Whither Gun Control

[John S.]

More police officers die fromn high cap hagazines than homeowners run out of ammo?? WRONG!!! If a police officer dies, its because the perp hits him or her with one or two bullets. Hi cap mags are irrelevant. On the news, the latest police officer to die was sitting in his car catching up on his paperwork and some **** did a drive by with a shotgun.

 

[1sttruck]

Using the Uniform Crime Rate data I looked at shall issue states vs not for overall crime, violent crime, and murder. Rates are per 100,000 of population. 'yes/no' means the 'yes' rate divided by the 'no' rate for comparison, likewise for 'new/old'. I used three year period averages in an attempt to minimize some year to year variation, and just used the first and last periods of the data set. United States, UCR, overall crime rates shall 72-76 00-02 new/old issue no 4605 3768 82% yes 4002 4443 111% yes/no 87% 118% Even though the no rates were higher in 72-76, the yes is 18% higher in 00-02; the no decreased while the yes increased. United States, UCR, violent crime rates shall 72-76 00-02 new/old issue no 481 504 105% yes 369 500 135% yes/no 77% 99% Even though the no was higher in 72-76, the no is almost the same as yes in 00-02; the no increased 5% while the yes increased 35%. United States, UCR, murder rates shall 72-76 00-02 new/old issue no 8.5 5.4 64% yes 10.2 5.7 56% yes/no 120% 105% The yes is 20% higher in 72-76 but only 5% higher in 00-02; the yes while starting higher shows more decrease.

 

[Vuarra]

Gun control or not, this set of arguments has gotten me scared crapless about my plans of visiting the US for a weekend coming up. Gun control or not, I have no way of knowing if my family will be blown away for being in the wrong place at the wrong time ANYWHERE in the USA. Gun control or not, kids are still blowing each other to kingdom come in street fights. Gun control or not, there are children who unintentionally kill themselves or other children from home firearms. Gun control or not, this is a problem with perception. Why are there more killings (whether homocide or murder... I don't think I'll care about the legal difference when I'm on the coroner's slab) in the US than in Canada, even in AB or SK, where guns are more common. AS CSNY sung, "Teach your children well". And teach other people's children as well... it may not be your job, but if you can teach someone not to be a criminal (...only criminals would have guns etc.) you'll have a better economy and life. Just my two cents.

 

[jason07-1zzfe]

Hahaha Thanks for the laugh. You made my day. Seriously, if your feelings are genuine...GOOD,oh well...maybe an enemy would think twice before invading or even our own gov't before trying something stupid for that reason. Even though I don't believe it, I think you're goofy... ONLY time I was ever scared of being shot was driving through the projects. You think they get their guns legally? To the person that said Japanese children are tought how not to get shot: What does that mean? I don't understand. Is that like in the movie The Matrix? [ June 08, 2004, 10:48 AM: Message edited by: Jason Troxell ]

 

[jason07-1zzfe]

BTW, I seems to recall several school killings a la Columbine occuring in Europe as well. Hmmm. Don't think it has anything to do with guns. How about not raising ******* children, letting TV raise them and doping them with drugs instead of doing some parenting??

 

[ALS]

Over the last twenty years Japan has seen their own version of U.S. Liberalism and the Hollywood Left's version of the ideal life and Guess what you get? Violence. This type of behavior was unheard of before the liberals hit the Island. The old Japanese history of a strong family and honor is now gone. It's the Me, me, me generation. Japanese Child Faces Juvenile Trial In Girl's Slashing Death POSTED: 11:20 am EDT June 8, 2004 TOKYO -- An 11-year-old girl will face a juvenile trial at a family court in southern Japan on charges of killing her classmate with a box-cutter, authorities announced Tuesday. Court officials decided to put her on trial after reviewing the case, a Nagasaki prefecture Family Court spokesman said. Under Japanese law, she will not be tried for criminal responsibility because she is under 14. The sixth-grader has been in juvenile detention since last week, when she allegedly led 12-year-old Satomi Mitarai to an empty classroom during their lunch hour, slit her neck and arms with a box-cutter, and left her to bleed to death. Investigators believe the two had exchanged nasty messages over the Internet. The court sessions will be closed and the girl's name will not be released because she is a juvenile. The panel of three judges could decide to place her in a juvenile correctional facility. It was unclear how long she might have to stay. Kyodo New agency said court proceedings would be completed by June 29, unless psychological tests are ordered. The decision came on the third anniversary of a killing that shocked Japan, when a man entered the grounds of an elementary school and stabbed eight children to death. Memorials of that rampage and a letter written by Satomi's devastated father dominated news reports Tuesday. "The belief that a school is, and must be, the safest place (for children) is crumbling," Education Minister Takeo Kawamura told reporters. "More has to be done to prevent these incidents." The letter written by Kyoji Mitarai, 54, expressing his loss and confusion since his daughter's June 1 killing, was published on the front pages of national newspapers. "Why aren't you here? That's what I can't understand," he wrote, reminiscing about how his daughter had been the one to cheer him up after her mother died from illness three years ago. "Where are you? Have you seen your mother yet? Where are you playing now?" said the letter. The homeroom teacher who found Satomi has since been hospitalized for trauma, and children at Okubo Elementary School, in Sasebo, 650 miles southwest of Tokyo, are undergoing counseling. Increased juvenile crime and violence at schools in recent years has eroded Japan's image as a safe haven. Last July, a 12-year-old boy in Nagasaki -- a city just north of Sasebo -- was accused of kidnapping, molesting and murdering a 4-year-old by shoving him off a roof. In 1997, a 14-year-old beheaded an 11-year-old neighbor. Police statistics show that while violent crime, like murder and robbery, among children under age 14 is still low, it is on the rise.

 

[Vuarra]

Glad I made your day

quote:

---

Don't think it has anything to do with guns. How about not raising ******* children, letting TV raise them and doping them with drugs instead of doing some parenting??

---

I'll agree with you on that. However, my (genuine) fear of going to the US is based on Buffalo news and US movies. If that explains anything, please let me know .

 

[1sttruck]

If 'bad parenting' is really the cause of our ills we're in trouble because it's a common problem, and having lots of guns laying around in households with 'bad parents' isn't going to make the situation any better. Looking at school shootings, they're still happening but they're buried in the back pages now in an attempt to minimize copy cat shootings, almost all of the guns that the kids obtained came from their 'law abiding gun owner' households. A notable exception was Columbine, where the firearms were purchased at a gun show by an older friend of the killers, but as I recall the buyer wasn't prosecuted as no laws were broken. Guns don't jump off of shelves and shoot people, people shoot people, but also don't buy into the common circular argument of: 1. We need firearms to protect ourselves. 2. We demand the right to sell firearms to who we please. 3. Uh oh, a bunch of bad guys bought firearms. 4. We need firearms to protect ourselves...

 

[jason07-1zzfe]

quote:

---

Originally posted by ALS: ...The decision came on the third anniversary of a killing that shocked Japan, when a man entered the grounds of an elementary school and stabbed eight children to death. ...

---

Interesting, mass killing without a gun. I think we need to make knives illegal.

 

[jason07-1zzfe]

quote:

---

Originally posted by 1sttruck: ..and having lots of guns laying around in households with 'bad parents' isn't going to make the situation any better. ...

---

You're right, we need the government to save us!! And now! So say we live in a "Utopia" with no guns, this will prevent the school violence? The evidence from Japan points otherwise. [ June 09, 2004, 11:26 AM: Message edited by: Jason Troxell ]

 

[Chris B.]

quote:

---

Originally posted by 1sttruck: If 'bad parenting' is really the cause of our ills we're in trouble because it's a common problem, and having lots of guns laying around in households with 'bad parents' isn't going to make the situation any better. Looking at school shootings, they're still happening but they're buried in the back pages now in an attempt to minimize copy cat shootings, almost all of the guns that the kids obtained came from their 'law abiding gun owner' households. A notable exception was Columbine, where the firearms were purchased at a gun show by an older friend of the killers, but as I recall the buyer wasn't prosecuted as no laws were broken. Guns don't jump off of shelves and shoot people, people shoot people, but also don't buy into the common circular argument of: 1. We need firearms to protect ourselves. 2. We demand the right to sell firearms to who we please. 3. Uh oh, a bunch of bad guys bought firearms. 4. We need firearms to protect ourselves...

---

1sttruck, We do need firearms to protect ourselves and who are you or anyone to deny me that right. My wife has a CCP and last summer she used her hand gun to stop a man who tried to assault her. There was a very good chance she would have been raped and maybe killed. I thank God she had a gun and knew how to use it that day! My Mother back in the 70's was mugged 2 times in the New York subways and my Father got her a gun and she was never mugged again! I'm so glad it is not up to you who gets to have guns in this country. It is the gun grabbers and liberals like you that want a disarmed public "to make it safe" . Our Forefathers gave us the 2nd ammendment for many good reasons. I'm a proud NRA member, gun owner, hunter, competive target shooter and freedom enthusiast and will fight your kind till the day I die and so will millions of other gun owners! P.S. My dozzen or so firearmes have never been used in a crime and never will!

 

[1sttruck]

Chris B. said "I'm so glad it is not up to you who gets to have guns in this country. It is the gun grabbers and liberals like you that want a disarmed public "to make it safe". Our Forefathers gave us the 2nd ammendment for many good reasons. I'm a proud NRA member, gun owner, hunter, competive target shooter and freedom enthusiast and will fight your kind till the day I die and so will millions of other gun owners! " You have no idea who I am, or what positions I do support. What you've pretty much seen in this thread so far are my objections to the typical falsehoods bandied about in 'gun threads', and in doing so I've made an effort to provide credible data and sources. I use to be an NRA member but I let my membership drop around the same time that Bush Sr did, when he objected to the NRA using the term 'jack booted thugs' when speaking of federal officers. I'm a former high power shooter, I still plink with the kids, but have never been much of hunter. The vast majority of gun owners in this country are not members of the NRA. From 'Outdoor Life' a few years back: http://www.outdoorlife.com/hunting/gunsbowsammo/ shootingrot.html Rot and Evil In the Universe of Firearms by David Petzal All is not well in the universe of firearms, and what follows is sure not going to help matters any. Andy Rooney has come to fame and fortune whining at us about what bothers him. So, as an aspiring curmudgeon, why shouldn't I give it a try? Here's what currently cheeses me off in the wonderful world of guns. l. The trend toward super-powerful long-range cartridges. I have no problem with these colossal rounds until people take them out and shoot at game at genuinely long range. In order to learn to shoot at long range, you have to practice at long range, and there are very few places you can do this. Moreover, there are very few shooters willing to practice at any range. The result of people slinging lead from half a mile is going to be missed game, wounded game, and an even worse image for hunters than we already enjoy. 3. The NRA, for not endorsing President Bush in 1992 on the grounds that he was not wholeheartedly in support of them. It was a very close election, and if more NRA members had voted for Bush, we might have been spared the most anti-gun President in our history. On the other hand, we might also have missed out on Monica Lewinsky. 6. Gun owners who leave firearms and ammo where kids can get at them. No comment necessary. 7. Varmint shooters who wear those nifty T-shirts that show exploding prairie dogs and other animals and carry catchy slogans like "The Red Mist." Friends, I have news for you. There are a lot of people who are not thrilled with the wholesale shooting of varmints, and not a few of them are hunters. Forgive me for suggesting that you curb your right to self-expression, but your T-shirts are not helping any of us. 9. All the yahoos who believe that Article II gives them the right to act like jerks in public, preferably when the media is present. Maybe it's not just shooters and hunters; maybe we're a less polite society generally, but I can't recollect when a group of people has come off so poorly. I've gone to local meetings where the antis looked respectable (though a few of them were visibly fighting down hysteria); but the hunters and shooters looked like the local **** 's Angels chapter had interbred with a pack of baboons-and they acted like it. The same with letters and phone calls. You may think politeness is dead, but I have news for you: There have been a lot of foul mouths speaking for Article II, and now we're paying for them. 10. Members of the entertainment industry who publicly deplore guns but who glorify violence in their work, thus leading the half-bright among their audiences to emulate what they see on the screen. But with real consequences. Take a bow, folks. -------------------------------------------

 

[ALS]

MOURNING IN AMERICA Reagan pulled gun on mugger to save woman As young Iowa sportscaster, 'the Gipper' confronted would-be robber with .45 Posted: June 9, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern "Leave her alone or I'll shoot you right between the shoulders!" A line from a Clint Eastwood movie or other classic Western? Or a tough-guy line from a cop show? No. It's Ronald Reagan – not as a movie star, but in real life – facing down a bad guy as a young man, just as he did later in life with various world leaders, tyrants and dictators. More than 70 years ago, as IowaChannel.com reports, long-time Iowa resident Melba King was a 22-year-old nursing student. The year was 1933, and on a hot, humid autumn night, as Melba was strolling home in downtown Des Moines, she felt a gun in her back. A mugger had stolen up behind her and was demanding money. But someone was watching out for Melba – a young Des Moines radio sportscaster named Ronald Wilson Reagan who had overheard the confrontation and immediately sprang to her rescue. Reagan pointed a .45-caliber revolver at the would-be robber from the window of the second-story rented room he lived in. "And he said, 'Leave her alone or I'll shoot you right between the shoulders,'" King recently told KCCI-TV." The scared mugger ran off, and Reagan went out to comfort King and walk her home. "You stay right where you are, and I'll go get my robe and slippers and walk over with you," the youthful Reagan told her, according to King's vivid recollection. Decades passed. The next time King saw Reagan was more than 50 years later, in 1984, when Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad asked her to attend a Republican campaign event. Embracing on stage, Reagan laughed as he quipped to the audience and King: "This is the first time I've had a chance to tell you – the gun was empty! I didn't have any cartridges! If he hadn't run when I told him to, I was going to have to throw it at him!" Staying in touch over the years, King's and Reagan's families exchanged birthday and Christmas cards, and comforted one another during hard times. "The Reagans helped King when she lost her husband Harold in 1987," said the Iowa news outlet, "and now she will send Nancy Reagan a sympathy note." [ June 09, 2004, 07:04 PM: Message edited by: ALS ]

 

[Vuarra]

A while back, I posted about my fears regarding entering the US because of guns. For the most part, I was pleasantly surprised about the society. Even after taking a wrong turn in Cleveland and ending up in a rougher part of town, I saw absolutely no firearms. However, I certainly had a little bit of a shock at signs at just about every retail establishment saying that firearms were illegal inside said place. That has to be the biggest difference between Canada and the US. I took a seat in a GTO whilst I was down there, and I have to say that I'll have to gain about 20 lbs before I'd feel that it had great side bolsters. The salesperson saw we drove in with Ontario licence plates, so he rather denied us a drive. Vuarra