BS: Shooting tragedies and guns

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: catspaw49
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 08:13 PM

Finally, yeah.....I got it now........I guess I thought it was obvious but I guess you needed to state it......which confused me. Easily done.....


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: GUEST,JIS
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 08:14 PM

The right to free speech is enshrined in the Constitution, yet we place restrictions on speech that are generally uncontroversial. The framers said nothing about restricting child pornography, but it has been held to not be protected speech. The framers made no exceptions for incitement or fighting words but they have held to not be protected speech. The framers made no exceptions for obscenity, but you still can't play George Carlins 7 Dirty Words sketch on the radio or on television without getting fined and risking your broadcasting license.

Yes, the 2nd Amendment gives a right to bear arms, but it does not give a right to bear arms sans any regulations or restrictions.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 08:30 PM

While others blither on and on about gun control, this mother tells about her son who could end up another shooter if he does not get the help she knows he needs.

Do we spend money for the sake of the children or waste it fighting for useless

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 08:34 PM

The term "bear arms" has been taken out of context:
Bear arms

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Janie
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 08:38 PM

Very thoughtful and balanced comments from several people on "Weekend All Things Considered" this evening. http://www.npr.org/2012/12/16/167401103/we-have-to-act-on-gun-violence-but-how.

What is clear is that a multifaceted approach is needed.

One thing I will say as a mental health professional; The fact that a person is mentally ill does not make that person dangerous. Mentally Ill is also a nebulous term. There are lots of diagnoses that support the medical necessity for treatment. Legally, anyone with a psychiatric diagnosis identified in the DSM or the ICD could presumably be legally deemed "mentally ill."

I bet 99% of you could come into my office at some point in your lives because you are experiencing some physical signs and symptoms and/or are either having objective difficulty functioning at school, work or with personal relationships and/or are experiencing subjective emotional distress, and there is a psychiatric diagnosis that can be made that will establish the medical necessity for treatment, be it medication, talk therapy or a combination of the two. A diagnosis does not predict the potential for lethality.

There is no medical definition of insanity. There are legal definitions that vary from state to state and that all pertain to criminal justice.

There is also no magic formula or esp by which a clinician (or a family member or a work colleague) can discern that an individual is dangerous, imminently or in the long term.

I won't take the time to hunt it up now, but on Friday evening, again on NPR, a sociologist/criminologist was interviewed who talked about the profile of a mass killer. When asked why that profile could not be used he responded, appropriately, that there are way too many false positives. To paraphrase him, lots of people have the symptoms, but very few have the disease - meaning the vast majority of people who fit the profile would never commit murder, much less mass murder.

I'm all for a better mental health system - would be great if there were the public will in this country to fund it. But a better mental health system and/or background checks ain't gonna do it folks. Gotta get rid of some of the guns available to the general population to truly reduce the risks.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Jack Campin
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 08:56 PM

The woman in the article Dorothy linked to took the precaution of securing all the knives in the house so her insanely violent son couldn't get at them.

Adam Lanza's mother was so determined to win her Darwin Award she kept three guns and enough ammo for a massacre.

Not much similarity.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: catspaw49
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 08:59 PM

No one thing will do it Janie. Now is the time to get serious on all fronts.

And Dorothy......My wife and I lived that exact scenario as older 'Catters will recall.   


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Bobert
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 09:00 PM

Why don't the gun wackos ever quote the entire 2nd amendment???

Why do the gun wackos think that folks with guns are all okay until they kill a bunch of folks???

Why do gun wackos think they can just repeat the same old NRA BIG LIES over and over as if the rest of us are f'n morons???

Why don't the gun wackos want one single regulation on guns??? Not one...

Why are gun wackos, ahhhhh, wackos??? I'm serious... What make you folks think so messed up???

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Janie
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 09:27 PM

I know we are on the same page, Spaw.

Jack, your comment is remarkable for both it's lack of empathy and for the ignorance. None of us know anything about the circumstances of the lives of the Lanza family. It would be nice and safe to believe that people who commit these terrible acts have big signs flashing above their heads that say "I will commit mass murder eventually", and that their family members are always and simply inept, stupid, uncaring, grossly negligent or otherwise deserving of such an insult as you just basely uttered without basis.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 09:29 PM

Quoting Pete:
"When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?"

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: bobad
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 09:31 PM

Your post is right on Janie - I've been thinking all day about how to say what you just did but you did it much better than I could have. It is near impossible to predict who might do what this guy did - there are numerous people with similar and worse symptoms who would never do what he did.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Henry Krinkle
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 10:15 PM

I think the guns belonged to the shooter.
They were registered to the mother legally. But I think they belonged to the son.
She bought them for him.
Like moms who buy their kids booze.
An enabler.
=(:-( ))

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: theleveller
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 03:07 AM

Whatever the state of mind of a potential killer, in order to commit mass urder on this scale he/she has to have access to a gun.

Everyone who owns a handgun, assault rifle, semi-automatic or automatic weapon is a potential murderer (I take the point about the need for shotguns if properly regulated - but even in the UK there are issues here as my son, a police firearms officer, will testify) - look at the statistics of shootings in different countries again, for fuck's sake. Anyway, I'd hate to meet any of you gun-totting, macho apologists when you were having a bad day. Grow a pair instead!

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Will Fly
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 05:15 AM

I'm all for a better mental health system - would be great if there were the public will in this country to fund it. But a better mental health system and/or background checks ain't gonna do it folks. Gotta get rid of some of the guns available to the general population to truly reduce the risks.

I have a story to tell on this topic, Janie.

My nephew was bipolar all his life - diagnosed as such in early teens - and died in his early 30s. He found no help for his condition from conventional medical treatment and spent much of his later life staying in the house with his mother (my sister), working on his computer (he was brilliant with electronics), and finding medications on the internet which he believed helped him through his problems. He tried to commit suicide with pills on at least two occasions, and he and his mother would regularly go through the kitchen and bathroom cupboard contents together, as a kind of therapy - even joking about it - to get rid of this and that substance.

One day my sister came home to find his room trashed - totally wrecked - water pouring in from burst pipes. My nephew was lying on the bed, dead from a rifle bullet through his head. The rifle had been in the closet. This was in Arizona, by the way - Tucson. "Luckily", he used the rifle just on himself and on no-one else. We'll never know if, without the rifle to hand, he'd have still been alive now - or whether it would still have ended in suicide by some other method. How many more years might he have had... We'll also never know whether, in a depressed state, he might have killed others at a later date.

Who knows? All I know is that the ready availability of that gun was a tragic factor at that point.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Jack Campin
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 06:50 AM

None of us know anything about the circumstances of the lives of the Lanza family.

We know the mother was the sort of fuckwit who buys three guns and a mountain of ammo. So we know quite a lot.

What kind of empathy does that dumb cunt deserve when her paranoic lifestyle got a couple of dozen innocent people killed?

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Ron Davies
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 07:32 AM

The Supreme Court has held recently that gun ownership need not be required to have connection with a militia.

The Supreme Court also held something--in 1856 I believe--that was later totally rejected by the US in general.

The Supreme Court is, believe it or not, made up of mortal individuals who can make mistakes.    There is also a issue of strict constructionism vs a more evolving approach to the Constitution.

In this case it appears to anybody who studies the situation at the time of the Bill of Rights, that the 2nd Amendment did absolutely intend to tie right to bear arms to the obligation to participate in a militia.    The recent Supreme Court decison saying otherwise is dead wrong.

As I noted earlier in this thread, there were three issues meant to be dealt with by the 2nd Amendment:    fear of a British attack, probably from Canada;   fear of Indian attacks, and fear of a standing army.

Now which of these do you think still applies?





And, as "Mr. Dooley" stated earlier--I think at the turn of the 20th century--"th' Supreme Court follows th' election returns".


But in fact in the Internet Age, the general population can in fact have an influence it has not until now.   We may not have to wait for Obama or successsors to replace members of the Court as they shuffle off this mortal coil.

There is already a petition on Facebook to repeal the Second Amendment.

Even if this is unsuccessful--and let's not be defeatist about it--there can be other petitions about restricting ownership of pistols.


And don't hesitate to write actual letters--their rarity makes each one carry a punch.

We can in fact pressure our Senators and Congressmen to do something about this revolting situation.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 07:42 AM

The 2nd Amendment guarantees the right of Americans to own 18th century muzzle-loading muskets and single-shot, flintlock pistols.

Beyond that it says nothing.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Howard Jones
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 08:04 AM

Living in a country without a written constitution, I find it difficult to understand why the 2nd Amendment should be so sacrosanct. It's just a law - admittedly a very important one - and laws can and should be changed when they no longer serve their original purpose. The US Constitution has already been amended 27 times, so there's no reason why it shouldn't happen again.

The original amendments which make up the Bill of Rights were apparently intended to limit the powers of the federal government. What this suggests is that Americans don't trust their governement - perhaps a reasonable position for a newly emerging country in the late 18th century, but is that still appropriate for a mature modern democracy? A democracy of which Americans are rightly proud, to the extent that they are keen to impose it on others.

I should know better, having experienced a much greater culture-shock than I had expected when I first visited the US many years ago. Because we share a (more or less) common language and heritage, and because American culture is so familiar to us, we expect you to have similar attitudes and expectations to us. To realise that intelligent and sensible people, with whom I think I should have much in common, believe it is not only normal but desirable for firearms to part of the domestic furniture is something I find completely baffling.

I have no great expectations that anything will come of this latest tragedy, apart from a great many crocodile tears among the real ones. The right to slaughter one's fellow citizens seems to be too deeply embedded in the American psyche.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: GUEST,gillymor
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 08:47 AM

"Let us provide in our constitution for its revision at stated periods. What these periods should be nature herself indicates. By the European tables of mortality, of the adults living at any one moment of time, a majority will be dead in about nineteen years. At the end of that period, then, a new majority is come into place; or, in other words, a new generation. Each generation is as independent as the one preceding, as that was of all which had gone before. It has then, like them, a right to choose for itself the form of government it believes most promotive of its own happiness; consequently, to accommodate to the circumstances in which it finds itself that received from its predecessors; and it is for the peace and good of mankind that a solemn opportunity of doing this every nineteen or twenty years should be provided by the constitution, so that it may be handed on with periodical repairs from generation to generation to the end of time, if anything human can so long endure." --Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:42

I like the idea of issuing musket, ball and a powder horn to aspiring militia men, Lighter, while confiscating their assualt rifles and large capacity magazines.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 08:49 AM

>>>"We know the mother was the sort of fuckwit who buys three guns and a mountain of ammo. So we know quite a lot.   What kind of empathy does that dumb cunt deserve when her paranoic lifestyle got a couple of dozen innocent people killed?"<<<


Well, as her son is said to have had Aspergers, perhaps she too had it? It is said she liked shooting for the solitariness of it....She also lived in a country where guns are commonplace and viewed very differently from how we view them over here....She died a terrible death, administered to her by her own son...apparently. Can't you let her rest in peace without anymore hatred surrounding anyone concerned?   It's over now. It's time for those grieving to very slowly start to somehow find their way back to life and for compassion to be shown to all those who died in this shocking tragedy.



By the way, Adam's father, Peter Lanza, it is 'rumoured', was due to testify in the Libor scandal. It is also rumoured that Robert Holmes, the father of the man who shot so many at the Batman film in Aurora, was also due to give evidence.

I would imagine these are just insane, paranoid internet rumours.......but I thought I'd mention them anyway...



Will, I'm very sorry to learn of the sadness of your nephew's death. xx

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Midchuck
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 08:56 AM

In this case it appears to anybody who studies the situation at the time of the Bill of Rights, that the 2nd Amendment did absolutely intend to tie right to bear arms to the obligation to participate in a militia.    The recent Supreme Court decison saying otherwise is dead wrong.

Can't be. By definition, the Supreme Court is never wrong. Even when they reverse a prior holding of the Supreme Court. Because there's no avenue of appeal from their decision.

I think I remember one of the Justices quoted as saying: "We are not final because we are infallible. We are infallible because we are final."

Peter

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 09:01 AM

""I would like programs that glorify violence taken off television, and video games that do the same outlawed.""

AMEN to that Bruce.

They keep telling us that people know the difference between cartoon violence and reality, and that probably works while it's Tom & Jerry, or Sylvester & Tweetie Pie hammering seven barrels of s**t out of one another.

But when you get to realistic violence toward apparently real people, it's a small step for the latent sociopath to want to try it for real. Then somebody says a wrong word to him and wallop.

Ban the bloody lot say I, and I don't care much if others disagree.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Ron Davies
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 09:01 AM

"Can't be."    Why do I think we're playing semantic games?   Can't be. That never happens on Mudcat.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Charmion
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 09:23 AM

I like the idea of tying gun ownership to militia service because it attaches norms of mission-oriented service and civic obligation to the possession and use of firearms.

It also compels participation by gun-owners in a group activity in which they get to know each other, and become known, in the context of weapons-handling.

Of course, I'm a veteran and child of a veteran. That is how I was brought up to understand weapons, and I believe this approach is more appropriate for an increasingly urbanized culture than the notions of self-gratification and self-aggrandizement that I infer from most of the anti-gun-control rhetoric I have heard and read.

I believe those same values of civic virtue underpin the opinions of commentators like Kendall, who uphold an ideal of American strength rooted in each individual's freedom of independent action. (Please correct me if I have this wrong, Kendall.)

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Will Fly
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 09:24 AM

Will, I'm very sorry to learn of the sadness of your nephew's death. xx

Thanks, Lizzie. It was about 4 years ago now, but it still resonates a little more when sad incidents like this latest hit the news headlines.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 09:39 AM

Atta girl, Liz - said to have had Aspergers, rumoured, could be, might be, & Etc. The usual run of factual information we expect from you.

I would imagine these are just insane, paranoid internet rumours.......but I thought I'd mention them anyway...

1. WHY did you "think you'd mention them anyway" knowing them to be shite?

2. N omore insane and paranoid than the majority of what you post - totally in keeping.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: johncharles
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 09:46 AM

the agressive and unpleasant nature of some of the exchanges on this thread is very sad
john

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 10:04 AM

""Those who think the 2nd Amendment applies only to a militia have no reason to suggest restrictions since they feel the right to private gun ownership does not exist.""

That's the trouble when you only take in half of what people say. The point that was made was that the Founding Fathers were talking about "a well regulated militia" and the right of "The People!"

If you believe in the Constitution and establish a well regulated militia, then individual citizens neither need, nor qualify, to keep and bear arms.

If, on the other hand, you know better than the men who wrote the bloody thing, let individuals keep and bear arms with all the following at their expense.:-

1). A clearly demonstrated need for a gun, together with the type required (hand gun, hunting rifle etc.)!
2). A certificate of proficiency from a Law Officer training facility, with a requirement for an annual refresher and re-license.
2). No multiple ownership of active weapons beyond 1 shotgun, 1 pistol and 1 hunting rifle, except in very special circumstances.
3). No (absolutely NO automatic or semiautomatic weapons) and absolutely no magazines designed to increase weapons' ammo load.
4). Automatic re-assessment when a legal weapon is discharged, other than when hunting or target shooting.

But kill the bloody gun shows once and for all, and regulate the activities of all gun sellers, private or commercial.

All of the above to be Federal law, applied nationwide.

The good guys still have their guns, and the others shouldn't have them anyway.

As for collecters, they should have no problem with their weapons being permanently de-activated, beyond those they might legally own on the basis laid out above.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 10:28 AM

I'm still waiting for an answer to yesterday's question:

How many times has an armed bystander taken out a heavily armed intruder bent on mass murder?

Meanwhile, a U.S. Congressman tells CNN that if more people had guns, this problem would disappear.

For school principals, he recommends the M-4 assault rifle carried by Friday's shooter.

For those who say that gun control doesn't work: we'll never know how many mass killings have already been prevented by in-place gun control laws that make it tough for nuts to get guns.

And it makes no difference if no practical measure could have prevented this particular atrocity. (Guns legally owned by mom but stolen, school equipped with security system, "suicide bomber" behind the trigger....)

It makes no difference, because the point is to reduce the per capita number of shootings nationally to as close to zero as possible. Any particular case is irrelevant except as one more in an endless series of so-called "wake-up calls."

If every school principal had an M-4 in her office, would schools be safer or more dangerous? If 250 million Americans were carrying, would there be fewer or more killings?

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: theleveller
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 10:31 AM

Very well put, Don.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 10:53 AM

Lighter: Rep. Louie Gohmert (Republican, by the way) is a certifiable lunatic - look up more of this Texas jackass' idiotic statements & actions.

But he's not the problem.

Problem is there are literally millions in the U.S. who are just as idiotic, and think the Gunfight at the OK Corral is the norm and that we're still living in 1880.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: GUEST,Lighter
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 11:32 AM

Some young guy in Arizona just shouted at an inquiring TV reporter, "Guns don't kill people! People kill people!" Maybe he was afraid that the TV man was going to take his guns away.

But you know, he has a point. Lock fifty loaded guns inside a warehouse and leave 'em alone for two weeks. Now, lock fifty gun-control advocates in a different warehouse and leave *them* alone for two weeks.

Some of those people will have strangled each other, but the harmless guns will have committed no crimes.

So it's true.

However, it's also true that some people *use* guns to kill more people than they possibly could or would with their bare hands.

And anybody who thinks otherwise is in a dream world.

Now let's talk about laws. If people, not guns, are the problem (as so many people have been programmed to say), we must need more laws against people. Laws, for example, making it harder for some of them to get guns.

Or, if always-innocent guns are more sacrosanct than possibly- dangerous people, maybe we want laws to lock up right away anybody we think might some day use a gun on someone. You know, preventive detention. For anybody who's a little odd. Including some legal gun owners. According to somebody.

Or there's the possibility of letting everybody pack a gun - including those same people who kill people. Or the possibility of cops in every school and mall and on every street corner. Lots of armed cops, paid for by your taxes, waiting for the less-than-once-in-a-lifetime chance of stopping an armed nut.

Those are the choices, gun guys.

Take your pick.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: theleveller
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 11:56 AM

"Guns don't kill people! People kill people!"

Well, using that same logic the answer's simple - keep the guns and ban people.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 12:05 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: pdq - PM
Date: 16 Dec 12 - 06:41 PM

At least half the posters on Mudcat don't believe the 2nd Amendment allow for private ownership of guns.

PeeDee... can you READ? No one here...including me... claims that the 2nd Amendment does not allow private gun ownership. And we ALL know that the courts have **interpreted** it that way. Currently, under the laws, it IS legal of buy & own many types of guns.

Some of us are merely pointing out the linguistic confusion in the wording of the amendment.... and also asserting that no bunch of "Founders" in their right mind would have written it that way if they had any idea what the future of weapons technology held!

It is entirely possible that a different assortment of justices would have held that it meant citizens were allowed to bear arms when acting AS a Militia!, and that appropriate arms would be issued when necessary.
We are living in fear because the gun lobby convinced them to rule for almost unlimited gun ownership! It was a VOTE... a pressured, emotionally driven VOTE. And any attempt to seriously amend that amendment would get an even MORE emotional uproar! Money would be thrown in huge quantities!

Now.... Obama and many other leaders have made noises about "doing something"... Lord knows what they can do... I suspect that THEY don't know yet.... but I'll bet that you will see versions of MY analysis floated in coming weeks! Why? Because it makes SENSE to re-evaluate the Founders wording, given the state of things today! Limiting assault weapons and large magazines will likely be the first step.....we shall se after that.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: pdq
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 12:12 PM

Bill D,

Are you capable of arguing the topic without dragging me into your post?

I said what I said and you are mangling it for your own purposes. Shame on you.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: catspaw49
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 12:17 PM

Since those are about the same thoughts or at least in the vicinity of mine...........

PEEDEE-----Help me out here with a mystery.......well, it ain't much of a mystery but maybe you can give some answer anyway. In the past couple hundred years we have seen fit to make certain adjustments to the Bill of Rights and the Constitution based onchanging times and attitudes. We seem to never do that to the second and I wonder why.............Of all the "rights" given by the Bill of Rights why have we messed with the rest and not seriously done much at all with what today might be the very least important right of all of them?


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: pdq
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 12:31 PM

I stated a few facts in the last day or two.

I resent being dragged back into this since I already said what needed to be said.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 12:44 PM

No, PeeDee, you resent your simplistic & dogmatic view being opposed by fact and logic.

And Spaw, there'es this proverb about teaching a pig to sing...

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: olddude
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 12:45 PM

We are all pretty much saying the same thing. Let responsible well trained people have their guns but come up with a way of keeping them out of the hands of criminals and unstable people. some easy steps, have a federal registration program and conceal carry law so the states don't have such wide variety of mish mash laws.   Get rid of gun shows that negate all existing laws. I would help quite a bit.   No need to fight about it

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: GUEST,999
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 12:47 PM

The fact that there have been 27 amendments to the Constitution does seem to indicate that the original document had flaws and oversights that people didn't think of when they put forth the original.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: pdq
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 12:51 PM

The fact that there have been 27 amendments to the Constitution does seem to indicate that the original document can be changed if that is what The People want.

They don't want the 2nd Amendment changed.

Live with it.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: GUEST,999
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 01:00 PM

"They [the people] don't want the 2nd Amendment changed."

That will be determined by the people soon enough I expect.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Amos
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 01:08 PM

1. The Second Amendment does, in fact, relate gun ownership and militia. It is completely disingenuous to pretend that it simply states one clause, the non-infringement clause, and it is equally short-sighted to pretend that the introductory clause concerning the militia is exclusive. The Amendment as written neither states solely that "No law infringing the right to bear arms" shall occur, and neither does it state that "Militia members shall always be allowed to bear arms" to the exclusion of other purposes. It clearly ties the two things together in a loosely-coupled relationship. Loosely enough that it cannot be interpreted exclusively toward militia membership, as written, but it also makes it clear that state militias is the antecedent consideration, the notion behind the dependent clause.

2. The fact that "there is no medical definition of insanity", succinctly stated by Janie, raises the issue of a shamefully large hole in our culture and science--we have a really piss-poor understanding of the human mind, its workings and malfunctions and its genus. We have a mishmash of approaches, some anchored firmly in material biochemistry, some focused on emotion, some dealing with rational management of logic and data, some focused on loss and trauma as remembered incidents, and some tentatively exploring spiritual aspects of thought. We have hundreds of bits and pieces and no working model of the whole, which surely involves all these things. Now there's something we should be ashamed of.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Megan L
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 01:48 PM

I was going to post this on the thread for the children but i see it was destroyed by bickering so I guess it has to go here pity the children deserve better from adults

No more lullabies

No more lullabies my dear
No laughing smile to still my tear
No joy as you come through the door
For you will come again no more

Hush you hush my darling baby
Hush you hush my own sweet child

All oer the world your mother weeps
Your father lonely vigil keeps
And wonders when we will ever learn
To save the child and love again

Hush you hush my darling baby
Hush you hush my own sweet child

My world stopped but theirs goes on
My lovely child forever gone
For them the shock will pass away
But I will love you every day

mhtbl 1845 17/12/2012

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 02:11 PM

Actually, PeeDee, if you want to deal with fact(heaven forfend), the majority of folks in the US in all surveys and polls DO want decent, functional firearms legislation and oppose the NRA/PDQ hysteria - if that's what you mean by "changing the Second Ammendment".

Live with it.

No back to your regularly scheduled BS.

By the way: when do you predict that the jack-booted storm troopers of the opressive U.S. government are going to begin their fiendish oppression?

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 02:40 PM

Beautiful sentiments Megan L! Empathy and sympathy for those families is strong despite the bickering and our hearts cry!

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: kendall
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 02:50 PM

We all know what the problem is; no one knows how to deal with it. Commenting on the obvious has become an exercise in futility.

Jack, I'm still waiting for that apology.
John P my IQ is 140. whats yours?

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: GUEST,olddude
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 03:04 PM

don't hold your breath Captain, he hasn't yet for anyone. But at least Law Enforcement officers past and present do understand what you are saying.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 03:08 PM

"We all know what the problem is; no one knows how to deal with it."
Kendall, In its relatively short history of 230 or so years The USA has done many great things and solved many deep problems. Most of us on the outside looking in have difficulty in comprehending why Americans ignore what seems so obvious.

Subject: RE: BS: Shooting tragedies and guns
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 17 Dec 12 - 03:10 PM

I have a beautiful MP3 of a Welsh Choir singing All through the night in a medley. You can PM me for a copy. However, it is too large to fit into some mail boxes. SOme it works.