Well, actually, banning cars as they presently exist (internal combustion engine cars, that is) would be an excellent idea. They are noisy, polluting energy-wasters. We could have long since replaced them with non-polluting vehicles...except for the oil industry and its all-powerful lobby.

So there's thread drift for you...

I think it's a distinct possibility that fossil fuels are presently doing more harm to people and the planet than guns...but not in such a dramatically obvious way, of course...it's more insidious than that.

kendall - "NON-American shitheads"? Just what are you suggesting, sir??? :-)

Shambles - Your point about schools is well taken! I spent many an hour fantasizing about blowing up my entire school and its student body with an atomic bomb (a small one...adequate to completely obliterating the school, but not necessarily the rest of the town). I utterly hated that place. I was there under duress, against my will, against every instinct in my body. I was subjected to bullying and harassment by people whom I would have avoided if not forced to be there by parents and society. I was bored to death with information of which 90% or more has proven to be completely useless in my adult life, and I was already educating myself better at home than they were doing for me in school anyway! School was just one long miserable purgatory, verging on Hell. I am never surprised when these violent incidents happen. Unlike me, some people do not stop at merely fantasizing violence...they carry it out.

Most schools, as far as I am concerned, are ridiculous places, oppressive institutions, and the students are their prisoners.

My apologies to teachers who may be offended by my views...I actually really liked most of my teachers back then...it was the institution, with all its silly rules and indoctrination, which I did not like...and the bullying students!

- LH