bar, and he pulled a knife. I put the door to my truck between us, took out my handgun and told him I was armed. When he saw the gun, he beat feet.

I called it in to the field operations center, who said they'd send an officer. A couple of hours later, I got a visit from a DPS trooper, who took down a description of the guy, so that he could watch out for him. No report filed, however.

Another thing you're assuming that may not be true is that you seem to be assuming even distribution of incidents. ie, 1.5M incidents means 1.5M separate people with one incident, rather than 2 incidents for 750k, etc.

[caseymoz]

109. So, instead of telling me that the moon is 500 miles away, you're saying it's 750.

3.5 for complete crimes still adds up to a number far too high.

And I left enough wiggle room in case you were going to say that, note I didn't cite percentage, now I will.

So, now that you've "corrected" me, you're now saying that 30 to 40 percent of all crimes (including autothefts, burglaries, assaults, rapes, murders etc.) are thwarted by citizens carrying guns. Whereas, if you take the assumption you erroneously thought I made it would have been, it would have meant 43-57 percent of all crimes are thwarted by citizens with guns. And since in both cases, we could assume that not all these incidents are reported, in the corrected case, you're then actually talking about 40-50 percent of all crime attempts. Whereas believable number, at best, would be 5-10 percent of crimes thwarted by guns. Hell, carrying a gun gun might worthwhile if they thwart even 1-5 percent of crimes. I'd call that "stat overkill."

However, either way, it's utterly unbelievable. Your sources are bullshitting you to sell guns. I'm not saying guns or evil, but take a look at who's paying the people handing you those stats and pay attention to what they're trying to get you to buy. I believe, from the numbers I've given you, purpose of that stat is purely to sell guns. The same as four out of five dentists and such . . .

"Another thing you're assuming that may not be true is that you seem to be assuming even distribution of incidents. ie, 1.5M incidents means 1.5M separate people with one incident, rather than 2 incidents for 750k, etc."

No, I wasn't assuming that. What I say applies no matter the distribution, because the distribution would be overrun by the fact that its 1.5-2.0 million per year. If that goes on for ten years, ten years six percent of the adult population would have thwarted a crime with a gun, many multiple times. If that goes on for say, thirty years, and we might presume it has since crime was higher before, that would be somewhere around fifteen percent of the adult population. Again everybody would know somebody, would at least have a cousin or uncle who has successfully thwarted a crime, and many three and four times by then.

But that's if you're distribution theory is correct, and you have no evidence to say it is, yet. All you have right now is a bullshit stat that you had to pull out of your ass so you could believe another bullshit somebody handed you. Why not just doubt the number? Be skeptical and think about why you're so invested in it.

However, even if your distribution theory is wrong, then most everything I said before is pretty much the same, except instead of six percent in ten years, it would be ten percent, and instead of fifteen percent in thirty years think of more like 25 percent. Only thing different: it would be unusual to know somebody who did it several times.

If reality were correctly reflected in that stat, we wouldn't be having an argument about guns. It would be settled, in your favor I assure you. But non-gun lovers, who know the minimum about math hear you pass on a stat like that without question, and they think your crazy, or that you're a member of a cult, or both.

[X_Digger]

110. You're also comparing the defensive gun uses from 1994 to crime stats from today.

I even mention in my post about the 15 or so surveys that the data for these defensive gun uses range from 1977 to 1994. 1993-4 was the peak of violent crime in the last 40 years.

Oh look, though, you did it again-

No, I wasn't assuming that. What I say applies no matter the distribution, because the distribution would be overrun by the fact that its 1.5-2.0 million per year. If that goes on for ten years, ten years six percent of the adult population would have thwarted a crime with a gun, many multiple times.

You assumed that the percentage of adult population would go up. If Joe Smith stopped a prowler in 97, 99, 00, 02, and 07 .. that's 5 DGUs, but the percentage didn't budge.

How could a situation like that happen, you say? Did I forget to mention that Joe's a retiree, living on social security in a shitty neighborhood riddled with crime and drug gangs? My bad.

[jody]

49. The issue is simple and you miss it. Government is not obligated to protect an individual unless

she/he is in custody.

Self-defense is a personal responsibility and handguns are the most effective, efficient tool for that job.

PA (1776) and VT (1777) recognized the natural, inherent, inalienable/unalienable right to keep and bear arms for defense of self.

As an inalienable right, it is impossible for PA and VT citizens to have given away that right when they ratified our Constitution and Bill of Rights.

The majority of other states' constitutions follow PA and VT in recognizing the inalienable RKBA.

If you support an omnipotent government without inalienable individual rights, then you face a battle at the ballot box or worst.

[KansasVoter]

104. wow, just wow.

[Atypical Liberal]

50. You are correct on one thing.

You are absolutely right. Freedoms have consequences. And I am quite content with the relatively low number of firearm crime that we have in this country. I am most certainly not willing to relinquish my firearm freedoms in an attempt to prevent criminal activity with them.

To quote Thomas Jefferson: "I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty, than those attending too small a degree of it."

>They say that there are two kinds of people in a gunfight, those who knew there would be a gunfight, and those didn't.
>The latter almost always loses. It just happens too fast, and how about if she had been able to draw, nervously, in a
>crowd firing back wild? Or if anyone else had.
>
>So, this demonstrates that carrying guns for general self-defense, out of paranoia when there's no specific
>threat present is of limited or no good.

There have been numerous examples, many posted here, that easily refute you assertion. There have been many examples over the years where a victim has been ambushed and yet is still able to successfully resist with a firearm. The question is simply this: Do you prefer some chance to resist to no chance to resist?

>Now, people have a right to keep and bear arms, and they have a right to defend themselves, but
>2nd Amendment proponents are not extremely truthful about the consequences of this.

The simple fact is, I don't care what the consequences are. Firearm crime and accidents in this country is very low, and continues to decline. 95% or more of firearm owners aren't involved in firearm crime every year. We know this because there just aren't enough crimes to go around to make it any higher than this.

I'm not willing to give up any of my rights to own firearms to try and curb what those 2% of people do.

Here's what I also think further gun control would do, contingent on good enforcement:

1) It will cut down on the number of assaults that result in homicides, simply because compared, say, to a wound from a knife assault, a wound from a firearm is five times more fatal, and a wound to a vital organ from a firearm is many times more fatal than that with a knife. Those are the statistics say.

2) It will would cut down drastically on the number of impulsive homicides resulting from a "bad moment" with a gun, since many gun homicides are not premeditated at all but result from bad decision over a split second. That decision takes place much too quickly and easily with a gun. With a knife you have to work at it, same with a car. Death isn't so push-button.

3) It would reduce mass deaths from school and public shootings. Nobody is going to kill thirty people in a few minutes without a firearm, or bomb.

4) It would reduce the number of gun accidents, particularly for children.

5) It would prevent at least some school shootings and workplace rampages.

6) It would prevent assassination like this, and those that result in mass deaths.

1) It would also mean that people who are faced with violent assault will almost certainly be without the means to defend themselves from it, save for those few who wish to engage in a physical contest with their assailant.

2) The idea that firearm crimes are "heat of the moment" type affairs committed by people who "just snap" is a myth:

http://www.cardozolawreview.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=138:kates201086&catid=20:firearmsinc&Itemid=20

3) And that is precisely what such deranged people will do. Someone who has set themselves on a mission of mass murder is not going to be dissuaded by a lack of firearms. See Oklahoma City.

4) Firearm accidents are already at 100 year lows, and continuing to decline. As are accidental firearm deaths.

5) Who knows?

6) Unlikely.

I would like to make a final point though, the best armed societies are not exactly known for their freedoms. Take a look at the Congo for instance.

There is a fundamental difference between our society and the Congo - in the Congo there is no effective rule of law. In a land where people have no recourse to justice, chaos reins. But I submit to you that even if - especially if - I lived in a land of chaos and no rule of law, I would still want to be armed.

[Kennah]

64. While the Fourth Amendment ...

... allows for reasonable search and seizure, I see no provision for reasonable infringement upon the right to keep and bear arms in the Second Amendment.

[Kennah]

66. On the assertion that the Congo is a society

I find it incredibly difficult to ascribe the traits of society or community to any number of nations on Earth, including the Congo.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/society

so·ci·e·ty

1. an organized group of persons associated together for religious, benevolent, cultural, scientific, political, patriotic, or other purposes.

2. a body of individuals living as members of a community; community.

3. the body of human beings generally, associated or viewed as members of a community: the evolution of human society.

4. a highly structured system of human organization for large-scale community living that normally furnishes protection, continuity, security, and a national identity for its members: American society.

5. such a system characterized by its dominant economic class or form: middle-class society; industrial society.

6. those with whom one has companionship.

7. companionship; company: to enjoy one's society.

8. the social life of wealthy, prominent, or fashionable persons.

9. the social class that comprises such persons.

10. the condition of those living in companionship with others, or in a community, rather than in isolation.

11. Biology . a closely integrated group of social organisms of the same species exhibiting division of labor.

12. Ecclesiastical . an ecclesiastical society.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/community

com·mu·ni·ty

1. a social group of any size whose members reside in a specific locality, share government, and often have a common cultural and historical heritage.

2. a locality inhabited by such a group.

3. a social, religious, occupational, or other group sharing common characteristics or interests and perceived or perceiving itself as distinct in some respect from the larger society within which it exists (usually prec. by the ): the business community; the community of scholars.

4. a group of associated nations sharing common interests or a common heritage: the community of Western Europe.

5. Ecclesiastical . a group of men or women leading a common life according to a rule.

6. Ecology . an assemblage of interacting populations occupying a given area.

7. joint possession, enjoyment, liability, etc.: community of property.

8. similar character; agreement; identity: community of interests.

9. the community, the public; society: the needs of the community.

[SteveM]

69. Problems with your observations...

"They say that there are two kinds of people in a gunfight, those who knew there would be a gunfight, and those didn't. The latter almost always loses. It just happens too fast, and how about if she had been able to draw, nervously, in a crowd firing back wild? Or if anyone else had.

So, this demonstrates that carrying guns for general self-defense, out of paranoia when there's no specific threat present is of limited or no good.

Now, people have a right to keep and bear arms, and they have a right to defend themselves, but 2nd Amendment proponents are not extremely truthful about the consequences of this. Whatever its drawbacks, gun control does have some advantages based on facts."
________________

In the case of assassination, the attacker usually does have the upper hand. However, if some in Ms. Gifford's entourage had been carrying (I rather suspect they weren't), the number of casualties would have been fewer. There are numerous examples of where people have thwarted attacks on their selves and others, even when the assailants were armed with crime aforethought. This forum is replete with them.

I see you have offered no specifics with regards gun-control. How can anyone be "extremely truthful" or take positions "based on facts" without specific proposals? You have set for yourself some idealistic goals, but show us nothing that will get us there.

[caseymoz]

91. I'm told Gifford herself was armed.

Maybe I was misinformed about it, but that was my main reason for bringing up that point.

What I would need to be anything but skeptical about anecdotes of gun success stories (which BTW, might be just a part of a sales/marketing pitch and eighty percent manufactured) are statistics: how often does carrying a gun prevent/stop a crime? What's the success/failure rate? How do armed victims fare compared to unarmed ones? Are people who are armed less likely to be victims of crimes, compared to unarmed victims?

Really, not one gun advocate I've talked to has cited any studies that give those stats.

I'm not making proposals on gun control. First, I know it won't happen, no matter what I propose.

I just don't like people saying that our having available guns doesn't have consequences. Just like having automobiles has consequences.

[GreenStormCloud]

71. It would also lead to an increase in crime.

People use guns to defend themselves against criminals.

[aikoaiko]

87. I think its safe to say that all freedoms can be exploited by malicious people

But it is a choice as to how much we curtail our freedoms.

[Francis Marion]

89. Benefit of Second Amendment :

The mass of the American People won't be
worked to death,
gassed,
starved to death in engineered famines,
or otherwise preyed upon by those who are armed- quite unlike well over one hundred million people in the twentieth century.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_genocide

I am saddened to learn of any person's death, and angered by this crime, but because of the Second Amendment, most of us will die of natural causes.

The criminal has already paralyzed our government.

Will we allow him to disarm us also?

Instead of understanding or protecting the Bill of Rights, people clamor to p*ss on it instead.

[KansasVoter]

103. LOL, you really think you need to protect yourself against the government?

In the last 100 years when has that been true?
In the next 50, your lifetime, do you think you will need to?
It is wacko talk like this from you that makes people think gun owners are unstable.
People LIKE YOU make me want to own a gun, not the government.
You scare me as much as the shooter. Do you stock up on food also? Ready to kill your neighbor if he needs food?

[Kennah]

106. You mean that you don't ...

... see any similarities between the Nazi Party in 1930s Germany and the Tea Party movement in present day America?

[KansasVoter]

107. No, I don't. But I am not looking as hard as others. And not wanting it to happen.

[Kennah]

108. I too am not wanting it to happen; however ...

...

2008 - RW people shouting about Obama and at supporters

2010 - RW people assaulting Democratic supporters

2011 - First couple of weeks, two USPS attacks, and the shooting of a Congresswoman.

Things are spinning outta control.

[Francis Marion]

112. We're fairly mild by world standards

Until our city streets furnish dozens of decapitated, brutally tortured corpses, like Baghdad or Juarez, we don't even know the meaning of the term political violence.

What has been called 'vitriolic rhetoric' cheapens that term also.

I remember reading an interview with a hard line Iranian theocrat who, when asked what should be done with respect to a competing political faction, said, (paraphrasing) '...we'll cut the heads off of some, and the tongues out of others,' -THAT is vitriolic rhetoric.

The Tucson crime was the product of ONE mentally ill criminal. Not a brigade of terrorists, not a death squad, not a secret police purge. To be clear, the Tucson crime is sickening and senseless.
But it's not an example of world class political violence, which is carried out to rational, willful purpose, and by many people. Tucson is one crazy man on one day, and the US is so delicate that it shut down our government, and provoked a misguided 'reaction' to restrict the freedom of the American People. What a shame that one criminal is allowed to do damage to our nation, far beyond the families and loved ones he murdered.

This is the time to protect the Bill of Rights, not gut it.

We don't need a 'Patriot Act' for the Second Amendment.

[Francis Marion]

111. If you have an ear to hear...(or a word to the wise is probably not sufficient...)

Because your home was not robbed recently, it will never be robbed, thus you don't need to have a lock on your front door.

Because you haven't had a fire recently, your home will never burn and you don't need to have a fire extinguisher. And besides, the only reason you want to have a fire extinguisher is because you're just hoping- praying- that your home will catch fire. Or your neighbor's will; you're just counting the seconds till then. Sicko, wacko. Scary firebug!

And because you haven't lived under an authoritarian government, you never will.

You have no idea why the Second Amendment exists: It is the chief attribute which distinguished a free person from a slave, from a genocide candidate.

Do you deny that over 100 million human beings were murdered BY AUTHORITARIAN GOVERNMENTS in the past 100 years?

Your world of privilege and illusion must exclude history to sustain itself.

Who could have predicted the state murder epidemics before 1915? 1917? Before 1933? Before 1975?
1994?

Black Americans lived without the Second Amendment here for two centuries. How's that for a test laboratory? Were they better off or worse off given the means to defend themselves?

You disrespect human rights by denying people the right to defend themselves. Over a hundred million people needed to exercise that right in the last 100 years alone.

How thankful that OUR human rights don't depend upon your peculiar prejudice.

Go ahead leave your front door unlocked, throw away your fire extinguiser (only the Fire Department 'NEEDS' one of those, anyway) and leave our Human Rights the hell alone.

[one-eyed fat man]

105. You can easily test a couple things

"Would he have had the money for such a good weapon on the black market? I don't know if he paid this way, but they don't generally take credit cards there. Would he have had the contacts to get one?

Assuming you are not "420 friendly" yourself, ask one of your doper buddies to ask the dude he buys his weed from if he can get him a gun. Odds are a dollar to a donut he has one or two he has taken in trade.

In England, where the violent crime rate is higher than the United States, gun crime is rare, although since 1998, the BBC reports that the number of people injured by firearms in England and Wales increased by 110%" while the newspapers report "Gun crime doubles in a decade"

Gangs in London have no trouble getting guns from the former East Bloc. The scale of the illegal gun trade is so great that the Lithuanian police joke that their criminals joined the European Union long before the rest of the country. Baikal: the gangsters' gun

And what do the English gangs bring to the criminal enterprise? They are the link that gets Columbian cocaine into eastern Europe in return for guns.

You pass your ban and in Arizona it might become easier to get a real AK-47 from Guatemala or Nicaragua via the trafficante than some semi-auto ban compliant imitation.

It wouldn't be the first time the Law of Unintended Consequences has exerted its influence.