BS: Anyone defend US gun law?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Greg F.
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 08:24 AM

One problem may be that for years many Europeans and others across the way thought of the US in terms of the Wild West as shown in the movies

A greater problem is the number of U.S. folks that STILL thnk of the present day U.S. in terms of the "Wild West" of the movies and behave accordingly.

Like the National Rifle Assassination, for instance.....

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,gillymor
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 08:58 AM

...and in another instance this jackass.
That this guy should be granted a carry permit is really discouraging and an indication of how far we have to go.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Greg F.
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 09:31 AM

Hey, that's FLORIDA - David Berkowitz could get a carry permit.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,gillymor
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 09:48 AM

Tell me about it, Greg. I live about 100 miles south of the locale of the most recent Zimmerman lunacy in one of FL's most conservative districts.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 12:18 PM

Still, you have to admire the intelligence of their weaponry, if they're able to form an Association all on their little selves. Most other people would form an Association of Riflemen. Probably says something about those who bear arms, dumber than their own guns!

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Rapparee
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 12:47 PM

Well, this group dates to 1859, and so the US was just following the lead of Mother England on November 17, 1871....

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Greg F.
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 12:59 PM

I think you'll find that the courses & objectives of the two organizations in question have diverged a bit since 1871, Rap.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 14 Sep 14 - 01:53 PM

In the USA, even the National Chamber of Commerce courses & objectives have changed from the original purposes. If an organization which begins as a reasonable interest group is co-opted by self-serving, greedy but clever marketers, it can be very hard to combat them and form counter groups. They use the rhetoric of their saner origins and distort the meanings until they are almost 180 degrees from the beginnings.

The NRA is a paradigm example.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 15 Sep 14 - 01:48 PM

Meanwhile, you can be the most lethal serial killer in history with a gun in your hand and another armed-to-the-teeth killer pal beside you and it still doesn't save you from getting what's coming to you at the hands of a fellow tooled-up psycho:

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/03/16823532-american-sniper-author-chris-kyle-fatally-shot-at-texas-gun-range

I hope the Iraqi resistance fighters who put a bounty on Kyle's head have the decency to pay up towards Routh's defence fund.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: olddude
Date: 15 Sep 14 - 02:36 PM

Jack you are a tool but you know that you creep

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 08:37 AM

How many guns does the US need
Before they call it a day?
Yes, and how many graves must the families weed
Before they're taken away?

The answer, my friend, is pissing in the wind
The answer is pissing in the wind

How many times must we post this again
Before OldDude learns he's wrong?
Yes, and how many times does someone feel the pain
Of someone killing their son?

The answer, my friend, is pissing in the wind,
The answer is pissing in the wind

Because if the US made love not war
Their women would be peeing themselves in the street,
The size of the dicks they once thought they saw
No more than a small stalk of wheat.

The answer, my friend, is pissing in the street
The answer is peeing in the road.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Rapparee
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 09:25 AM

I see that a guy in Holland shot up a courthouse today...and then there's that fella who shot up a museum recently....

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Greg F.
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 09:29 AM

And how do those incidents compare numerically with the cases of gun violence in the U.S., Rap?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Lighter
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 09:31 AM

Irony Ahead:

But since they're not Americans, they're just "exceptions that prove the rule."

End Irony.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: olddude
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 09:59 AM

Rahere yes but you should see how good the audience is when I play at the coffee shop :)

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: olddude
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 12:18 PM

According to my wife i am always wrong so I am use to it my friend

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Rapparee
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 05:18 PM

Zug: 14 dead; Tours, 4 dead, 10 wounded; Nanterre, 8 dead; Erfurt, 18 dead; Freising, 3 dead, 1 wounded; Turin, 7 dead; Madrid, 2 dead, 1 wounded; Emsdetten, 11 dead; Tuusula, 8 dead; Naples, 7 dead, 2 wounded; Kauhajoki, 10 dead; Winnenden, 15 dead; Lyon, 10 wounded; Athens, 3 dead, 2 wounded; Rotterdam, 3 dead, 1 wounded; Vienna, 1 dead, 15 wounded; Espoo, 4 dead; Cumbria, 12 dead...and then there's Utøya and Oslo: 77 dead and at least 209 wounded. Of course, that's not at all current.

Maybe if Europeans were allowed to pack heat these wouldn't have been so bad -- or they still would have happened, just as they might have in the US.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 05:43 PM

Rap, just makes the case even more firmly for not having guns, thank'ee.
In fact, your count is about 2 days' death count on a similar basis in the US - and those events go back up to fifteen years!

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Jeri
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 06:13 PM

If the UK has it right, why is your violent crime rate EIGHT TIMES that of the US?

I'd be happier if the likelihood nut jobs could get their hands on guns, and anybody could get their hands on assault weapons was reduced, but this whole "my country is better than yours" stuff is just stupid.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Greg F.
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 06:19 PM

If the UK has it right, why is your violent crime rate EIGHT TIMES that of the US?

Hunh? WHAT statistics RE: "Violent Crime" (whatever that is defined as)rate???

And what have firearms to do with it?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 07:56 PM

Only took 2.3 seconds to get an analysis of comparative violent crime rates.

There are other pages, but this one says:

"Due to fundamental differences in how crime is recorded and categorized, it's impossible to compute exactly what the British violent crime rate would be if it were calculated the way the FBI does it, but if we must compare the two, my best estimate‡ would be something like 776 violent crimes per 100,000 people. While this is still substantially higher than the rate in the United States, it's nowhere near the 2,034 cited by Swann and the Mail."

It is hard to compare when societies have different definitions and reporting systems. The UK seems to whack on each other more, but do less average damage.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Lighter
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 08:26 PM

> substantially higher than the rate in the United States...

So it's a good thing the savages *are* kept forcibly unarmed, isn't it?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,Stim
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 09:32 PM

One is inclined to think that if those in the UK had the kind of access to guns that we do in the US that everyone would be dead in a week. A month tops. Too bad, because we'd miss some of you;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Ebbie
Date: 16 Sep 14 - 10:23 PM

OK- how about a rueful shake of hands?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 01:58 AM

Jeri, nobody's saying "Our country's better than yours".

We're saying "Our gun laws are better than yours". The fact that your gun-death rate is 30 times higher than the UK's bears witness to that. We're also saying how frustrating it is that your redneck small-dicks like oldude, rapparee, Stim, lighter et al don't seem to have the intelligence to make the connection.

That's all - not difficult is it? Not for normal people at least.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Ebbie
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 03:41 AM

Frankly, I don't see a great deal of difference between dying of a gunshot or from a knife attack. If it had to be, I suspect I would prefer the shot.

What does make me laugh, however, is the notion that some here seem to hold that the UK is so much more civilised because it doesn't allow guns. It appears that, guns or no, you guys got a LOT of crime. What is so civilized about that?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 04:03 AM

Maybe we do, maybe we don't, Ebbie. I don't fell qualified to comment on that.

But what I do know is that much of our crime is very low-level stuff - shoplifting, driving offences etc.. Almost none of our crime involves firearms, or weapons of any sort - carrying what's classed as an offensive weapon (including guns, knives, baseball bats, hammers, screwdrivers, and a lot of other stuff) in the commission of a crime elevates that crime to the 'Aggravated' level, and will result in a doubling of the sentence, should the perp go to court.

And, compared with the US, a minuscule number of crimes here involve anyone being shot. There's a correlation there that only those who are either too stupid, or too wilful, are unable to get into their heads.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 04:18 AM

Something else worth bearing in mind is that much of our violent crime - shootings, stabbings, beatings etc. - involves attacks by gang-members on members of other gangs in our major cities, it's hardly ever a 'simple' robber/victim incident.

And murder is so unusual here that you can pretty much guarantee that every killing makes the front pages of our national newspapers! and is reported on national TV news - even more so if it's a shooting or a stabbing. I'm certain that's far from being the case in the US.

Although I argued with BillD over one silly issue of UK sovereignty, I'm in complete agreement with his views on changing laws. But, like many other UK-ers here, I'm frustrated by your political system which makes changing gun laws virtually impossible, by the seemingly meek acceptance over there that bringing change about is 'too difficult', and by the idiot small-dicks who think everything there is 'jest fine 'n' dandy y'all'.

Time to take my dog for a five-miler. Sleep tight.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Musket
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 04:21 AM

Jeri, you have a responsibility not to talk bollocks eh?

After all, if the zoo keepers eat with the chimps, the zoo will never make a profit.

Ebbie. Here's something for you. We don't have much crime at all over here by US measuring or we have far more. No idea which is accurate. Before spending time looking at health systems used by Kaiser Permanante and what we might learn from their primary care approach, I made a point of looking at other cooperation studies, and policing was one of them.

Whether US or UK has more or less of anything crime wise is not know and can't be because we measure so much of it differently.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 05:21 AM

One 'difference', Ebbie, is that anyone trying to run amok with a knife in a crowded mall would not get very far or have the chance to stab many people before being stopped & overpowered. With a gun, judging by #s of deaths involved in your innumerable instances of such, and our very few copycat ones like Hungerford & Dunblane*, that is a whole lot more difficult.

≈M

*Honestly can't think of any others

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 06:44 AM

Another point is that, if you're un-armed and someone comes at you with a knife, there's a chance of defending yourself, even of disarming the assailant (and before the smart-ass small-dicks come in trying to say it can't be done, I've done it).

If you're un-armed and somebody's banging away at you from 20 yards with a gun, automatic or not, you're fucked and you're toast.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 07:05 AM

As ever. Bill D refuses to examine his documents: if he had, he'd have realised the figures quoted are examined in those texts and show the comparatives are chalk and cheese.

When it comes to knife crimes, the sale and carriage of combat knives are legally limited in the UK to those with folding non-locking blades of under 3", with the result that these days most knife crime involves kitchen knives. Even the carriage of these is questionable, they always come zip-tied into sheathes for this very reason.

So suggesting that the UK simply sublimates the urge to violence into knife crime is equally wrong, and worse, a red-herring, as it's based on two wrongs making a right. Whether the UK has a knife problem or not has nothing at all to do with the US gun problem, and the refusal of the gun lobby to take responsibility for its actions. We are pointing the finger here, and saying that the next time you have a massacre, the supporters of the gun lobby here will be every whit as much responsible for it as the shooter. All it takes for evil to win is for good people to do nothing, which is exactly what has happened in the past, and which must stop now. We said so then, and we're saying so now, with the difference that in the past, we didn't personalise the responsibility for the risk. Now we are.

A similar lie was perpetrated a while back in reply to my comment that ammunition and explosives are not covered by the Second Amendment, claiming it is "natural" that the Amendment extends that far. I have nowever discovered ammunition growing on trees, so how can it be "natural"? The Amendment is "to bear arms", to carry weapons, not to shoot them: you can carry them as a club, and be issued with ammunition as your National authorities see fit.

Responsibility for a wrong is not something which is shareable between those responsible for it, it is something each and everyone who could have done something to stop it shares full responsibility for. In the UK, a charge of murder can be levied in its entire weight against every one who was part of the crew who killed someone, it is not "twenty years divided by twenty perps", it's twenty years each, or whatever the judge sees fit.

No, the Gun Lobby has definitively lost the case, and it might be a wise thing dfor the Principal of every school to write to the President of the NRA holding him contingently liable should any of the children in the school be injured. This ducking the blame must stop, can stop, and eventually will stop. The only question is how many innocents must die in the mean time.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 09:25 AM

BWM -- If I might point out: not "another point", but the same point I had just made, differently expressed.

Regards
≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Rapparee
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 09:40 AM

Ammunition not natural?

Lead is a rather common element. I can make potassium nitrate (saltpeter) in my back yard from old shit (literally, old shit) and sulfur is found in the volcanic remains near here. Charcoal can also be made, and willow (which grows in abundance) makes the best for gunpowder.

Nitrocellulose is simply nitrated cotton (other cellulose could be used, of course). Nitric and sulfuric acids are also made rather easily.

As for ignition, flint and steel (both are, ultimately, common).

Or, more simply, the archers at Agincourt set a pretty good pace in loosing arrows, didn't they? Silent, and an arrow will quite likely pierce a "bulletproof" vest. At a hundred yards or a thousand, you're still stuck.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 09:44 AM

Bent down, turned round & gave me a wink
Said "I'm gonna mix it up right here in the sink".

Have fun, Rap -

What about pointed sticks and sharp stones?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 09:46 AM

Apologies Michael - I confess I didn't read your post. Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa, Mea Maxima Culpa!

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 10:50 AM

Rap, you just fell foul of another of my points: changing the subject to mediaeval archery doesn't let guns off the hook! And claiming that just because cartridges are physical, it makes them natural is the largesse of a birthday, I guess. I've heard of a gum-tree, but never a gun-tree. The closest I can get is the offspring of a horse, which if argued would mean Samuel was hung - as opposed to hanged, which is what happened to many of his clients.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 11:07 AM

Changing the subject is the tactic of someone who knows that, by any normal person's standards, his argument is completely demolished. It's like trying to change the subject to (unverifiable) UK crime stats, when the thread is about the crackpot gun laws in the US, and the gun-death rates there that, by any civilised standards, are utterly appalling.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Lighter
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 11:37 AM

Who is it, now, who changed the subject?

The question was, "[Does] Anyone defend the US gun law?"

The answer was yes, and several reasons were given.

And that was the end of that particular discussion.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 12:22 PM

What, ptrecisely, is "THE" U.S. gun law supposed to be?

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: GUEST,#
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 12:30 PM

US Gun Law: who has the gun makes the law.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: olddude
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 12:55 PM

Would you be more comfortable is bad guys used pipe bombs instead
How about a blade. Both rap and I are regarded as expert's on sharp edged weapons. Samurai sword. You see if one is going to kill the method is meaningless. Guns are not the problem people are

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: olddude
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 12:59 PM

Guy was killed two weeks ago with a broken beer bottle in a bar. Means doesn't. Matter I think. Dead is dead so do we outlaw beer

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 01:39 PM

I am genuinely distressed at someone of Dan's intelligence coming out with such indescribable idiocies.

This is not a sarcastic or satirical or ironic assertion; nor a truculent or pugnacious or aggressive one. Just a plain statement of fact. I can't find the words to express how unbelievably sad it makes me.

Sincerely

≈Michael≈

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 02:03 PM

". Bill D refuses to examine his documents:..."

All I was doing was pointing out that 1) it was easy to find what figures are available, and 2) that it is hard to compare figures from 2 different systems which don't categorize in the same way.
My little comment about 'whacking' was the sort of irony I am often accused of not getting myself.

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: olddude
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 02:27 PM

Relax Mike I don't hurt anyone

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: olddude
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 02:33 PM

I would support better gun laws with loopholes closed not more ineffective laws that protect Noone and that I being serious

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Lighter
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 04:09 PM

> it is hard to compare figures from 2 different systems which don't categorize in the same way.

That is correct, but if the source has any credibility at all, we can reasonably conclude that the rates of violent crime are similar enough to discredit any assertion that Americans are especially predisposed to violence.

At least in comparison with the UK.

We don't need to know the precise degree of equivalence to draw so general a conclusion. (Which, perhaps coincidentally, accords well with common sense.)

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: olddude
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 07:41 PM

we need a federal handgun carry standard. the state laws are nuts. some states impossible to get a permit, others like florida, if you can breathe you get one. like i said before we need better laws

Subject: RE: BS: Anyone defend US gun law?
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Sep 14 - 07:51 PM

we can reasonably conclude that the rates of violent crime are similar enough to discredit any assertion that Americans are especially predisposed to violence.

Not at all. We're talking violence WITH FIREARMS as opposed to "violence" ( however that is defined) in general.