Some facts about guns in the US

[billvon]

Why does your right to feel comfortable outweigh my right to choose how I defend myself?

It doesn't. But your right to feel like you are safe does not outweigh the rights of your neighbors to not be killed. Thus the tradeoffs represented by gun laws.

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Manslaughter charges against man who fired through floor
July 04, 2012

A Gary man has been charged with firing a shot through the floor and killing a 62-year-old man who was sleeping in a bedroom below, police said.

Jamalh Nelson, 32, was arrested earlier this week by the Great Lake Regional Task Force and identified by witnesses, police said. He was charged with involuntary manslaughter and unlawful use of a weapon.

Nelson was drinking in an upstairs apartment in the 600 block of West 60th Street when he fired a shot into the floor on Nov. 12 last year, police said. The bullet struck Dewitt Wright in the shoulder as he lay in bed in the room below, police said. Wright later died.
============

 

[pjdude1219]

Yet Gun Control Advocates would use similar tactics. Comparing countries with liberal gun ownership vs countries that outlaw the weapon. Then they cherry pick their data wanting only to compare just gun related homicides and almost always use totals instead of the rate per hundred.


Why does your right to feel comfortable outweigh my right to choose how I defend myself?

It's not my want to be confer table against your right to defense it my right to be and feel safe against your want of a gun. Your gross mischarcterzation of the issue and laws does change the underlying facts

 

[pjdude1219]

Well the most recent analysis of that study has shown that he was indeed correct and their mocking was unjustified. The problem with searching for ways to counter an argument is that some sides forget to check to see if anyone else has countered their counter. I actually checked everything out and Lott was upheld by independent research and analysis a little over five years ago. Since then the people who have claimed Lott was wrong have not tried to refute the newer research and the analysis of their errors.

Still lying. No evidence has ever shown him to be correct.

 

[Cowboy]

I suppose you are with people like Mike Huckabee, who says that God is prevented from doing anything about killers, because we fail to kiss his ass enough.

There were no school shootings in the Holy Roman Empire, you know.

 

[Cowboy]

This goes back to the cost in human lives to buy the right to "be ready" for the return of King George III.

Or King Obama I, or King [Whoever Is Next].

Funny how so many liberals were screaming about fascism when Bush was president, yet simultaneously insist that the need to resist oppressive government is a thing of the distant past.

 

[Cowboy]

I note that the discussion has digressed to 'liberals' vs. 'conservatives' again. I find it most unfortunate that we cannot just be practical, moderate and common - sensible about the issue.

Last week, here in Detroit, 2 shootings caught our attention. The first: a 70 year old basketball coach escorts 2 of the Martin Luther King high school girls basketball team from the school to their cars in the parking lot after practice. 2 teen aged boys (1 an 11th grade student at that school) jump them in the parking lot, pull pistols and demand money. 1 grabs the gold chain around the coaches neck. The coach pulled a pistol and shot both boys. The 11th grader died at the scene, the other "suspect" is in critical condition at hospital. The coach is a police reserve officer (required to carry his weapon at all times) and has a license to carry the pistol.

Meanwhile, at a bus stop a distance away, a fellow waiting for a bus was approached by an armed man who demanded his valuables. Instead of his wallet he produced a firearm and killed the robber. He was also licensed to carry the weapon.

I see good points on both retaining second amendment rights AND restricting the type of weapons available to pretty much anyone along common sense lines. Single shot muzzle loaders were the most sophisticated firearms on the planet when the constitution was written, this needs to be taken into serious consideration in this discussion. We need to throw in some minimal barriers to criminals obtaining firearms as well - merely check anyone who wants to own a firearm, like we do with cars. It would be a good idea to keep real close tabs on sociopathic people with known violent tendencies even if that bordered on invasion of their privacy for the practical purpose of protecting society.

Single shot muzzle-loaders were the most advanced firearm in the world at the time the Constitution was written. This tells me that the Founding Fathers had no problem with Americans owning "military style" weapons.

 

[pjdude1219]

Or King Obama I, or King [Whoever Is Next].

Funny how so many liberals were screaming about fascism when Bush was president, yet simultaneously insist that the need to resist oppressive government is a thing of the distant past.

no liberal has ever said that. that is a srawman at best a flat out lie at worst.

 

[keems]

I live in one of those pink zones, I wonder what that suggests about humanity? I wish not to say .

Still though its a bad world out there.

 

[Tiassa]

But It's Not Really Gun Control ....

But It's Not Really Gun Control ....

While many seem to think the idea of a government devising firearms regulations with an eye toward crime, justice, and public safety is an abomniable offense against human freedom, a gun seller in Arizona has reminded us that, really, it's just about feeling empowered.

The owner of a Tucson gun store where Mark Kelly recently purchased an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle canceled the transaction because Kelly did not plan to keep the rifle for his personal use.

Doug MacKinlay, owner of Diamondback Police Supply at 170 S. Kolb Road, posted on the store’s Facebook page Monday that he canceled the transaction March 21. A full refund was sent to Kelly via express mail, MacKinlay said.

“I determined that it was in my company’s best interest to terminate this transaction prior to his returning to my store to complete the Federal Form 4473 and NICS (National Instant Criminal Background Check System) required of Mr. Kelly before he could take possession of this firearm,” MacKinlay said in the statement.

(Duarte)​

See, the government shouldn't decide who can buy what weapon for legal purposes; that power should be reserved to the political whims of store owners.

But it's not really gun control. It's just gun nuts being, well, nutty. Welcome to Arizona.
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Notes:

Duarte, Carmen. "Tucson gun store owner cancels Mark Kelly's AR-15 purchase". The Arizona Daily Star. March 25, 2013. AZStarNet.com. March 26, 2013. http://azstarnet.com/news/local/tuc...cle_65e90fa2-95a8-11e2-89fd-0019bb2963f4.html

 

[Tiassa]

Responsible Gun Ownership

Responsible Gun Ownership

As the gun violence debate burns from coast to coast, we must remember to take care to not punish responsible gun owners. Yet, what is a responsible gun owner?

It might be a tough answer, but when we're asking the question about law enforcement officers, perhaps there's a problem:

Authorities say a 4-year-old boy grabbed a loaded gun at a family cookout and accidentally shot and killed the wife of a Tennessee sheriff's deputy.

Investigators say Wilson County Deputy Daniel Fanning on Saturday was showing his weapons to a relative in a bedroom of his Lebanon home when the toddler came in and picked up a gun off the bed. Sheriff Robert Bryan says the weapon discharged, hitting 48-year-old Josephine Fanning.

She was pronounced dead at the scene. The child is not related to her or her husband.

Bryan says the shooting was a terrible accident and that within seconds of Fanning placing the gun on the bed, the toddler picked it up.

(Burke)​

On the up side, we can note that the firearm was not Deputy Fanning's service weapon; the AP reports, "the sheriff says the deputy's weapons are normally stored in a safe".

Oh, good.

Within seconds.

Let me guess, this was, in a morbid coincidence, the only one of the firearms that was loaded?

No, seriously. Within seconds.

It just seems there is something self-evident here.

• • •​

Meanwhile, in Toms River, New Jersey, authorities are trying to figure out how a four year-old playing outside managed to go into his house, obtain a .22 rifle, and shoot a six year-old, all while the shooter's parents were home.

​

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Notes:

Burke, Sheila. "Boy, 4, accidentally kills Tenn. deputy's wife". Associated Press. April 8, 2013. HuffingtonPost.com. April 9, 2013. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20130408/us-accidental-shooting-4-year-old/

Associated Press and Huffington Post. "2 Shootings Involve 4-Year-Olds In 3 Days". The Huffington Post. April 9, 2013. HuffingtonPost.com. April 9, 2013. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/09/gun-violence-children-shooters_n_3044642.html

 

[Tiassa]

Responsible Gun Ownership: Terrible Twos Edition

Responsible Gun Ownership: Terrible Twos Edition

Authorities in Tennessee said they responded to a call late Sunday morning reporting a woman was shot. Reika Kidd, 22, remains in fair condition after being shot by her two year-old son. Sheriff Andy Dickinson said that the youngster found a handgun belonging to Ms. Kidd's boyfriend and discharged it.

"The gun belonged to her signficant other who sleeps with it under his pillow," Dickson said. "He told us that he usually locks it up in the morning, but didn't on that day."

(Cheshier)​

Say it with me: Every gun owner is a responsible gun owner until he or she isn't.

Because this stupid misfortune gets even more stupid:

Dickson said in the investigation, officers determined that Kidd, her two-year-old, a three-week old baby and Jamal Gray, her partner, were all sleeping in the same bedroom.​

As we might imagine, the district attorney is considering whether or not to file charges, and the Department of Children's Services has undertaken an investigation of the children's welfare.
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Notes:

Cheshier, Tajuana. "Carroll County mother recovers in Memphis hospital after her 2-year-old son accidentally shoots her in abdomen". The Jackson Sun. April 9, 2013. JacksonSun.com. April 10, 2013. http://www.jacksonsun.com/article/2...-year-old-son-accidentally-shoots-her-abdomen

 

[Tiassa]

Update: Brandon Holt, 6, Has Died

Update: Brandon Holt, 6, Has Died

Note: This updates #250 above. The link associated to the shooting of Brandon Holt reported while the boy was still alive.​

A six year-old boy named Brandon Holt is dead in Toms River, New Jersey after his four year-old neighbor shot him in the head with a .22 caliber rifle.

Brandon had been sitting in a all-terrain vehicle about 15 yards away from his house when he was shot once by a 4-year-old playmate, Mastronardy said. The boy's father immediately secured the .22-caliber gun while the mother called 911.

"Unfortunately, it's a tragic accident," Mastronardy said. "Right now, what we want to concentrate (on) is working with the family and helping them through this difficult time."

Whether the boy actually pulled the gun's trigger or it accidentally discharged remains under investigation, Mastronardy said.

But how a 4-year-old child was able to gain access to a loaded gun was the question that was on the minds of many Tuesday and one that authorities did not answer.

(Panissidi and Loder)​

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Notes:

Panissidi, Anthony and Stephane Loder. "Police: N.J. boy, 6, dies after being shot by 4-year-old". Asbury Park Press. April 10, 2013. APP.com. April 10, 2013. http://www.app.com/article/20130409/NJNEWS/304090081/toms-river-boy-shot

 

[Fraggle Rocker]

Funny how so many liberals were screaming about fascism when Bush was president, yet simultaneously insist that the need to resist oppressive government is a thing of the distant past.

None of us called Bush a fascist. He was a retard (diagnosed with pre-senile dementia) who couldn't speak in complete sentences. And he was a traitor (lied to us about Saddam being the perpetrator of 9/11 so we wouldn't realize it was the Saudis, his family's buddies in the energy industry). And he was just plain incompetent (he appointed a Controller of the Currency who was so poorly suited to the job that he wasn't paying attention to the subprime mortgage fiasco and therefore didn't order his bank examiners to shut down any bank that was dealing them). But he was no fascist.

I agree that oppressive government has not faded away. But anybody who thinks they'll be able to overturn it with guns is deluded. For starters, have you seen the weapons the government has??? You and the AK-47 you hug in your sleep will last exactly five seconds in a confrontation with that hardware. They've got drones that can find you and shoot you in the dark without any of their people even having to climb out of their bunkers!

But more important, the next war (whether it's a civil war, a religious war, or an old-fashioned war between two countries) will be fought in cyberspace. Guns are obsolete for everybody except street criminals and crazies.

 

[Tiassa]

Today In Things That Make No Sense

Today In Things That Make No Sense

Brendan O'Brien for Reuters:

A Texas man used a gun to commit suicide in the infield of a National Rifle Association-sponsored NASCAR race at the Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth late on Saturday, local authorities said ....

.... Franklin was involved in a verbal altercation with other race spectators before the incident, said Daniel Segura, a Fort Worth Police Department spokesman.

Franklin's body was found in the back seat of a truck, according to an online police report.​

No, really, I got nothin'.
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Notes:

O'Brien, Brendan. "Texas man commits suicide with gun at NRA Sprint Cup race". Reuters. April 14, 2013. Reuters.com. April 14, 2013. http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/04/15/us-usa-nascar-suicide-idUSBRE93E00S20130415

 

[Buddha12]

No matter how well you write gun laws, no matter how much education you can give there will always be accidents, suicides and murders with guns so this debate can and will go on forever and deaths will continue no matter how many laws are enacted and how long discussions are kept up.

 

[joepistole]

Whatever the solution is it should have a reasonable chance at preventing the recent mass murders. And frankly, I have yet to see a proposal that would have prevented any of the recent mass murders. In order to prevent those murders we would need to confiscate weapons. And I don’t think the country has the will to confiscate all guns or the political will to spend the money confiscating weapons. There are some 311 million guns out there in the hands of private individuals.

According to Wikipedia only 384 people were murdered in 2010 with riffles. Six thousand deaths were attributed to hand guns in 2010. And about 2k deaths were attributed to be from an unreported gun type. Contrast that to the number of auto deaths (32k). Why are we so focused on riffles when they only account for a few hundred deaths every year? Keep in mind that our population is well over 300 million people.

We have had more than a half century of gun regulation in this country. After every mass murder, we go through this exercise. Unfortunately it has become routine and very predictable. We pass some feel good legislation and we delude ourselves until the next mass murder event involving guns.

Personally, I don’t think the solution lies in banning stuff. Banning stuff has not solved our illegal drug problem. Banning stuff didn’t solve our problems with alcohol abuse (e.g. Prohibition). Banning abortions didn’t prevent abortions and you can go on and on. I think our solution has to be a bit more sophisticated and must be multifaceted. If we really want to get serious about gun violence, we don’t need more useless solutions. We need a solution that works, that really does reduce gun violence.

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

 

[Tiassa]

Character Building?

The American Heritage

Sadness:

Authorities in southern Kentucky say a 2-year-old girl has been accidentally shot and killed by her 5-year-old brother, who was playing with a .22-caliber rifle he received as a gift.

Kentucky State Police said the toddler was shot just after 1 p.m. CDT Tuesday in Cumberland County and was taken to a nearby hospital, where she was later pronounced dead.

Cumberland County Coroner Gary White told the Lexington Herald-Leader that the children's mother was at home at the time.

White told the newspaper that the boy received the rifle made for youths last year and is used to shooting it. He said the gun was kept in a corner and the family didn't realize a shell was left inside it.

White said the shooting will be ruled accidental.

(Associated Press)​

An unspeakable tragedy, a fare owed for a journey toward freedom, a lamb sacrificed to the heartland values of Middle America, and a complete shock.

We could never have seen this coming.

Oh, wait, wait, wait. Yes, we could.

Start 'em young; it builds character. They need to learn that Liberty is not free.
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Notes:

Associated Press. "2-Year-Old Girl Shot, Killed By 5-Year-Old Brother With Rifle He Recieved As A Gift". Talking Points Memo. May 1, 2013. TalkingPointsMemo.com. May 1, 2013. http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/girl-shot-killed-by-brother-with-rifle-he-recieved-as-a-gift.php

 

[Tiassa]

What Could Ever Go Wrong?

Good News/Bad Stupid News

There's always room for Jell-o.

Never mind.

There's always room for good news, like: Nobody is dead!

But then comes the bad news, or, rather, the stupid part. KOMO News explains:

A 9-year-old Auburn girl is recovering in a Seattle hospital after her 7-year-old brother accidentally shot her in the leg Wednesday night.

Auburn police say the kids were inside their home, located in the 4600 block of Auburn Way South, when the brother grabbed a .22 caliber rifle from another brother's closet.

At roughly 9:30 p.m., police arrived at the house and found the girl with a gunshot wound to the leg.

"He was playing with it, it was a loaded rifle and it went off," said Auburn Police Cmdr. Mike Hirman.​

The young lady is expected to recover completely.
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Notes:

KOMO Staff. "7-year-old Auburn boy accidentally shoots sister in the leg". KOMO News. May 1, 2013. KOMOnews.com. May 2, 2013. http://www.komonews.com/news/local/...tally-shoots-sister-in-the-leg-205721591.html

 

[iceaura]

None of us called Bush a fascist.

I sure did. And still do. That's the proper term for rightwing military/industrial authoritarianism, W's ideology, and the added dollop of mystical religion and myth based cultural propaganda just iced the cake

But then I never claimed that the need to resist an encroaching government, or cover for an incompetent one (fascist governments are seldom competent) was a thing of the past, either.

Thing is, such governments don't oppress by bringing in the heavy weapons, until it's too late anyway. What people faced with a fascist government need to fear is death squads, terrorist operations working deniably apart from some local government, the Klan, that kind of thing. And personal firearms do have a role there, at least in historical and cross cultural experience. There's a reason black people were systematically kept unarmed, in the Jim Crow south.

 

[Fraggle Rocker]

Six thousand deaths were attributed to hand guns in 2010.

I don't know where you got that, but it was not from Wikipedia. The article on gun deaths listed the USA with ten gun deaths per 100K population in 2010, which extends out to the universally acknowledged round number of thirty thousand deaths by gun violence annually. Guns now kill more Americans than road accidents. This means that for every American, there is a one percent probability that the cause of our death will be a gun.

Every gun in the country is three times more likely to be used (by the owner in a moment of anger, confusion or clumsiness, by an intruder who wrestles it away from the owner, by a burglar who steals it, or by a criminal he sells it to) to kill an innocent victim. It is also three times more likely to be used (by the owner, by a member of the owner's household, or by someone who bought it at a swap meet from the aforementioned burglar) to commit suicide. That makes six tragedies for every legitimate instance of self-defense.

In other words, every gun brought into this country makes each one of us a little bit less safe.

Why are we so focused on rifles when they only account for a few hundred deaths every year?

Because the deaths are so much more spectacular, they get more media attention.

I sure did. And still do. That's the proper term for rightwing military/industrial authoritarianism, W's ideology, and the added dollop of mystical religion and myth based cultural propaganda just iced the cake.

No it's not. The most concise definition of fascism is "resistance to transcendence." The original Fascisti in 1930s Italy, and then in the Third Reich where they were called National Socialists or "Nazis," were people who just wanted to keep things as they were. They saw the future and they were afraid of it.

Every conservative political movement that favors an aggressive military policy, a balance of political power in favor of the corporations, and the "ideology" (to use a polite word) of a man with pre-senile dementia who can't speak in complete sentences or remember the ending of an old homily like "Fool me once...", is not fascism.

Thing is, such governments don't oppress by bringing in the heavy weapons . . . .

As I noted earlier, the next war will be fought in cyberspace. The government doesn't need troops to oppress us. All they have to do is disable everybody's ATM card and the country will collapse into chaos in a week. Guns won't help anybody on either side.