BS: Guns & laws in the US

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,olddude
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 12:58 PM

These shooting and killing are really a new event in our country. they just didn't happen back in the 50's and early 60's. The gun show law was on the books forever. Those shows were all about the sportsman. Shotguns, duck calls, etc .. At that time gun laws were sparse. Hell you could buy anything war surplus from a mail order catalog and cheap. No problems. However as the drug folks got organized, more and more killings. The gun laws go tighter. The killing rate got worse, so more gun laws, more killings. The criminals figured our really quick they could buy all they need and more from the shows. More and more laws that did nothing to help. If sensible laws are passed, it will be much harder for them to get weapons. Sportsmen support sensible laws, but we don't support stupid and meaningless restrictions that make no one safer.

If we address the huge profits from illegal drugs, you will also fix the gun violence. No sportsman is doing the drive by shootings.
My home town in Pennsylvania, there is no crime, there is no killings. There is no drug problems either. Everyone is armed to the teeth, because everyone hunts for food, fishes, grew up with firearms, loves God and takes care of one another. Most doors are never locked.And if a stranger needed help they would do anything to help them. It is the culture. It is the way they were taught. Hard work, God , family, friends. But those people can defend themselves. I like all the kids back there could shoot before I could ride a bike. Safety training starts in the womb I think. We just never had an issue of any type and still don't when I go back home. It is the nature of the society and how people grow up. Drugs have not taken hold there because there would be no profit .. few if any would buy. Other parts of the country, not so ... America is a huge country. My county alone is twice the size of Great Britain. Populations are diverse and cultures are different as is the problems.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,number 6
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 01:06 PM

I'll also throw this one inot the debate for my British friends ... Americans have their Clint Eastwod and 'Gran Torino', the Brits have their Michael Caine and 'Harry Brown'.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 01:12 PM

"The U.S. is a very large country ... larger than Europe .... may regions in the U.S. have a murder rate equal to GB on the other hand many parts of Europe"

The US population (about 300 million) is less than half that of Europe (780 million). Europe is a little larger than The USA even if you count largely unpopulated Alaska.

If there is a region in the US of comparable population to Great Britain with less than twice the murder rate, I don't know what it is.

I think that among G20 countries the US has the most murders apart from Russia. It has a higher murder rate than every European country but Russia and Asia.

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

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,olddude
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 01:28 PM

What we really have is a total breakdown of values in many area's of our society. We have broken homes, drugs, poverty, latch key kids, no guidance, no adults passing on traditional values. If a kid only knows that the answer to every problem in life is violence, then how can we expect to not see the school shootings. These are new events in this nation. Roll back to the 50's or early 60's and it didn't occur. What has changed? no parents who care, no adults anywhere who care, kids then seek what they need from other sources I.E. gangs. They learn to take what they need. No work ethic, no guidance, no God, no country believe in nothing, have nothing, escape using drugs and then you have what we are seeing today. I have no answers only can figure out the cause. If there were no market for drugs, we would not have this. Why do we have a market. It is escape .. when your life is so meaningless that the recourse is to escape. Hence the profits .. hence the violence

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,olddude
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 01:37 PM

One of the stupid talk shows late at night when i couldn't sleep, had a young woman on doing DNA tests for the "baby daddy" .. 6 guys and none of them were the father. Six guys all around the same time ... I mean this is more common then we think. What parenting skills on the 5 other kids she has also is going on there. My guess the kids grow up on their own, no values, do whatever they must to survive. And somewhere down the pike get an illegal weapon.

Society starts at the family level, when it ceases to be a family with real values, then how could other human life be important.

anyway my rant is over

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Amos
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 01:37 PM

THere are many ways of escaping the pain, if that is a clear goal. Drugs is one of the least viable. There are psychological sollutions, physical sollutions, emotional solutions, and so on.

The "lesson" of dramatizing or acting out mental and emotional pain by lashing out physically is a really dumb lesson, reinforced by alcoholics and movie producers. In real-life terms it is about the dumbest answer to be found.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Bill D
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 01:40 PM

"These are new events in this nation. Roll back to the 50's or early 60's and it didn't occur."

Howard Unruh

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,olddude
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 01:41 PM

Amos
YUP so right and it keeps happening all over or there would be no market for the illegal drugs.

Oh when I said twice the size of GB I meant land mass not population

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,number 6
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 01:41 PM

Sorry ... I meant Western Europe population 412,787,xxx, U.S population 313,388,xxx ... ok ... I'm still wrong. I think it is fair to compare the whole of the U.S. to Western Europe rather than a specific European country.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,olddude
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 01:55 PM

One of the reason I like the show swamp people is it reminds me of growing up. Troy after his hunt comes home. He has a sea of family and friends all at his house to celebrate his success. He holds his granddaughter and says this is what it is all about, family, friends. Look how God blessed us. I also believe if you drove up to his house at that moment he would set another plate at the picnic table for ya.

Now his kids grew up with firearms, he has an arsenal. Do I think any of his grand babies are going to walk into a school and start shooting. Not .. ever .. the kids have values, conscience, respect of life and others .. because of their family .. Their guns are tools for their way of life.

We have to address this broken society and get back to what you see at Troy's house to fix this violence i think.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 02:01 PM

The USA is 38 times as big as GB in area, 5 times the population. You were wrong in the numbers Olddude but the actual figures make your point stronger.

look at the chart on this page.

If you compare the USA to Western Europe the USA has a murder rate of about 4.8 per 100K the average murder rate is 1 or less per 100k

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 02:02 PM

It has a higher murder rate than every European country but Russia and Asia


Should be

It has a higher murder rate than every European country but Russia and the former Soviet, Baltic states.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 02:11 PM

Olddude, with respect to your opinion. I have to point out a couple of things. A very small percentage of kids from every type of home are murderers. A lot of murders are committed by middle class people, Colimbine and VT come to mind off hand. I am for strict regulation of guns designed to kill people, hand guns, assault rifles, sawed off shotguns. I am all for the well regulated private ownership of hunting equipment.

The standard for the carrying of a gun, in terms of safety training, insurance and safety regulation should be at least as strict and for the operation of a motor vehicle.

I don't think it is viable to try to control gun violence by the imposition of values. But that is just my opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,olddude
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 02:19 PM

You point Jack is very well taken my friend

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 02:34 PM

And still no answer from Number 6 re. conflating gun homicides with Wiki figures on total homicides.

Where might that 4.7 figure be if guns were at the same per capita level as in the UK.

3.7?....2.7?.....maybe 1.7.

Let's try to keep discussing like for like. Even allowing for drug related shootings and Dunblane Ralph Moat etc., gun homicide in the UK is very low.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 02:49 PM

"Where might that 4.7 figure be if guns were at the same per capita level as in the UK."

There are certainly other factors.

Where might they be if the social safety net here was as good as the U.K.'s?

What if there was not excessive violence in our media? Remember when all Clint Eastwood did in Hollywood was soot and punch people on screen?

What if we were all like Looney Tunes characters and the only consequence of a gunshot was a black face or having our beaks spun around?

beak

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: gnu
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 03:27 PM

JtS... "Where might they be if the social safety net here was as good as the U.K.'s?"

You bet! The poor in the US don't equate to the poor in the UK. By a longshot! (pun intended)

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: number 6
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 05:40 PM

Well Monsieur Wisyeeweeg, as gnu says the "poor in the U.S. don't equate to the poor in the UK" ... and that is a given. Britain's war on poverty is much more effective than the U.S.(Britain being a more politically socialistic in it's approach). An offshoot of the large population of the poverty in the U.S. is the formation of gangs. Gangs are the only way out for many. From what I can gather 60% of all gun murders in the U.S. are gun related. One can also say this 60% is a probably directly related to drugs.

So .... if 60% of the murders in the U.S. is gang related (and bear in mind the much larger population of the poor in the U.S. as compared to |Britain) this would mean 2.82 % of the total U.S. ratio of that 4.7%. This would reduce the amount of murders in the U.S to a ratio of 1.88 (somewhere in the same ratio as Western Europe)

From this I would say decriminalization of drugs would probably have a greater impact on decreasing gun violence than arguing about gun legislation (though personally I would like to see some sort of gun control also). If the U.S. had more of a socialistic approach in governing it's population this would also have an impact.

Gun crime will also rise in Western Europe as we see more and more of government austerity programs. Poverty will increase and along with that is the hatred, fear and intolerance of minorities.

As per the horrific tragedy of mass murders in schools and such ... well I have already alluded to this in previous posts.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 08:14 PM

Im glad Ilive in AUSTRALIA

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Bobert
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 09:35 PM

Bottom line is that you can chart America's decline with two striking stats:

1. stagnated wages

2. number of handguns

Way past time for a conversation about both... Way overdue!!!

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: gnu
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 09:50 PM

Simple. Start with REASONABLE and LOGICAL gun laws that everyone can get behind. Laws that the NRA cannot defend against. Like we have in Canada. Go slow. Pick the battles. Don't stack the deck against yourselves... ya can't win that way.

Otherwise, yer just gonna lose... yer just gonna make it harder to get something done.

Ban guns? Fuck me! Like that's a solution that some of you think will be succesful in this situation? Giver yer heads a shake and see if they rattle.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 10:06 PM

"Start with REASONABLE and LOGICAL gun laws that everyone can get behind. Laws that the NRA cannot defend against. Like we have in Canada."

Canada bans assault rifles. The US lifted that ban under Bush.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Bobert
Date: 19 Apr 12 - 10:38 PM

Kinda hard to get anywhere with the NRA... Anything and everything that smacks of any regulation, sane or not, will get the same over-the-top knee-jerk reaction by the NRA...

Obama wants to take away your guns!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 20 Apr 12 - 08:07 AM

Somebody already took away their fuckin' brains.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: olddude
Date: 20 Apr 12 - 10:24 AM

In all my ranting and raving on this threat that is all I was trying to say. Give us some laws that we all can get behind. Then if the NRA or anyone wants to argue, they will be looked at as what they really are. I know of no one that thinks the gun show law as we have now is a good idea. In the 60's they went from, "look I got this great duck call at the gun show" to now where it is as far from the sportsman as you can get. Walk in and it looks like a military weapons cache.

Simply change the law to read, if you sell at a gun show, ya gotta go through the checks and balances like buying from any licensed dealer... Now you can still have your shows, but we will be a hell of a lot safer

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Apr 12 - 10:27 AM

That's exactly what they think about their political opponents, Backwoodsman. They think they're brainless. I know...I've heard some of these fellas on the Right talking to one another about "liberals". God, do they ever detest liberals. And they honestly believe that everything that's wrong with the world is due to either liberals...or Muslims.

But the Muslims they're so worried about are not liberals. ;-) In fact, they are extremely conservative in their own cultural terms.

You see, politics works this way:

1. It's the Great Divider.

2. By dividing people up into "us and them" consciousness, it conquers them...and it enriches the elite who rule over them.

3. The elite is normally composed of bankers, industrialists, and arms manufacturers. These people get rich off conflict. Wars and fear of war are primary sources of income for them. Increased expenditure on surveillance equipment and organization also profits them.

4. So...the more they can get different groups of people to hate and fear each other, the more money they can make.

5. The creation of separate political parties and other separate factions aids greatly in this endeavour, by setting up various groups of people in permanent opposition to one another.

6. All those groups of people can easily be convinced that the other groups of people ARE the real problem.

7. They are not. The elite that rules over them all is the real problem.

8. It was that way in Roman times. It is that way now.

9. And there probably isn't a lot you can personally do about it...except stop believing in it, and thereby giving it your support by default, just because you don't know any better. Stop believing the standard propaganda line that makes you hate and fear your brother!

I stopped believing in it quite some time ago. If enough people stopped believing in it, the human status quo would have to change.

It is never going to change by hating and despising your brother and characterizing him as "brainless". He's not brainless. He's just been coached and prepared within a different belief group than you, therefore he has become susceptible to a different line of political propaganda. And that serves the ruling elite, because as long as they can keep you and your brother fighting each other they have you right where they want you...under the big political thumb, dominated, and controlled.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,olddude
Date: 20 Apr 12 - 10:39 AM

In pretty much every state that I have hunted in, you are required to have either military experience, or a hunters safety course before you can get a license. No one I know thinks that is a bad law. Hunters were the ones that wanted it. We don't want to go in the woods with people who don't know what they are doing. So , if you are going to buy a gun, require a safety course or some other proof of safety training. Nope, not for buying the weapon. Then we read about a little kid getting hold of the gun and killing his brother by accident. You see a law requiring safety training isn't bad and most everyone would stand behind it I think.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,olddude
Date: 20 Apr 12 - 10:42 AM

for those who don't understand what I was saying about safety training. One area of the training is securing the firearm so kids won't get their hands on it in their home. That is why I used that example. We need that law

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 20 Apr 12 - 11:23 AM

""I know of no one that thinks the gun show law as we have now is a good idea.""

Everybody who sells at them and everybody who buys Dan.

Now I don't know how many that is but it's a long way from nobody.

The worry is that a very large proportion of buyers are probably the very people that nobody in their right mind would allow to own guns, including your drug dealers and gang members.

At least our drug dealers have to find illegal sources for their guns, which is comforting given that almost all of our gun crime is drug related.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 20 Apr 12 - 11:38 AM

""It was that way in Roman times. It is that way now.""

Ancient history 101 LH.

Rome conquered pretty much all of the then known world by force of arms and set up an empire which lasted 500 years by doing the exact opposite.

They didn't divide, they assimilated and rewarded conquered races.

Taking Carthage as an example: After destroying the city they built a huge city of their own and welcomed all of the local, mostly nomadic tribes, many of whom settled and in the fulness of time became Roman citizens.

North Africa didn't become Roman, Romans in North Africa became one with the Africans, and the benefits accrued were such that few complained.

Not divide and conquer, then rule with a rod of iron, more conquer, then treat as allies and eventually assimilate.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: GUEST,olddude
Date: 20 Apr 12 - 02:37 PM

Don
I said "I" since I don't know any criminals or drug dealers I will still stand by what I said.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Bobert
Date: 20 Apr 12 - 07:00 PM

How does "thoughtless" work fir ya', LH???

Serious...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Apr 12 - 08:06 PM

It isn't exactly lack of thought that is the problem, Bobert. Everyone thinks in some fashion. They think along their own accustomed and habitual lines of internal "logic", and whatever happens to push their buttons and sustain their mythology. In fact, most people are almost incapable of not thinking (becoming internally silent and calm) whenever they're awake...and that is exactly what bedevils them. They get drunk and take drugs to partially silence their unruly mind which is causing them so much stress! ;-) So it isn't lack of thought that's the problem. It's unhealthy, unproductive, immature, fearful and divisive patterns of thought that are the problem. It's negative thoughts that are the problem.

And I'm saying that a ruling elite and the mass media usually encourage a great deal of unhealthy and negative patterns of thought...specially when they are getting their public pumped up to fight a war...or to surrender some of their long enshrined civil liberties for the sake of "security".

****

Don - Yes, you're essentially correct about the Romans establishing that rule of iron, and assimilating populations into the empire, and offering those populations various incentives to cooperate. For sure. But they did use typical divide and conquer tactics whenever it was to their immediate advantage, as any conquering empire does. For awhile it was Christians who served as the Empire's scapegoats for the public to focus anger on. They were viciously persecuted and often killed, it was a bit like what the Nazis did with the Jews and other groups in the brief era of the Third Reich. Later a time came when it occurred to the emperor of Rome that Christianity could serve more effectively as a force to unite the empire and coopt a large variety of other faiths, and it became the official religion of Rome after that. The Romans ran the world's most successful and longlasting empire, so they obviously were pretty good at it. But...things moved much more slowly then than they do now. Our modern technologies have greatly speeded up social change. An empire that would have lasted 500 years back then might last only 50 now. The American Empire (which consists of financial/mercantile and military control over others and estabishing client/puppet governments rather than by open colonization) really got going fullblast at the conclusion of WWII (though it had been underway in a smaller fashion ever since the declaration of the Monroe Doctrine). It's been over 65 years since WWII ended. I think time is running out for the American Empire. What comes afterward is hard to say, but we may not live long enough to find out.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: kendall
Date: 21 Apr 12 - 12:03 PM

Don T, If you think Canada never had an Indian problem, look up the Massacre of the Miti.

As far as fewer cops being shot, just recently in Greenland NH 4 of them got it, but the bastard who did it also bit the big one.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 21 Apr 12 - 06:53 PM

""Don T, If you think Canada never had an Indian problem, look up the Massacre of the Miti.

As far as fewer cops being shot, just recently in Greenland NH 4 of them got it, but the bastard who did it also bit the big one.""

I'm puzzled cap'n.

1. I never said that Canada didn't have an Indian problem. It's a hell of a long way back in this thread, but from what I can recall, I said that Canada didn't feel the need to exterminate them.

2. I do not recall specifically mentioning cop killings in this thread at all.

Are you sure you have the right Don?

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Bobert
Date: 21 Apr 12 - 07:29 PM

How about "wrong thinking", LH???

I mean, when folks use mis-information and mythologies to advocate bad laws and policies they don't get a pass... Something wrong is happening...

BTW, Obama hasn't pushed one single gun regulation but that doesn't stop Mitt Romney and the NRA going into their Obama-is-gonna-take-yer-guns-away BIG LIE

Yawn...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: olddude
Date: 21 Apr 12 - 07:55 PM

Well if Obama is going to take them all away ... anyone want to buy a great colt .357 Mag. I never shoot it anyway :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Little Hawk
Date: 21 Apr 12 - 10:59 PM

That's right, Bobert...wrong thinking is the problem.

Regarding Obama's supposedly dire intentions of taking everyone's guns away...there can't be any truth to it, because if there was, Chongo would be going ballistic about it! And he's not. Case closed. Obama is not going to take your guns away.

Chongo's main point, though, is that he will encourage gun ownership more than Obama would, more than Romney would, more than Wild Bill Hickock or Machine Gun Kelly would, more than practically anyone would! He intends to return the USA to more or less the conditions that existed in, say, the 1870's when it comes to gun ownership. The more the merrier. ;-D He would also like to have a lot more gunnery training schools around so that the public can learn proper and safe use of their firearms...at least one such school for every 1,000 citizens right across the country. This would provide a lot of new jobs and ease the unemployment problem.

Just another great idea from the APP! Vote for Chongo in 2012.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: olddude
Date: 22 Apr 12 - 02:26 AM

Chongo has my vote there LH ... a good old fashioned red neck ape is just what we need fer sure. Can me and "Rap" be minster's of the arsenal. Hell we have torn apart put together and shot about everything ever made . And we could train em right how to hold an Uzi on full auto ... I even know how to conceal it ... yup my vote

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Bobert
Date: 22 Apr 12 - 10:09 AM

So, now that we agree that the wrong thinking of the NRA has trumped common sense to the point where even the president of the United States is afraid to piss them off then looks as if this discussion has run its course...

Sans, Chongz, of course, who can keep any discussion going with his three-ringed-crazy-monkey routine...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: gnu
Date: 22 Apr 12 - 01:18 PM

Don... "It's a hell of a long way back in this thread, but from what I can recall, I said that Canada didn't feel the need to exterminate them."

There is debate over that. One is whether the government deliberately distributed small pox infected to plains (and other) tribes.*

Of course, I am assuming you are referring to slaughter by military forces (or, as some history books call it, war). The Northwest Mounted Police and British Forces, to my knowledge, never engaged in such practice. I assume this was a concious decision made by the British Parliament after a logistical analysis by their military commanders in the field. Of course, the Brits did employ some tribes to pursue such practices on other tribes.*

Please note that I have a very limited knowledge of USA and CAN history in this regard.

* I would hasten to add, in both istances, that these (most - again, debatable) took place long before the US military engaged Native Peoples.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 22 Apr 12 - 02:25 PM

"One is whether the government deliberately distributed small pox infected to plains (and other) tribes."

The history I learned was that the Hudson's Bay Company gave Small Pox blankets to "lazy drunkin troublemakers" (their descriptions) who had settled around their trading posts and begged for liquor. I never heard of the government, which came much later, being so accused.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: gnu
Date: 22 Apr 12 - 02:59 PM

Indeed, JtS. But, I have heard it said. Hence, my *

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Apr 12 - 11:16 PM

I think it was mostly a case of "benign neglect" in Canada rather than extermination. There were very few Indian wars in Canada following, of course, the extensive fighting that occurred in the French and Indian War that preceded the American Revolution.

During the same period, there were hundreds of Indian wars in the USA. The British government, on the whole, appears to have been intent on avoiding such conflicts, but it had the advantage of sending in the legal apparatus first into new territories, rather than allowing settlement first...with little or no law. It was the aggressive expansion of unregulated settlement, whiskey-trading, and other essentially "free market capitalist" policies that provoked most of the Indian wars in the USA. The indians, in essence, were sitting on precious land and resources that the settlers and business people wanted to exploit...so the Indians had to go.

In Canada, the crown went in first (in the form of the mounted police) and established the rule of law. Then settlers came in afterward. There was no lawless period in the territories, and whisky traders were not allowed to set up their operations. This greatly assisted in maintaining peace between Whites and Indians, because the law was there and the law was not to be questioned, and everyone understood how it worked, Indians included. It greatly protected the Indians from the worst abuses, such as the whisky traders and lawless men and gangs that terrorized the American West during the same period...a period of almost unbroken peace in the Canadian west (save for the Riel rebellion).

The British approach was essentially a socialist approach, in that the central government goes in first with police and courts and legal systems, and establishes the rule of law.

And that basic difference in national philosophy between the USA and Canada remains to this day. The USA has always encouraged unregulated laissez-faire aggressive profit-oriented business operations by private commerce of every sort to open up any new area that is annexed. Making money becomes the main motivator. The British back then brought in the rule of law first, and business afterward. That's a vital difference in social philosophy. What are you really in it for? Establishing social order? Or making a quick financial killing and getting something for nothing? In the American West, it was the latter, and that's what caused most of the Indian wars to occur. The Indians were getting robbed everywhere the USA settlers went, they had no legal recourse of any sort in the lawless territories, so they fought back with every means at their command. In the end, of course, they lost. And the Indians lost in Canada too in the end....but not in nearly so violent a manner.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: bobad
Date: 12 May 12 - 09:14 AM

Shooting targets resembling Trayvon Martin sold online

By Barbara Liston

ORLANDO, Florida | Fri May 11, 2012 6:16pm EDT

(Reuters) - Shooting targets resembling Trayvon Martin, the unarmed black teenager shot to death in Florida by a neighborhood watch volunteer, were offered for sale online before the ads were pulled by the auction site.

The sale at an online gun broker's auction site started on April 22 and offered 40 10-packs of paper targets, according to a screen shot of the auction ad by WKMG-TV in Orlando before the ad was taken down.

The targets featured a silhouette of a faceless person wearing a hooded sweatshirt, known as a hoodie, and holding a bag of Skittles candy and a container of tea. In an email exchange with WKMG, the seller claimed to be motivated by profit and to have sold out in two days.

Martin was wearing a hoodie and returning from a convenience store with Skittles and tea when he was shot on February 26 in Sanford, Florida. Neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman, 28, is awaiting trial for second-degree murder in the racially charged case.

"Obviously, we support Zimmerman and believe he is innocent and that he shot a thug," the seller wrote on the site, according to WKMG-TV.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Bill D
Date: 12 May 12 - 01:45 PM

that should read "We WANT to .."support Zimmerman and believe he is innocent and that he shot a thug,"

Sickening............It was clear from the 1st reports that it was just a kid with candy.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Greg F.
Date: 12 May 12 - 05:55 PM

Good Ol' Florida - folks tend to forget that its one of the most virulent racist states in the Land Of The Free and always has been.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: gnu
Date: 12 May 12 - 06:11 PM

bobad... that is beyond sickening.

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Bobert
Date: 12 May 12 - 06:44 PM

I'm going to look into having a decal of George Zimmerman made up that you install in your toilet... Another one of Charlton Heston...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Guns & laws in the US
From: Bobert
Date: 12 May 12 - 06:53 PM

and...

...300

B~