Guns don't kill people ....

[glatt]

the Darwin awards are for people who do such stupid things it takes them out of the gene pool before they have a chance to reproduce. But it's cruel to prevent the reproduction after the fact like they did here. It would have been better if they took themselves out before the kids were born.

[chrisinhouston]

Today after Obama mentioning how he would like to see Guantanamo closed I saw a quote from Lindsey Graham when it was last proposed saying:

“Simply stated, the American people don’t want to close Guantanamo Bay, which is an isolated, military-controlled facility, to bring these crazy bastards that want to kill us all to the United States,”

But he just voted against any change or increase background checks for gun purchases when the majority of Americans want them increased.

Oh the irony!

[Lamplighter]

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by chrisinhouston

Today after Obama mentioning how he would like to see Guantanamo closed I saw a quote from Lindsey Graham when it was last proposed saying:

“Simply stated, the American people don’t want to close Guantanamo Bay, which is an isolated, military-controlled facility, to bring these crazy bastards that want to kill us all to the United States,”

But he just voted against any change or increase background checks for gun purchases when the majority of Americans want them increased.

Oh the irony!

Well, Chris, tell me please how doing the antigenocide thing could add up to crazy?

Before you go demonstrating your ignorance of the three prerequisites to get a genocide going, consider that being a well-armed electorate physically prevents a genocide from being successful.

Doesn't stop the odd murder while running drugs, particularly when you note that users are dealers, but it does stop genocides.

[JamesB]

Originally Posted by morethanpretty

Who in there right mind thinks a 5 year old is responsible enough to own a gun?! How is that even legal?

It's worse than that.

While most of the news services are saying that the 5 year old received the gun as a gift and the general public is reading that as "recent gift", a few other news services have revealed that the 5 year old had been given the gun over a year earlier as a 4th birthday present.

[Sundae]

I was thinking of Big Sarge when I heard this on the radio.
It was a rifle.
It was for hunting.
Family lived in rural Kentucky and used guns for hunting and the boy went out with his Dad.

Sarge has taken all his kids hunting.
But Sarge was in the military and the Police.
He would never had left a gun in the corner of the room. A loaded gun?! NO.

In this specific case I don't believe anything or anyone is to blame except for the irresponsible parents. That's like putting a corrosive liquid in a lemonade bottle in the fridge. Children all over the world play "Bang, bang you're dead." The boy would have known better than any English child what happens when you shoot a gun. There is a tiny chance he is a budding psycopath, but there is a far greater chance that the lad was playing and never expected his toy to be primed for slaughter.

[ZenGum]

^WSS^

Now son, Daddy's 303 is too big for you, so we got you this special lil' .22. It's yours, but it sits in the gun cabinet, all locked up, with the other guns. Then, when we go shooting, you can carry it, and I'll stand by you and hand you the bullets one at a time so you can shoot them.

Nope, seems Daddy's an idiot. Sad.

[BigV]

So, so sad.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Sad, but nature's way. You do stupid shit, you get fucked up and/or die.

[piercehawkeye45]

A very good perspective on an intelligent gun control measure:

...

Arrested, tried, convicted, and sentenced to a jarring 28 years to life at Attica, I entered prison. For many years I sifted through a host of rationalizations, but today I accept responsibility. I’m sorry for killing Alex, sorry for taking all the life he could have had.

With this in mind, I wish to add some perspective to the gun-control debate. My first gun was a chrome .25 caliber automatic with a pink, pearl handle. It was beautiful. But it was a killing machine, and at 14 years old I had the same hole in my heart that President Obama, in a Chicago speech, stated other child killers had. I had no business with that gun. Yet making guns accessible to troubled souls is business as usual in America.

Here’s how the game works. Criminals manipulate people with clean records -- cash-strapped students, vulnerable women, drug addicts -- to buy guns for them in states with minimal oversight, like Virginia. The criminal transports the guns to New York, then resells them or trades them for drugs that he’ll take back to Virginia to sell. This was the hustle when I was out in the ‘90s. I’m sure some form of it still continues.

...

Likewise, it’s bizarre that the bazaars selling guns aren’t regulated. Websites like Armslist.com provide a buffet of leads for charismatic criminals to buy guns from private sellers. These sites are like perpetual gun shows, which are truly the ultimate forums to make connections for criminals who blend in well -- like me.

Bottom line, criminals create an indirect demand for gun manufacturers and merchandisers. For most criminals, purchasing a gun isn’t a one-shot deal. I had two separate gun-possession charges before I killed with an assault rifle. These are my convictions, but they hardly represent the number of guns I went through during my criminal career.

Engulfed in an orgy of violence, my last month of freedom was chaos. Home invasions, robberies, murder -- at the center of it all were guns: They would be disposed of, tossed after shoot-outs, then bought again. Easily. And I always bought new guns, so the notion that criminals just use stolen guns, acquired from a neighborhood burglar, is absurd. (The paper trail may suggest that, because the people making straw purchases also file false reports claiming the guns stolen.) Like most criminals, I created an extraordinary demand for the gun sector.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/...ontrol/278824/

[Undertoad]

We went over this many moons ago UG. Britain: gun control, no guns, no genocide. Iraq: no gun control, place is lousy with AK47s, genocide.

If you can't reasonably explain this, you MUST change your mind, if you are capable.

[piercehawkeye45]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

We went over this many moons ago UG. Britain: gun control, no guns, no genocide. Iraq: no gun control, place is lousy with AK47s, genocide.

If you can't reasonably explain this, you MUST change your mind, if you are capable.

Agreed. It is more about how violent the society is at the time. Violent societies with guns....gun violence. Non-violent societies with guns.....low gun violence. Violent societies without guns.....non-gun violence.

[Big Sarge]

Wasn't there a recently released study showing Russia, which has strict gun control, has a very high gun violence rate? I believe it also showed Norway with a very high gun ownership rate but with the lowest gun violence in Europe.

Anyway, my 5 year old shoots guns and I hope she kills her first deer this year. Addie's "stepdad" and I are in the same hunting club

[lookout123]

tw must have lost his password.

[chrisinhouston]

Nice one from the Atlanta Journal/Constitution: