Well this one was close to home...
"San Bernardino shooting live updates: Syed Farook named as a suspect in attack that killed 14"
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/l...htmlstory.html
Printable View
Well this one was close to home...
"San Bernardino shooting live updates: Syed Farook named as a suspect in attack that killed 14"
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/l...htmlstory.html
San Berdoo is in my old backyard... I used to live in Rancho Cuca... spent a lot of time in SB and in the Mts just above it.
-tg
Why is it an "active" shooter? I suppose that a sedentary shooter would be somewhat less dangerous, but if they were so sedentary that they were asleep, would they still be shooters? Therefore, EVERY shooter should be active or they aren't shooters.
two out of three are no longer active at all...
-tg
CNN has done quite the bang-up job removing all those speculative articles they posted yesterday before anyone knew anything about the killers.
I watched the news for a few hours yesterday. It was amazing all of the misinformation that was being handed out.
I would rather be slow and accurate than fast and wrong.
The one rule you can count on in these cases is that the initial reports are wrong.
Is it true that the Republicans have just voted down legislation that would block suspected terrorists, felons, mentally ill from buying guns ??
did i really just read that?
Yeppers. The suspected terrorists can't get on a plane but they can buy a gun.
Just because you get placed on a list with no due process, should ones rights be taken away? Felons are already prohibited from buying or possessing firearms. The 'suspected terrorist' list is completely different from the 'no fly' list.
Then why not change the bill to match the No Fly list, and keep the bits about felons and mentally ill?
The argument against the mentally ill restriction is that the situation is temporary and hard to define. Depression is often correlated with gun violence (not necessarily against others, of course, but suicides are wrapped into the statistics), yet depression is a fairly vague, nebulous, and often temporary condition. It might be theoretically reasonable to restrict gun possession by depressed people, but it is not practical to implement as a law.
My personal feeling is that we are required to demonstrate a minimal (VERY minimal) competence and obtain a license to operate an automobile due to the potential harm a person could cause with it. We are also required in many states to undergo a far more rigorous training before we are allowed to get a hunting license. I see no good reason not to require the same for gun ownership. The idea that a license would be the first step towards a ban is absurd....until they come for our cars.
The time to change the bill is in committee, and there were far more provisions in this bill than just preventing the mentally ill and those on the terrorist watchlist from obtaining firearms.Quote:
Originally Posted by NeedSomeAnswers
It's pretty obvious this bill was sent to the floor for a vote in this form precisely so it could be used as a political weapon to bash the Republicans who would inevitably vote against it.
Setting aside the slippery slope and history repeating...Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
Would said license be essentially 'allowed to own firearms' with a 'pistol' endorsement, 'rifle' endorsement, 'automatic' endorsement, 'suppressor' endorsement, and so on?
I believe there was a counter-bill proposed which would place those who are on the watch list into a 72 hour hold after attempting to purchase firearm(s) to allow the authorities time to obtain a court order, and follow a due process procedure.Quote:
Originally Posted by homer13j
The news cycle does tend to accentuate the 'blocking' by republicans, but ignores the fact that alternatives were offered (just like the alternatives proposed to the ACA).
I would say that something more like the requirements in the hunter's education program we run would be appropriate. Hunting accidents have seen a steep decline in recent decades, which is often attributed to the wide adoption of mandatory hunter education classes. What gets covered in other states I couldn't say, but in Idaho, you need to have been through the class even for an archery hunt.Quote:
Originally Posted by SJWhiteley
On the other hand, that would be a FAR steeper requirement than we have for the standard drivers license. To get a CDL, the requirements are fairly strict, and to maintain one you have to participate in random drug testing, but for the class D you have a small written test and a modest driving test. To renew either driving or hunting licenses, you need....a pulse...and that's about all.
Would that leave the gun show loophole in place?Quote:
Originally Posted by SJWhiteley
If I wanted to buy a gun for any kind of nefarious purpose, I wouldn't be going to a store.
Eating cabbage always gives me serious intestinal gas, and my girlfriend's mother made kielbasa & sauerkraut for dinner tonight.
I am now an active pooter. :eek:
People who want a firearm with bad intent will usually find a way through backdoor channels.
Correct. No amount of gun laws will prevent criminals from obtaining guns. News flash, criminals don't follow the laws. What makes people think they will be stopped from buying guns?
It would, of course, but it's not clear what the 'loophole' really is: effectively, people who want to buy a gun from another individual do not go through a background check, as long as the seller and buyer reside in the same state.Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
So, the change would be that to sell any (hand)gun to an individual, that individual must go through a background check - probably by going through an FFL. This solves a minor number of problems, though. The only issue it solves is the strictly honest person selling a gun to a prohibited individual. It's trying to regulate a transaction between two individuals; very difficult.
One of the other issues is calling it a 'gun show loophole'; if the left continue to refer to it as that, they could get exactly what they want. Sell [edit: buy] a firearm at a gun show [edit: from and individual - buying from a dealer ALWAYS requires a background check], then you would have to go through an FFL. Is being in the parking lot considered being 'at' the gun show? This is where playing politics and being disingenuous gets you into trouble.
Yeah, I guess guns can change hands pretty simply. Lots gets stolen, too. Not much background checking goes on in those cases, as far as I know.
I'm not judging the US gun laws (I think your problems are societal rather than caused by your lax gun laws - although they probably enable incidents to be worse than they would be otherwise) but I've always thought this argument was flawed. Having gun laws in place doesn't prevent a criminal from obtaining a gun but it does make possession of a gun a prosecutable offence. In other words, criminals may well still be able to obtain a gun but you get the opportunity to stop them before they use it.Quote:
People who want a firearm with bad intent will usually find a way through backdoor channels
I'm not convinced tightening your gun laws would suddenly turn all the criminals straight and I do have some sympathy for the self-protection argument (though it doesn't speak highly of your security forces) but the lax gun laws do normalise possession, making it MUCH harder to police. So if you believe that taking guns out of your society would reduce your crime rate then legislating against their sale and ownership would make a substantial difference.
One thing I would like to say as a massive compliment to my US cousins: you don't seem to have allowed this to turn you guys against immigration or muslims (or at least, no more than you were already) which could so easily have been the outcome. You seem to have kept your rationality and seen this for what it is. You guys get a lot of flack and are often portrayed as stupid and simplistic but the way you've responded to this gives that stereotype the lie.
OOOH! I recognize that! Sarcasm!Quote:
Originally Posted by FunkyDexter
If you're not getting that part of the news over there, you're lucky... that seems to be exactly what it has turned into. States are rejecting Syrian refugees (although that movement began with Paris) and the likes of Trump is calling for a Islam/Muslim registry -- apparently he thinks it's 1938 here... and it's just getting worse.
-tg
I agree. I've been getting it from the news and from emails.
One thing about gun laws is that they aren't applicable in all parts of the country. If you live in a high crime area, your view of things is certainly going to be different from mine. In my case, I spent twenty minutes, or more, this morning, wandering around the house trying to figure out what weird place I left my keys (it's good practice, as I get older). Eventually, having ruled out all the reasonable places, I figured that they must have managed to fall from my pocket. I then retraced my steps looking for anywhere they might have fallen. Once that search turned up nothing (except for dust bunnies), I decided that possibly I had gone out to check the mail. Upon opening the front door, I found the keys....hanging from the lock, on the outside of the door.
That wasn't as lax as we were when I was growing up in New Hampshire. My parents drove up to Maine one weekend to drop me off (I found my way home, but it took a few months...they were so funny). When they got home, they found that not only had they not locked the front door, they hadn't even closed it. On the other hand, I never did have a key to that house, and can only remember one or two times in twenty years that they actually locked the door.
There are still places where it just doesn't matter all that much.
Actually, no it wasn't. Other than Donald Trump (who's basically a loony) the way you guys are playing out in the news over here is pretty good at the moment. Our press usually takes any chance to portray you guys as being dumb as a biscuit so I'm surprised if we're doing the opposite this time round.Quote:
OOOH! I recognize that! Sarcasm
Oh well, I guess you are all as stupid as we think you are after all:p
So i did a bit of reading which showed me that the The 'suspected terrorist' list is probably not the tool to use to ban people from owning guns.Quote:
Just because you get placed on a list with no due process, should ones rights be taken away? Felons are already prohibited from buying or possessing firearms. The 'suspected terrorist' list is completely different from the 'no fly' list.
Out of interest though are you guys generally in favour of
- no change at all?
- Some change to tighten loopholes as to background checks?
- maybe some change but have no confidence that Politicians will enact a good solution?
I cant suddenly pretend i am a fan but hey it's not my country.Quote:
I'm not judging the US gun laws
On the terrorism front though, we had a terrorist attack over the last few days in London on the Tube, the guy had a knife and managed to stab 1 person, who is currently in hospital.
Its is a lot harder to get hold of guns over in the UK and Knives do a lot less damage. While i am not saying that these 2 attacks (in the US and UK) are indicative of what will happen every time, it actually makes me feel safer the lack of available guns in the UK.
I do find it strange that many of you guys find the exact opposite, guns being widely available make you feel safer.
It wouldnt, but that is not really the point is itQuote:
I'm not convinced tightening your gun laws would suddenly turn all the criminals straight
I am dubious its as much protection as people think it is.Quote:
and I do have some sympathy for the self-protection argument
Guns seem to be a comforter, people seem to think 'as long as we have guns too then its ok as we can shoot back, the reality of the situation is often the people doing the killing shoot first and shoot unexpectedly.
Oh that reminds me i need to resurrect the Trump Thread!!Quote:
Actually, no it wasn't. Other than Donald Trump (who's basically a loony)
A lot of how you feel about the gun laws largely depends on where you live, and likely your age, and probably your experiences. My own views have changed. Evolved really. When I was half my age, I probably would have called for stricter laws. But I've since learned that stricter laws don't necessarily work. One of the things that I learned in the Air Force is that is someone is determined enough, they're going to find a way in. Just like hackers. We tell people all the time that if someone felt their product was valuable enough for someone to steal it, they will find a way to do so. You can't stop them, but you can make it as difficult as possible. Terrorism works the same way. Clearly this couple - given the level of stuff they've since found - was determined and found a way to accomplish their goals. Would have stricter gun laws stopped them? Not likely. If they hadn't been able to acquire the guns, instead of gun victims, we'd be digging people out of the rubble of collapsed buildings instead.
Pretty much every one is part of some group that's done something wrong to some one else at some point in history. None of us want to be judged by the actions of a few in that group. As a gun owner, I certainly don't want to be judged by the actions of a few nuts. But no one wants to acknowledge that for all the guns out there, most are owned by responsible, mild-mannered ordinary people. Charlton Heston and the NRA doesn't help the issue either. And that's where I see the problem, not just in this issue, but in nearly everything political. The two sides are so politically opposite from each other, that they become stubborn and adopt an "all or nothing" approach with a scorched earth policy that does more damage. Then the media plays it up, making it even worse. That then feeds the public's perception of fear mongering, calling on their representatives to "do something" and the cycle repeats, and it just feeds on itself, until you get someone like Trump.
NeedSome - so no, I have zero confidence that politicians have the ability to enact a sensible solution, especially at the federal level.
-tg
That's not true. As I stated above, the republican did put forward a compromise that the democrats soundly rejected (regarding the 'watch list' ban). It's the media portrayal that the republicans are doing nothing that feeds the notion that they are stalwart in their opposition to everything. The Democrats push their ideas as 'common sense' when they are anything but, so when it's opposed by Republicans it's seen that they are against 'common sense measures'.Quote:
Originally Posted by techgnome
Regardless, even if the republicans basically rejected every new law or change, how is this even remotely a 'scorched earth' situation? There are thousands of gun laws, but the federal courts on a regular basis do little to enforce those laws. This is where other politicking comes in - the vast majority of firearm criminals are black: killers where the race is known, are black. Over half of all victims are black. By prosecuting to the fullest extent of the law (a straw purchase, for example, is up to 10 years in prison).
Essentially, we end up in a situation where we do not consider only the crime, or potential for crime, but we are tempering that with consideration of race, religion and/or nationality. This applies specifically to this situation, and should we profile, or not. Individual crime is in contrast to organized terrorist activity, or organized crime, where profiling may, indeed, play a part of solving a crime or preventing further crimes. Profiling a extremist muslim terror cell structure is equated - incorrectly - to profiling any given, individual, muslim.
Regarding firearms alone, while some don't believe extending background checks will lead to further restrictions, a good many do. with hundreds of millions of firearms in this country, registration is likely to be impractical, historical precedents demonstrate that such laws do lead to restrictions on the law abiding populace from owning firearms. Regardless, should such a law be realized, it will be (un)surprising how few guns really are in this country.
I can easily explain it.Quote:
Originally Posted by NeedSomeAnswers
I spent five years living in rural Pennsylvania where almost everyone owns guns and there is no violent crime to speak of.
I spent most of my adult life (and much of my childhood) living in inner city Cleveland where few people own guns and gun violence is quite common.
Where would you feel safer?
The problem isn't guns - it's a distinct lack of respect for human life that has infected our inner-city culture. Eliminate the violent crime statistics from Chicago, Baltimore/DC, Detroit and New Orleans (all are areas with strict gun laws) and suddenly America becomes one of the safest countries in the world.
I spent twenty years living in rural New Hampshire where few people own guns and there was no violent crime to speak of. I now live in Idaho, which is pretty well saturated with guns, and violent crime is a lot more common than what I heard about growing up, yet is still pretty low. As I write this, I'd also note that it is entirely possible that my perception is based on what gets reported. Since I've never had a television, all the news I get is from radio and newspapers (and word of mouth, I suppose). Growing up, there weren't any local radio stations, so what I heard was from Boston, primarily. Now I have local radio stations. The papers in both places were local. Still, reporting has changed over the decades, so it may be that there was more crime than I knew about in New Hampshire. In both cases I was never involved with any violent crimes, or knew anybody close to me who was.
I agree with homer that the problem isn't guns or lack of guns, it's an attitude towards the people around you, which has a whole lot to do with where you live and the conditions that you live in, as far as I can tell. However, it might also have something to do with the way you perceive the people around you and the conditions you live in. Crime in America has generally been declining for decades, but I seem to remember that a survey of the perceptions of the public showed that people thought it was increasing dramatically. If you believe you are less safe, won't that have a pretty strong influence on how you live your life?
We see exactly the same in the UK. Violent crime has been on a downward trend for decades but people always think it's going up... even though, if you stop and think about it objectively it's pretty obvious it's gone down. Remember the teddy boy riots of the 50s, or the organised criminal gangs of the 60s? How about a bit of 70s style domestic abuse? I'm convinced that fear is our default setting and it doesn't require a tangible reality to support it.Quote:
Crime in America has generally been declining for decades, but I seem to remember that a survey of the perceptions of the public showed that people thought it was increasing dramatically
I don't think availability of guns is a cause of violent crime and I think the impression that it is comes from a correlation of a single data point: the US. Switzerland has one of the highest gun owning rates of any country in the world but almost no violent crime at all. Those guys look at littering as big deal. However, I do think any given incident is likely to have a far worse outcome if guns are involved than if they are not and guns are more likely to be involved in a given incident if their possession is legalised and normalised. That doesn't make a lot of difference in cases like San Bernadino or most of the mass killing you get in the US which always seem to spark this debate. In those cases the perpetrators would almost certainly have acquired fire arms whether they were legal or not, but legislating against arms would probably see a huge drop off in the death rates from more casual violent crime.
All true. It would be a fact that if the availability and quantity of firearms was lower, there would be fewer gun crimes. However, there are other factors at play.Quote:
Originally Posted by FunkyDexter
The only reason guns were able to be, effectively, banned in the UK is because of a populaces willingness to give up those guns. Likewise in Australia. In addition, both had gun registration - a precursor and requirement for a significant reduction in firearms. Neither of which exist in the US. Those who want to ban this thing have this thing not directly affect themselves.
Rather pedantically, if enough people who didn't eat marmalade, and really, really, hated marmalade, wanted to ban marmalade, and they vastly outweighed the marmalade eaters - were in the majority - would it be OK to ban marmalade on the desire alone? Yes, marmalade doesn't harm people (except that one guy in a freak marmalade accident) but for an extremely vast number of people, neither do guns. However, this, again, is distorted because we are looking at averages: if you live, not only in Chicago, but a very small area(s) of Chicago, your 'risk' is much higher. Further, the 'risk' has to be further mitigated by your own behavior, not just by locale or nebulous gun ownership.
This then becomes offset with these events: there are very few things that a victim in San Bernardino could have done to mitigate this situation. Of course, the feeling is that reduction in gun presence would help mitigate the chance of a victim becoming just that. Just like seatbelt and airbags have reduced auto deaths, the government must do something. Conversely, the 'lack' of airbags and seatbelts has little benefit, but reducing the publics access to firearms does: guns are used defensively, where someone innocent does not die or become seriously injured because of the use of a firearm. Again, gladly, extremely rare, but every criminals death in this situation is rolled up into the firearm death statistics.
Personally, coming from England to the US, I am overwhelmingly in favor of an individual being allowed (sic) the right to defend oneself using appropriate tools. The situation is real and remote: if someone breaks into your house, would you rather have a firearm, or hope and pray that 'nothing bad happens'? Personally, I hope and pray that any person who experiences a break in have the opportunity to decide for themselves what the outcome will be.
I wish we could decide.
When it comes to home protection, that's a much more complicated issue. A simpler issue is the woods. A few years back I met a couple guys headed into a wilderness with side arms. These were not hunting weapons, so I can only assume that they were carried for defense against some perceived threat, though I didn't stop to ask what threat (I seem to remember that they were wearing cotton, too, so they may have been a bit unclear on what threats they might face). Generally, such people are worried about the large carnivores present in those woods. The problem is that the large carnivores don't really relish a fair fight. They want to dispatch their target (prey or not) as fast as possible. This means that if you get attacked by a bear or mountain lion, they will win the first round. You just have to be there for the second round. Drawing, loading (unless you keep one in the chamber, which is unwise in general), and aiming, all while being chewed on is fairly rare and often not all that useful.
On the other hand, I feel that anybody who wants to go hiking, and would not feel safe doing so without a weapon, should carry that weapon. It's a lot more important that they get out there than that my views of what is reasonable to carry be observed. I think it's absurd, but then again, I carried enameled steel pots, two of them, the first time I went on a solo hike. If you get out there enough, you'll figure out what's right for you along the way. If you're afraid of the animals, be armed. If you are afraid of me, be armed. Either way, the ends justify the means.