swamp wrote:
> On Sun, 06 May 2007 15:54:55 GMT, Bama Brian
>
mindspring.com> wrote:
> >> swamp wrote:
>>> On Sat, 05 May 2007 14:33:17 GMT, Bama Brian
>>>
mindspring.com> wrote:
>>>>>>> swamp wrote:
>>>>> On Fri, 04 May 2007 04:10:42 GMT, Bama Brian
>>>>>
mindspring.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>> swamp wrote:
>>>>>>> On Wed, 02 May 2007 14:41:31 GMT, Bama Brian
>>>>>>>
mindspring.com> wrote:>>>>> Rifles aren't concealable - or to be absolutely accurate - aren't *as*
>>>>> concealable as pistols/handguns. It would be considerably more
>>>>> difficult for a madman to sneak a rifle onto a campus, airplane, into
>>>>> a mall, etc.
>>>> Oh puh-leez. Do you not remember the old stereotyped images of
>>>> gangsters carrying violin cases?
>>> Yeah, vaguely.. From what I can tell, we're about the same age, so you
>>> get no age handicap w/ me. Puh-leeze back at you. Crazy people don't
>>> have the means, reasons, funding, motivations, or wherewithal to
>>> commit such murders.
>> Cho wasn't a psychotic? Sure acted like it.
>
> Which side are you arguing? Clearly a psychotic, but a less damaging
> psychotic were guns less available.
>
>> The mafia, if it exists, isn't out to kill
>>> college kids. If it exists, some of their kids are in college, and Cho
>>> would on their hypothetical hit list.
>> AFAIK, the Mafia isn't hypothetical. They do use guns in final
>> solutions that honest citizens will not do.
>
> This could be a typo misudderstanding. I meant to say "Cho would *be*
> on their hypothetical hit list." The mafia can have handguns, too.
> They aint after me. Or you, I hope.
>
>>>>>> Really? Then, by your logic we should get rid of aircraft, tanks,
>>>>>> missiles, explosives beyond black powder including nukes, tv, computers,
>>>>>> the internet, automobiles, steamships, the internal combustion engine,
>>>>>> and so on, since all of these have evolved to form the components of a
>>>>>> military that is far more deadly than anyone who lived in 1776 could
>>>>>> ever have imagined.
>>>>> More tap dancing. My stance isn't technophobic. Far from it. My
>>>>> argument centers on whether the social utilility of handguns (the kind
>>>>> that can be used to kill people) is outweighed by their social
>>>>> detriment, and whether modern handguns *need* to be covered under 2A
>>>>> rights. Said rights do not apply to aircraft, nukes, computers, etc.,
>>>>> only guns.
>>>> Yet it is the 2A rights that have helped protect all our other rights.
>>> Helped, yes. The other 9 amendments protect us as well. They were
>>> written for good reasons.
>> Show me which of the other 9 amendments actually allow "We the
>> People..." the right to protect ourselves.
>
> They *all* do, fer criminey's sake. You don't consider freedom of
> speech, peaceable assemby, or *from* unlawful entry protection? To me,
> these protections are just as valuable as the right to bear arms. More
> so, in many cases.
And which ones support the right of self-protection? You may be
screaming, "You son of a bitch" while being murdered, but words won't
protect you there.
>
>>>>> Gun technology has evolved. People, not so much.
>>>> So? Communications technology has evolved. Yet we don't seem to limit
>>>> the 1A because of it. Yet the 1A gave us the LA riots after Rodney
>>>> King. How many died there? Why haven't you called for a ban on amateur
>>>> video cameras?
>>> Interesting question. Why haven't you?
>> I believe in freedom. You?
>
> I do. I just don't think guns = freedom, and in some respects can work
> oppositely. Cameras, otoh, I don't see as such a threat. An opinion
> (or a recording) has never killed anyone, even in the Rodney King
> rioting.
>
>
>
>>>>> Now that I'm done ranting, I'll answer your question. I can name one:
>>>>> a 9mm Glock.
>>>> Just the Glock?
>>> No. but you're deliberately missing the point, ie, being disingenuous.
>> Nope. I'm asking a question.
>
> A loaded question, yes.
>
> Of course not just the Glock. Handguns in general. You can keep your
> Hammerlis.
>
>>> I don't know guns, and you know I don't know guns. You tell me. Seems
>>> like a good place to start.
>> Because it was Cho's primary choice? He also used a .22 pistol.
>
> Not to nit-pick, but according to ballistics, he only used the Glock
> that day. Doesn't matter, I'd ban the .22 as well. And Smith & Wesson,
> and Browning, Colt, Luger, etc. Make and manufacturer isn't the issue.
>
>>> Which handguns/small guns/pistols/revolvers should be inaccessible to
>>> filberts, iyo?
>> Once someone is adjudged as a threat to others - all of them.
>
> Hey! We can agree on something.
>
>> But I
>> will not do a mass ban, as all people are not nut cases.
>
> Agreed, but it's the nut cases we *all* need to worry about. A
It sure as Hell ain't the solid citizen we need to worry about!
> And I'm
> not arguing for a mass ban either, unless you consider a handgun ban a
> mass ban. You probably do, huh?
That's a mass ban. And you know it.
>>>> How about the Browning Hi Power 9mm, designed in 1922?
>>>> Maybe the Colt .45, designed beginning in 1906? Does the broom-handle
>>>> Mauser of 1896 land on your list of guns to be banned?
>>> Don't know the Browning, and the Colt .45 from movies only, and never
>>> professed otherwise. Therefore, I have no comment.
>>>
>>> You've committed fallacy #3. See above
>> Hmmm?
>
> You're demanding gun expertise. One needn't be an expert on guns to
> know they can be used to kill.
Really? I suppose even a BB gun can kill - but it's most effective when
held by the barrel and used as a club.
Maybe you should learn something about guns.
>
>>>> Did you think the evolution of handguns was an artifact of only the last
>>>> few years?
>>>>
>>>> We've had powerful, repeating, magazine-fed handguns for over a century.
>>> ok, and 2A rights were written a century before that. Invoking them is
>>> a no-no.
>>>
>>> You've now argued fallacy #4. See above.
>> Whatever. My point stands. We - and school children - have had access
>> to powerful, concealable firearms for over a hundred years. Earlier,
>> there were revolvers in cap-and-ball, and later cartridge, versions.
>> Then there were the rifles, which in rural areas (and some urban areas)
>> were carried to school by kids who wanted to go hunting after school.
>>
>> What's changed?
>
> The guns! There weren't revolvers of any type in 1776. Those weren't
> invented until.. oh.. the early to mid 1800s. Clint Eastwood has one
> from pre- Civil War. You probably know better than I do, but all the
> guys who wrote 2A rights were dead.
The ones who wrote the rest of the Amendments are just as dead - yet I
suppose you're going to be positively dreary and insist on following
those dead white guy amendments.
>>>> Yet the school shootings are relatively recent and have become a
>>>> phenomena only over the last 50 years. It is also the last 50 years
>>>> that have seen the growth of a culture wherein children are largely
>>>> ignored in pursuit of whatever artificial goals the parents may find
>>>> more pleasing.
>>> I think you're off the mark, in gun speak. imo, it's not the kids, and
>>> never was or will be the kids. But, if you're going to grill me on
>>> guns, I'd like to hear your views on what goals, re: kids, are
>>> "artificial" and which ones aren't?
>> I didn't say it was the kids. I said that it was how they were raised.
>>
>> Mommy and Daddy both with "careers". Latch-key kids, with no
>> after-school supervision. Mega-schools wherein a child becomes nothing
>> but another number in the faceless crowd. Television programs which
>> glorify violence. Movies and video games which do the same. Families
>> which are too busy to even make it to church, or temple, one day a week.
>> Family values where a big-screen tv is more important than the kid's
>> progress in school. Schools which want active kids "doped" so the kid
>> will be passive in class.
>
> Are you by any chance a "South Park" watcher? If not, I can recommend
> an episode. In most cases, I tend to agree that "doping" kids is a bad
> idea.
>
> Mom & Dad having careers is modern day reality. I think kids are more
> adaptable than you do. They'll find ways to entertain themselves, and
> it usually isn't shooting up the schoolyard.
Many times it is. Or it's taking drugs, getting drunk, vandalizing the
school, shooting pedestrians from a car with a paintball gun, smashing
mail boxes, molesting smaller children, and any of a thousand other ways
to get in trouble.
Now most kids don't get in trouble. But the pages of any newspaper will
typically have details of such events on a daily basis.
> Church isn't part of it
> either. Churches screw up more people than they "fix." Organized
> religion must be tolerated, but should not be encouraged.
I'm not a fan of organized religions of any faith. Yet they accomplish
much good these days by offering a "good" lifestyle to kids who see
little good in the popular culture offered by Hollywood.
> Alternatively, I'd argue that public school teachers are grossly
> underpaid and overly administrated by overpaid administrators. At
> least in CA. The teachers used to care about the individual student.
> Some still do, but it's easy to see how the bureaucracy would wear
> them down.
Depends on where you are. I would NOT want to go to school in any large
city in CA these days. And most parents who have a choice now put their
kids into private schools - for good reasons. The crime rates in public
schools are truly abysmal.
> Movies and videos aren't the issue either. Kids know the difference
> between fantasy and reality.
Most do. But there's that ten percent. Ever see the imitators of the
Jackass TV show? Do you deny they exist?
>> The list can go on and on. And we've not even addressed the growth of
>> the Honor culture in disadvantaged areas.
>
> I don't know what the "Honor" culture is.
As an example: "The mofo dissed me so I had to shoot 'im!".
>> To ignore the fact that we had no such school shootings prior to the
>> 1960's is to ignore reality at our peril.
>
> Who's ignoring?? Some of your fellow hoplophiles have claimed school
> shootings *did* occur prior to 1960, but the incidents they cited
> looked more like feuds than the random killings we've seen recently.
The only one who has done that is Catl. And he's notoriously anti-gun,
as well as being near nutzo in his posts.
>>>> It isn't the tools these kids use when they act out - it's the fact that
>>>> the parenting they receive - and their entire cultural environment - has
>>>> become toxic that is the real problem. And it's getting worse.
>>> Not exactly sure what you mean by "cultural environment," but
>>> I'm genuinely interested in when you'd let kids have guns, what you'd
>>> let them shoot at first, what age you'd let them first go hunting,
>>> when you teach them to dress a kill, etc.
>> When I'd let kids have guns? That's a damn stupid, misleading question.
>
> There's no such thing as a stupi.. ok .. that's not true, but mine was
> genuine. 12,13, 14?? A good kid, I mean.
>
>> I'll let kids "have guns" when their families teach them firearms
>> safety, appropriate uses, and so supervise their use and de-mystify
>> them. And if the parents don't have time - as most of them won't, I'd
>> like to see firearms training done in the schools and the firearms
>> locked away so they cannot be used without adult supervision.
>>
>> If neither of these conditions can be met, then I'd wait until the "kid"
>> becomes a young adult, at 18 or 21.
>>
>>> And then, would the wrong timing cause a Cho, Klebold, or Harris?
>> It was apparently parental indifference and school bullying which
>> contributed to the creation of all three. Can you put a "time" on when
>> the kids flipped out? I can't. I didn't live in any of the three families.
>
> I can't either, which is why I asked. The reason I asked is that every
> kid gets bullied, or at least encounters bullies. Most of them don't
> react by using guns, and I'm thinking the earlier they're taught how
> to use guns, the *less* likely they'd be to resort to them.
Kids need good support and parenting to get by the bullying that is
endemic in our schools. I got bullied also, way back in 1960, but I had
no family support. I had to deal with it as best I could.
>
> Just a hypothesis...
>
>> Klebold and Harris got guns from ILLEGAL Straw Man purchases. Cho was
>> already 23 when he bought his two - LEGALLY, as an adult. The guns did
>> not create the problem; the problem in all three school shooters existed
>> long before they sought guns as a solution.
>
> No argument there, other than your use of "straw man," which means
> something completely different in usenet speak. Think I know what you
> mean, tho.
>
>>> I know that's a tough question. If you want to kill me for asking it,
>>> I'm in CM. CA.
>> I support free speech; no matter how asinine, misguided, or just plain
>> irritating. And at no time have I threatened you. That you would think
>> such of me shows just how much of an emotion-laden, non-factual meme
>> that guns are to you.
>
> It's called humor, the sense of which seems sorely lacking in
> hoplophiles.
>
> Did you really mean "meme?" What an odd word to use... I'm American.
> Wouldn't our meme be pro-gun?
>
> It's called humor. You gun guys don't seem to pick up on it.
>
> For the record - 'bama Brian has never threatened me in any way.
>
>>>> In attempts to solve these problems, we call for more and more big
>>>> government interference, throw more and more money at the problem, and
>>>> pile Pelion on Ossa in ever-more futile attempts to solve these
>>>> problems. Yet we cannot seem to look at the recent past and at what
>>>> worked well just 50 years back and use this guidance to solve today's
>>>> problems.
>>> You're living in the past, my Alabaman friend.
>> I don't live in Alabama.
>
> Then why the handle?
Would you be surprised to learn that Barack Obama is not from Alabama?
>> And those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it.
>> George Santayana, "The Life of Reason"
>
> "Even those who remember the past are doomed to repeat its missteps
> unless they take active measures to ensure against them in the
> present."
Did you notice I didn't use quotation marks?
>>> You can't blame
>>> excessive or insufficient gov't on the recent increase in multliple
>>> slayings. I don't think guns are to blame either, being inanimate
>>> objects, but seem to be the weapon of choice of animate objects.
>> I don't believe I did blame it on the gummint. I did however, put the
>> problem where it belongs, on how these kids are being raised and
>> schooled. If you're not willing to look at the lack of such school
>> shootings prior to the 1960's and ask yourself why, then you're just not
>> being honest with yourself - or with us.
>
> Seems any anti-gun argument = dishonesty in tpg. We can agree the
> trend is there, but will have to disagree about its cause or remedy.
Nope. Bring on your argument. Show us where we're wrong. Just stop
saying, "I think handguns are bad and should be banned" as your entire
argument.
>>>> So pardon me while I don't support your attempt to cure measles by
>>>> painting out the spots.
>>> Is that what you think I'm doing, or would attempt to do? Hmm.. You
>>> should know that my argument for handgun control isn't novel, and
>>> specifically addresses 2A rights, which I wholeheartedly support, in
>>> spite of what you might think
>> I don't think so. Today it will be the handguns. Then you'll be back
>> for the "assault rifles". Finally, you'll be back for the deer rifles
>> and the shotguns. I've been involved in the gun debate for decades -
>> and I've never seen any gun-grabber satisfied, except for a total ban on
>> all firearms in civilian hands. And you appear to be no exception.
>
> Well, you're wrong, and I'd even give the assault rifles back. There
> would need to be some limiter on making them fully automatic, and I
> believe such a device already exists. Something that could be removed,
> but would get you in trouble if you did. Somewhere along the lines of
> putting more than 5? shots in a shotgun when you're hunting birds. You
> can break the law if you choose, but can also have the gun confiscated
> if you do. In times where assault rifles are truly necessary, one
> wouldn't care about the law any more. That's the situation addressed
> by 2A rights.
Are you not aware that the so-called assault rifles banned by the
Clinton administration were nothing but ugly semi-autos, and not full
autos? But I digress; your ignorance may be showing again.
>>> I still say the burden of producing the "cure" lies in the hands of
>>> pro-gun.
>> Since the misuse of firearms is a socio-economic, demographic issue, the
>> "cure" is pretty obvious. But you've been led to thought - and won't
>> think because it doesn't suit your emotional bias.
>
> I've been led to think, by you guys, that your arguments are canned,
> and that *you* guys are the ones being led as opposed to doing your
> own thinking.
Since you've exhibited no thinking whatsoever, I'm surprised you say that.
> You say anti-gun argument is emotional and biased. You're half right.
> I'm biased against being shot. I'm biased against kids being shot.
> Pardon my bias. However, the argument against handguns is logical.
When were you shot? When were your kids shot? Your argument against
handguns is hardly rational. You've ignored or belittled all that we've
said, although all you've ever said is that handguns are bad. Seems to
me that you're the irrational one.
> And, your "cure" is pretty unrealistic, wouldn't you say? How do we
> change socioeconomic demographics? If you could figure that one out,
> *you'd* win the Nobel Prize, and we wouldn't be debating the relative
> merits of handgun ownership.
I can name half a dozen ways to begin these changes - but you'll have to
get out and vote for someone who will support them. Would you attend
city council meetings? You may even have to walk the wards in a "get
out the vote" effort. Are you willing to do that? Or is the E-Z fix of
banning handguns the best you can do?
>
>>>>> At the moment, yes. A few more incidents like the one at VT, and it
>>>>> may no longer be so.
>>>> Yes, I'm sure you'd like to see the laws and rights of a free people
>>>> defined and limited in a knee-jerk response to a sensational tragedy.
>>> Correction: Tragedies, as in plural. And increasing.
>> Then why won't you look at the REAL problems? Why do you have your head
>> buried in your personal emotional sand?
>
> Because socioeconomic problems, regardless of our differing ideas on
> the best way to treat them, will never be cured. You're the idealist,
> not I.
Nope. Your method is to treat all Americans like criminals and ban
handguns. If that isn't idealism of the worst sort, I don't know what
else to call it.
We will NEVER, EVER get to zero handgun deaths. NEVER! It ain't
a'gonna happen, so long as there are guns in the country, whether in
civilian hands, police hands, or the military's hands. So your handgun
ban will NOT stop the handgun violence. If nothing else, the cops will
sell handguns to the criminals out of the police's own armaments. It's
happened often before - and will happen often again.
So let's stop pretending that limiting freedom will have a good outcome.
Limiting freedom has never had a good outcome in any country, anywhere
in the world, at any time.
>>>> The Patriot Act was such a wonderful piece of legislation enacted to
>>>> support our freedom after 9/11 ...
>>> I won't even touch that one.
>> How about the Military Commissions Act?
>
> Yikes. I think we have enough on the table already, don't you?
>
>> Knee-jerk legislation enacted to solve a sensational immediate problem
>> is wrong, wrong, WORNG!
>
> Generally, yes, but don't think reaction to the increase in random
> shootings over the last 10-20 years qualifies as knee-jerk. It's not
> going to fix itself; that much is certain. What would Santayana say?
What would Jesus do?
On the one hand, you accuse me of speculation - and then you turn around
and invite it.
Your reaction to the VT tragedy damn well is knee-jerk - and your fix
for it is absolutely Draconian. It is also anti-freedom, but I'm sure
you rationalize it away with the wishful, "if it saves just one
child..." thinking.
