Tragedies continue because liberals lack common sense & don't comprehend security

[Oldstyle]

I will agree that I'm extremely disappointed that they appear to not be working on any of the other fronts. I hope that they are, but it certainly appears they are sold on the guns laws only which I view as a mistake. Certainly gun laws are part of a Democratic agenda. But I also feel it would be a mistake to completely ignore tragedies. I think that many of them do believe the gun laws are the fix and they are sincere in wanting to save lives. Just as I feel many pro gunner have the right intentions. I don't think you close the door on either sides ideas.

Then I would suggest that you check yourself and desist from calling those with genuine misgivings about the wisdom of imposing laws "childish". Quite frankly, it's insulting.

I don't feel I have called any good arguments childish. I do however find some of them quite insulting. But I will try to be alert to it in the future. You should be aware that some of the arguments I have heard have been essentially just name calling. I don't have any respect for that and in fact find it childish. I think if you look at all my posts you'll find I tend to be one of the most calm headed and respectful in the conversation.

When you call someone with a lifetime of experience "childish" simply because their viewpoint doesn't jive with yours then that's hardly "respectful", Brain.

 

[Brain357]

With all due respect, Brain...I would NOT give up my ability to defend myself to make the overall violent crime rate go down by .5! I'm sorry but in my opinion to do so is to play the lottery with my safety and the safety of my loved ones...something that I view as irresponsible.

Would you agree to drive 20 mph from now on to save lives from car crashes? I think the case could be made that far more lives would be saved doing THAT then would be saved by more gun control laws.

And spare me the naive generalizations about corporations. They are as varied in their outlook as most individuals are. This notion that corporations are inherently "evil" is silly.

I ment go down to .5. So from 4.8 to .5. I don't know if that changes your answer or not, but my answer remains the same.

If the law was 20 mph I would do that. I have never gotten a speeding ticket. Would I agree it is a great idea? Probably not. I think there is a big difference between accidental deaths and homicides.

So you want to take away my ability to protect myself and my loved ones on some pie in the sky reduction of the homicide rate from 4.8 to .5? I find you rather naive, Brain. No disrespect but that's the way you're coming across here...

I think you're very aware that with the level of violence prevalent in American society that your .5 number is almost laughably out of reach unless you make sweeping changes to the urban landscape that nobody on the Left is even contemplating let alone pursuing.

I thought I was actually very clear that it was just a silly hypothetical. As I said it could not be guaranteed. I was stating that what I want is a more safe country. There is obviously no one thing that could be done to make the country that much safer. But if there was and it could be guaranteed you bet I would do it. I don't care if it's no guns or giving a gun to everyone. I'm a little disappointed that your so selfish that you wouldn't do it just because your too worried about yourself. I suppose you are pro life also?

 

[Brain357]

Then I would suggest that you check yourself and desist from calling those with genuine misgivings about the wisdom of imposing laws "childish". Quite frankly, it's insulting.

I don't feel I have called any good arguments childish. I do however find some of them quite insulting. But I will try to be alert to it in the future. You should be aware that some of the arguments I have heard have been essentially just name calling. I don't have any respect for that and in fact find it childish. I think if you look at all my posts you'll find I tend to be one of the most calm headed and respectful in the conversation.

When you call someone with a lifetime of experience "childish" simply because their viewpoint doesn't jive with yours then that's hardly "respectful", Brain.

And what is name calling?

 

[Brain357]

Of course they would be worse. My problem isn't with having laws against private citizens owning automatic weapons, rocket launchers or tanks...my problem is with the ultimate goal of gun control activists and that's the removal of all guns from the hands of private citizens. Do you not agree that for many on the far left that they won't really be happy until they take away the right to bear arms?

I will only say that my intention is that I want what will ultimately make this the safest country in the world. If we have guns or not I don't really care. If someone could guarantee to you that the violent crime rate would go down to say .5 if everyone gave up their guns, would you? I would. It of course can't be guaranteed, but my point is I would do what will save lives. I think there are a lot of arguments that are not good or truthful completely closing the door on what might be an important front in the war. Is taking gun info from the NRA a good idea? It certainly is imortant to them that guns be popular and I believe they get a lot of money from gun corporations. And as you probably know corporations don't have feeling, no heart, no soul... They care about making money. Corporations are great when I'm buying a big tv for cheap. Not so good when they are poluting or providing unsafe products. I don't think we should rely on information from the drug companies, do you?

With all due respect, Brain...I would NOT give up my ability to defend myself to make the overall violent crime rate go down by .5! I'm sorry but in my opinion to do so is to play the lottery with my safety and the safety of my loved ones...something that I view as irresponsible.

Would you agree to drive 20 mph from now on to save lives from car crashes? I think the case could be made that far more lives would be saved doing THAT then would be saved by more gun control laws.

And spare me the naive generalizations about corporations. They are as varied in their outlook as most individuals are. This notion that corporations are inherently "evil" is silly.

I almost skipped over this one. I didn't say they were inherently evil. I said they have one care and that is making money. It could be making really great children's car seats that saves lives. But they are doing it to make money. What big corporation do you think has some other agenda?

 

[Brain357]

Then I would suggest that you check yourself and desist from calling those with genuine misgivings about the wisdom of imposing laws "childish". Quite frankly, it's insulting.

I don't feel I have called any good arguments childish. I do however find some of them quite insulting. But I will try to be alert to it in the future. You should be aware that some of the arguments I have heard have been essentially just name calling. I don't have any respect for that and in fact find it childish. I think if you look at all my posts you'll find I tend to be one of the most calm headed and respectful in the conversation.

When you call someone with a lifetime of experience "childish" simply because their viewpoint doesn't jive with yours then that's hardly "respectful", Brain.

A wise man can have a childish oppinion on a certain topic. It does not make him childish, but his ideas on that subject are still childish. If you think I have called you as a person childish then I will apologize now. If I said one of your arguments was childish and it is then I can't do much about that. But I will be clear that I do not think you are at all childish.

 

[boilermaker55]

If you want to trade insults numbnuts. I am quite well informed but I am not brain washed like you in any manner. So take all your ridiculous right wing tea party propaganda and spew it all you wish.
You really don't have any idea of what my position is on gun rights so you hatred shows so greatly you make an ass of yourself

What ever in the hell are you talking about. The NRA has had its way in this country since its inception. Seems you have no idea what in the hell you are even talking about.

Anyone and everyone with the exceptions of felons can have a gun. And you have the stupid mind to post this post.

Actually, what ever in the hell are you talking about? You may want to turn on a TV every once in a while. Maybe read a newspaper. Possibly some news websites on the internet?

By the way, the NRA hasn't "had their way" with this country. The Constitution has had it's way with this country - all the NRA has done is uphold and defend it. Something even assholes like you should be doing.

 

[FA_Q2]

Thank you for the well thought out response. I wish everyone here would do that rather than just take the talking points from the NRA or the far left for that matter. We might actually be able to fix the problem that way. I was just giving you a hard time about the clip. If you were arguing for gun control the pro gunners would say you don't know anything about guns and blah blah blah.

I try and I am always looking for a good debate. Sometimes its hard to find here.

I figured about the clip. I don’t get angry about misstatements like many here seem to do. The use of the word ‘clip’ and ‘magazine’ is separate from the actual point even if it was inaccurate.

I don't dissagree about someone having two .45's for example. But why even appose a ban on high capacity magazines then? Wouldn't two .45's with say 16 round magazines be more deadly yet? Since there aren't any examples of the high capacity magazines being used for defense I think at worst it doesn't hurt anything. At best maybe some guy has to reload and drops his clip and gets tackled.

I guess I view every life as being very valuable. If you can save a few lives in a mass shooting then why not try? Will it drastically effect the overall homicide rate? Probably not, I still like to think the mass shooting are very rare, but again every life is valuable.

This is likely the largest are that we are goig to disagree on but I hope that I can show you the light

You ask why does it matter then? I hold life just as important as you and think that we should try our damndest to save every person we can BU*T (and this is a BIG but) there is a line that we need to acknowledge. The reality is the safest and BEST government to live under if safety and preservation of life is the metric you are measuring would be fascism or despotism. That is a simple truth.

Preservation of life is important but not at the expense of freedom. Where you want to air on the side of protection I am absolutely against that concept. I ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS air on the side of FREEDOM. Whenever you wish to take anything away, be it a big gulp, a large clip or smoking, I err on the side of freedom and fight it with every breath I take unless there are real and tangable benefits that can be proven AND those benefits outweigh the cost in freedom.

For example, the restriction on the right of free speech that makes yelling fire in a theater (or other crowded place) illegal is a sound restriction on freedom. The right to privacy that has been taken by the patriot act CLEARLY has saved lives and protects us but the COST is way too damn high. The patriot act is terrible law. Life is not the ONLY thing to consider here, our freedom is also an important consideration. The cost is low and the payoff high as related to that cost. The payoff with a restriction on magazine size is not only not proven but utter conjecture. It lacks enough reasoning for me as well as I can fabricate a large capacity magazine with ease, aquire one that is already in circulation or use more than one weapon (ie, the 2 guns example that I gave earlier). My beef here with your idea is essentially this: you want to limit freedom because YOU don’t see it as a large loss of said freedom. I also do not have a need for large cap mags, don’t own any and have no plans on purchasing the, but the idea that freedom is taken from people without what I consider due diligence in the reasoning goes against everything that I stand for.

The people that created the patriot act likely used your exact same logic. DO you think it was applied correctly there? Are you comfortable with how far this hole goes? If limiting 10 is allright, why not 5 or 1. That, BTW, is NOT a slippery slope argument. It is the same logic applied universally and it is the logic that can and WILL be used again and again...

Every life is valuable. EVERY FREEDOM IS ALSO VALABLE. Do not discount freedom.

I agree with much of what you say about viewing numbers from other countries. You would have to admit that Russia is often given as a pro gun argument when it is really not valid. So how do you counter that? Well pointing out the low homicide rates of countries with strict gun laws. For the sake of the US I hope that the number of guns is in fact not much of a factor in homicide rate. It could be other countries ban the violent video games, or violent movies, or some of the drugs we use to treat mental health, or do better policing.... But given that all the countries with much better homicide rates do have more strict gun laws, I think that would be a mistake to not look into it further.

And many that have worse homicide rates ALSO have stricter gun laws. As a matter of fact, ALMOST THE WHOLE WORLD has stricter gun laws. I do not aspire to be like the rest of the world.

That said, IF, and only if, the statistical analysis showed that gun laws in those countries was a factor in the lower homicide rates would such a comparison be valid. As the data does NOT support that claim, such data is meaningless. You might as well claim that every country that has a lower homicide rate is does not contain states, or a congress, or have a bill of rights, or does not sell hummus on Tuesday. All those would be just as meaningful. FIRST you need to establish that gun laws have a positive effect, AND THEN you compare the gun laws with our gun laws. That is the ONLY logical order to do it in.

How about we look at Canada?

In 1991, Bill C-17 tightened up restrictions and established controls on numerous firearms. Since about then the violent crime rate went down through 2007. They currently have a homicide rate of 1.6 which is drastically better than ours. Not a perfect comparison of course, but is there something to learn from this? There may very well be. Is it wise to completely write if off? I think that would be a mistake.

How about we look at Canada. First, we need to address your thumbnail. It is not cited. It does not explain itself at all. It does not even use the metric we are going by: homicide rate. It does not even mention the country that it applies to. I REALLY hope you did not pull this from a blog. Essentially, you should not even have posted it

Really, I KNOW you can do better than that

It took some digging but here we go:
Police-reported crime statistics in Canada, 2011
official Canadian source on this with some good data.

All violent crime (except sexual assault against children) have been on a gradual down trend since 1980 and the data in your thumbnail is outright false. There is simply no dicernable way for me to fit the increase in your cite with the actual numbers. It looks as though the gun law had little to no effect in canida as well with the homicide rate starting at 2.5 and decreasing to just under 2.0 after a decade

We can see that directly after the law was passed (I did not check the date but I am going off of your 1991 timeframe) a sharp increase in homicides tool place, leveled out the next year and then continues the same downward trend that had been going on the previous years. Note: I am NOT attributing the spike to gun laws – spikes happen and that is a given. That trend line dies not really change at all. As far as I can tell, this is not a good piece of evidence for gun control, the law does not look like it altered the trend at all.

Further, the piece that interests me quite a bit is the fact that attempted murders and actual murders have CONVERGED a lot after the law passed. That went from a full point in difference to just .1 difference. That is, 40% of attempted murders FAILED and now a pithy 2% fail. Possible that might be due to people lacking protection but the criminals not lacking the offensive means to kill? I believe that is likely but I would need to pull up more evidence to support so I will just leave that as an interesting thing to think about for the time being.

All said and done, I don’t think Canada is the example you were looking for unless you can present this data in another way.

 

[Oldstyle]

I ment go down to .5. So from 4.8 to .5. I don't know if that changes your answer or not, but my answer remains the same.

If the law was 20 mph I would do that. I have never gotten a speeding ticket. Would I agree it is a great idea? Probably not. I think there is a big difference between accidental deaths and homicides.

So you want to take away my ability to protect myself and my loved ones on some pie in the sky reduction of the homicide rate from 4.8 to .5? I find you rather naive, Brain. No disrespect but that's the way you're coming across here...

I think you're very aware that with the level of violence prevalent in American society that your .5 number is almost laughably out of reach unless you make sweeping changes to the urban landscape that nobody on the Left is even contemplating let alone pursuing.

I thought I was actually very clear that it was just a silly hypothetical. As I said it could not be guaranteed. I was stating that what I want is a more safe country. There is obviously no one thing that could be done to make the country that much safer. But if there was and it could be guaranteed you bet I would do it. I don't care if it's no guns or giving a gun to everyone. I'm a little disappointed that your so selfish that you wouldn't do it just because your too worried about yourself. I suppose you are pro life also?

I'm "selfish" because I believe that people have an obligation to do everything that they can to protect themselves and their loved ones from harm? Why is that selfish? What it is, is being self reliant...something that Americans used to be known for but over the past fifty years has slowly disappeared from our national makeup.

It might shock you, Brain...but I'm not pro life! Nor am I opposed to same sex marriage. Even more shocking? I'm an agnostic. OMG!!! Seriously, dude...you need to stop generalizing. Simply because I'm a fiscal conservative doesn't mean I'm a bible thumping bigot. I believe in common sense solutions to problems. I don't believe in "silly hypothetical" solutions to problems. Why waste time on something that you KNOW isn't going to happen?

 

[buckeye45_73]

So you want to take away my ability to protect myself and my loved ones on some pie in the sky reduction of the homicide rate from 4.8 to .5? I find you rather naive, Brain. No disrespect but that's the way you're coming across here...

I think you're very aware that with the level of violence prevalent in American society that your .5 number is almost laughably out of reach unless you make sweeping changes to the urban landscape that nobody on the Left is even contemplating let alone pursuing.

I thought I was actually very clear that it was just a silly hypothetical. As I said it could not be guaranteed. I was stating that what I want is a more safe country. There is obviously no one thing that could be done to make the country that much safer. But if there was and it could be guaranteed you bet I would do it. I don't care if it's no guns or giving a gun to everyone. I'm a little disappointed that your so selfish that you wouldn't do it just because your too worried about yourself. I suppose you are pro life also?

I'm "selfish" because I believe that people have an obligation to do everything that they can to protect themselves and their loved ones from harm? Why is that selfish? What it is, is being self reliant...something that Americans used to be known for but over the past fifty years has slowly disappeared from our national makeup.

It might shock you, Brain...but I'm not pro life! Nor am I opposed to same sex marriage. Even more shocking? I'm an agnostic. OMG!!! Seriously, dude...you need to stop generalizing. Simply because I'm a fiscal conservative doesn't mean I'm a bible thumping bigot. I believe in common sense solutions to problems. I don't believe in "silly hypothetical" solutions to problems. Why waste time on something that you KNOW isn't going to happen?

Dont worry that guy is a moron. he says being pro life is selfish, but aborting a kid to continue your hoish party lifestyle isnt....hmmmmmm....what a dumbass.

I like how he tries to seem reasonable when he's full of shit....he knows it wont do anything for crime, yet he wants to curb our rights, just in case. This sounds a lot like his global warming (and yeah I bet a million bucks, he's a global warming lover) scam....just in case...yet all the people that back this bill will still have guns, houses with security systems, guard dogs, ect. But Tyrone in the ghetto wont be able to buy a gun legally........and they say the right is racist and doesnt care about poor people.......lol

 

[Oldstyle]

I will only say that my intention is that I want what will ultimately make this the safest country in the world. If we have guns or not I don't really care. If someone could guarantee to you that the violent crime rate would go down to say .5 if everyone gave up their guns, would you? I would. It of course can't be guaranteed, but my point is I would do what will save lives. I think there are a lot of arguments that are not good or truthful completely closing the door on what might be an important front in the war. Is taking gun info from the NRA a good idea? It certainly is imortant to them that guns be popular and I believe they get a lot of money from gun corporations. And as you probably know corporations don't have feeling, no heart, no soul... They care about making money. Corporations are great when I'm buying a big tv for cheap. Not so good when they are poluting or providing unsafe products. I don't think we should rely on information from the drug companies, do you?

With all due respect, Brain...I would NOT give up my ability to defend myself to make the overall violent crime rate go down by .5! I'm sorry but in my opinion to do so is to play the lottery with my safety and the safety of my loved ones...something that I view as irresponsible.

Would you agree to drive 20 mph from now on to save lives from car crashes? I think the case could be made that far more lives would be saved doing THAT then would be saved by more gun control laws.

And spare me the naive generalizations about corporations. They are as varied in their outlook as most individuals are. This notion that corporations are inherently "evil" is silly.

I almost skipped over this one. I didn't say they were inherently evil. I said they have one care and that is making money. It could be making really great children's car seats that saves lives. But they are doing it to make money. What big corporation do you think has some other agenda?

Oh, I'm sorry...you didn't say they were "evil"...you said that they had no feelings, no heart and no soul. Once again, Brain...corporations are as varied as snowflakes. Ben & Jerry's is a corporation but they have quite a bit of heart and soul.

As for what corporations "agenda" is? Do you really not understand that it's the duty of corporate officers to do their best to create a profit for the stockholders of their corporation? Let me guess...you're one of those poor brainwashed youngsters that believes that making a profit is taking advantage of people?