64
   

Another major school shooting today ... Newtown, Conn

 
 
firefly
 
  3  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:14 am
@BillRM,
Quote:
One then must wonder Firefly why you spend so must efforts/times to try convince people of your point of view on this website if none of it had any importance in the so call real world.

What "point of view"? That our country has a problem with gun violence isn't "a point of view"--it's an actuality that exists. Even the NRA has acknowledged it--they just don't want to blame guns or lax or poorly enforced gun laws and regulations.

And people, like you, who can't see or accept that, and who try to dispute it with outlandish and absurd statements, I wouldn't waste my time trying to convince.
In fact, people like you, and oralloy, and H20Man, can't even enter into a discussion of the gun violence issue because you don't admit there is a problem, a systemic problem, with gun violence in this country. So you really remove yourself from any informed discussion.

I enjoy thinking about issues, and informing myself about them in the process. I learn a great deal about the topics I post on because my curiosity impels me to do a great deal of reading about them. That's what makes my postings important--to me. My efforts are really self-serving--they increase my own awareness, they help me to better understand something. If I didn't feel I was learning something, this would not only be unimportant, it would be a complete waste of my time. I'm doing this to inform and educate, not to convince. Whether people reading this thread wind up being convinced of something is not my main objective--disseminating information is far more important to me--that lets people make up their own minds.

When I want to make a difference in the real world, I act in the real world. Every single one of my elected representatives, on both a state and federal level, has already heard from me asking them to take action to reduce gun violence. Those are the people I want to convince, not anyone here.

Meanwhile, I've learned a great deal about the gun violence in this country just during the course of this thread, thanks to my reading, and that's what's important to me.







Region Philbis
 
  1  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:15 am
@oralloy,

feeling left out?
sorry, OralBuoy -- you are also flailing around the deep end of the pool, not knowing how to swim...
Frank Apisa
 
  3  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:25 am
@Region Philbis,
Quote:
WaterBuoy is out of his league here...


He certainly seems to be...and as you point out later, so is Oralloy.

But insofar as they do not realize what BillRM is telling them is correct...and since they cannot focus...best to agitate them and keep them in the action. They end up helping make the side they are fighting for look foolish.
oralloy
 
  0  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:28 am
@Region Philbis,
Region Philbis wrote:
feeling left out?
sorry, OralBuoy -- you are also flailing around the deep end of the pool, not knowing how to swim...


You trash shouldn't run around falsely accusing your betters of your own stupidity.
0 Replies
 
BillRM
 
  1  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:31 am
@oralloy,
Quote:
That one is easy. Because there is no legitimate reason to ban harmless cosmetic features like a pistol grip or an adjustable stock.


Is it not strange that a fairly bright woman can not get that point or when challenge can or will not address why she think a so call assault rifle is more dangerous then similar weapons without the features that cause them to be label an assault weapon.
0 Replies
 
BillRM
 
  2  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:33 am
@oralloy,
Quote:
Yes, there are exceptions, but "the left in general" deserves the condemnation that they receive on this issue.


Those exceptions run into the millions if not the tens of millions so once more you are not helping the cause by attacking millions for being democrats.
JTT
 
  -1  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:37 am
@Frank Apisa,
Quote:
.best to agitate them and keep them in the action.


More of your "honesty", Frank?
firefly
 
  1  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:43 am
@BillRM,
Quote:
you are not helping the cause by attacking millions for being democrat...


What is "the cause", BillRM?

Does it have anything to do with trying to reduce the senseless gun violence that goes on in this country every day?

Exactly what is your "cause"?
BillRM
 
  0  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:43 am
@firefly,
Quote:
That our country has a problem with gun violence isn't "a point of view"--it's an actuality that exists


Wrong as violence of all kinds have been tending down not up for decades and there is no such thing as gun violence that are in any manner difference from the other means of violences including the latest fad of pushing people in front of subway trains.

===============================================

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2012/0612/US-violent-crime-rate-down-for-fifth-straight-year



US violent crime rate down for fifth straight year
Although crime historically spikes during hard economic times, the US is currently bucking that trend. Both the national violent crime rate and murder rate were down in 2011, reports the FBI.

By Patrik Jonsson, Staff writer / June 12, 2012

The Chicago skyline is seen from a helicopter on June 15.

The Christian Science Monitor
Weekly Digital Edition
The FBI on Monday reported that violent crime dropped in the US for the fifth straight year, this time by 4 percent, a trend that has defied some criminologists’ thinking about the link between personal and property crimes in tough economic times.

According to the FBI, which culls from information volunteered by some 14,000 law enforcement jurisdictions from Oahu to Key West, violent crimes dropped in all four major US regions: 4.7 percent in the West, 4.9 percent in the Midwest (a region where the murder rate actually rose slightly), 4.5 percent in the South, and 0.8 percent in the Northeast. The national murder rate dropped by 1.9 percent.

In the property crimes categories, car thefts and larceny thefts decreased nationally, but burglaries ticked up slightly in all regions except the South, the FBI reported.

The falling crime rate amid the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression has puzzled some criminologists, since crime historically spikes during hard times. But countering that trend, some say, have been improvements in US policing tactics, tough sentencing laws that keep recidivists off the streets, an aging population, the popularity of video games that keep young people inside, and even communal solidarity in the face of economic adversity.

Yet even as crime rates, including the murder rate, approached historic lows, some experts also sounded a note of caution in the newest report of preliminary figures.

Firstly, a growing number of violent and property crimes in the second half of the year partially offset the trend, causing criminologists like James Alan Fox of Northeastern University in Boston to suggest that the US may be coming to “the end of the trough” in violent crime.

And in areas where people know tend to know their neighbors more intimately – small towns – there are indications that communal solidarity may have begun to slip. Indeed, the murder rate in towns with 10,000 or fewer inhabitants spiked in 2011, going up by 18 percent. At the same time, some experts note that may be a statistical anomaly, since the violent crime rate in small town America dropped by 23 percent just the year before, in 2010.



oralloy
 
  0  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:44 am
@BillRM,
BillRM wrote:
oralloy wrote:
Yes, there are exceptions, but "the left in general" deserves the condemnation that they receive on this issue.


Those exceptions run into the millions if not the tens of millions so once more you are not helping the cause by attacking millions for being democrats.


All those exceptions (I'm a Democrat too remember) should strive to realize that their party is trying to do something that is very wrong, and not take it personally when their party is condemned for it.
0 Replies
 
Frank Apisa
 
  0  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:45 am
@BillRM,
Quote:
Quote:
Re: Frank Apisa (Post 5218514)
Quote:
How many people have been shot accidentally in homes where guns are kept?



None in my homes or my parents homes or my uncles homes or friends homes or for that matter none in the homes of any of the hundred or so homes that I know personally have firearms in them.

Given that somewhere like half the homes in the US have one or more firearms in them I would think that such a happening is very very rare.


Well...there are still a considerable number of accidental shootings in homes with guns. Estimates seem to go (at a low estimate) between 600 and 700 per year.

The questions that then arise are:

Would there probably be more or fewer "accidental shootings" in homes if the percentage of homes with guns increased from approximately 50% to approximately 75%?

And if the answer is "they would increase"...wouldn't it make sense to suppose increasing the number of guns available in schools to 100%...wouldn't the chances of accidental death by shooting increase?

The logic seems undeniable, Bill. I fully understand that the law allows for guns...and I truly do not see changes that will significantly reduce the rights of Americans to possess guns...

...but my point that more guns in schools could increase accidental shootings there...

...and my question regarding H2O’s suggestion still stands:

Are we to disregard all the people who will be killed accidentally by the vastly increased firearms in the schools...and by the teachers or staff members who go postal????
oralloy
 
  1  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:46 am
@firefly,
firefly wrote:
Exactly what is your "cause"?


Some of us believe in the Constitution and civil rights.
0 Replies
 
Frank Apisa
 
  0  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:46 am
@JTT,
Quote:
Re: Frank Apisa (Post 5218570)
Quote:
.best to agitate them and keep them in the action.


More of your "honesty", Frank?


ABSOLUTELY. Do see something "dishonest" in what I said?
0 Replies
 
Frank Apisa
 
  1  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:48 am
@Frank Apisa,
By the way, Bill...

...I honestly do not consider 600+ accidental deaths due to gun possession to be very, very rare at all..

What I do consider RARE...is the number of times a firearm is used to actually stop a home invasion or intruder.
0 Replies
 
firefly
 
  2  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:50 am
@BillRM,
Quote:

Wrong as violence of all kinds have been tending down not up for decades and there is no such thing as gun violence that are in any manner difference from the other means of violences including the latest fad of pushing people in front of subway trains.


Well, we should stop trying to treat or cure cancer, because there are so many other diseases, and causes of death, right, BillRM. Why should we focus attention on any one of them, right, BillRM? I mean you're just as dead if you die from a heart attack, right? Why bother to give flu shots, people can die from choking on food.

Firearms are used for most of the homicides in this country.

BillRM
 
  1  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 11:57 am
@firefly,
Quote:
Does it have anything to do with trying to reduce the senseless gun violence that goes on in this country every day?


Sorry those poor kids that were killed by a mentally sick man is the excused to try to disarmed as large a percent of the total population as possible.

When real world suggestions to make children safer in schools such as a programs similar to the armed pilot program for teachers you do not wish to hear of it.

Longer range programs to try to deal with the mentally ill before they reach the point of gunning down children in a school or pushing people in front to trains you do not wish to hear about.

Instead you wish to take steps that in no way or in no manner will make one person adult or child in this country safer.

Banning rifles with a pistol grip or a flash suppressor will not save one person and given that the changing out a mag is a two second job and mass murder had been done with pistols with smaller mags that solution is not likely to be all that helpful either.
BillRM
 
  1  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 12:06 pm
@Frank Apisa,
Quote:
Would there probably be more or fewer "accidental shootings" in homes if the percentage of homes with guns increased from approximately 50% to approximately 75%?


You got to be kidding me there are now more firearms then adults in this country and given that roughly half the homes in this nation already have guns in them you can not increase it by 75 percent nor is having an armed teacher program is going to increase the homes with firearms

Self-Reported Gun Ownership in U.S. Is Highest Since 1993
Majority of men, Republicans, and Southerners report having a gun in their households
by Lydia SaadPRINCETON, NJ -- Forty-seven percent of American adults currently report that they have a gun in their home or elsewhere on their property. This is up from 41% a year ago and is the highest Gallup has recorded since 1993, albeit marginally above the 44% and 45% highs seen during that period.


http://www.gallup.com/poll/150353/self-reported-gun-ownership-highest-1993.aspx

The new result comes from Gallup's Oct. 6-9 Crime poll, which also finds public support for personal gun rights at a high-water mark. Given this, the latest increase in self-reported gun ownership could reflect a change in Americans' comfort with publicly stating that they have a gun as much as it reflects a real uptick in gun ownership.

Republicans (including independents who lean Republican) are more likely than Democrats (including Democratic leaners) to say they have a gun in their household: 55% to 40%. While sizable, this partisan gap is narrower than that seen in recent years, as Democrats' self-reported gun ownership spiked to 40% this year.


The percentage of women who report household gun ownership is also at a new high, now registering 43%.

Gun ownership is more common in the South (54%) and Midwest (51%) than in the East (36%) or West (43%) -- a finding typical of Gallup's trends in gun ownership by region.

One in Three Americans Personally Own a Gun

Since 2000, Gallup has asked respondents with guns in their households a follow-up question to determine if the gun belongs to the respondent or to someone else. On this basis, Gallup finds that 34% of all Americans personally own a gun.

The gender gap in personal gun ownership is wider than that seen for household ownership, as 46% of all adult men vs. 23% of all women say they personally own a gun.

Middle-aged adults -- those 35 to 54 years of age -- and adults with no college education are more likely than their counterparts to be gun owners.

Bottom Line

A clear societal change took place regarding gun ownership in the early 1990s, when the percentage of Americans saying there was a gun in their home or on their property dropped from the low to mid-50s into the low to mid-40s and remained at that level for the next 15 years. Whether this reflected a true decline in gun ownership or a cultural shift in Americans' willingness to say they had guns is unclear. However, the new data suggest that attitudes may again be changing. At 47%, reported gun ownership is the highest it has been in nearly two decades -- a finding that may be related to Americans' dampened support for gun-control laws. However, to ensure that this year's increase reflects a meaningful rebound in reported gun ownership, it will be important to see whether the uptick continues in future polling.

Survey Methods
Results for this Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted Oct. 6-9, 2011, with a random sample of 1,005 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.

For results based on the total sample of national adults, one can say with 95% confidence that the maximum margin of sampling error is ±4 percentage points.

Interviews are conducted with respondents on landline telephones and cellular phones, with interviews conducted in Spanish for respondents who are primarily Spanish-speaking. Each sample includes a minimum quota of 400 cell phone respondents and 600 landline respondents per 1,000 national adults, with additional minimum quotas among landline respondents by region. Landline telephone numbers are chosen at random among listed telephone numbers. Cell phone numbers are selected using random-digit-dial methods. Landline respondents are chosen at random within each household on the basis of which member had the most recent birthday.

Samples are weighted by gender, age, race, Hispanic ethnicity, education, region, adults in the household, and phone status (cell phone only/landline only/both, cell phone mostly, and having an unlisted landline number). Demographic weighting targets are based on the March 2010 Current Population Survey figures for the aged 18 and older non-institutionalized population living in U.S. telephone households. All reported margins of sampling error include the computed design effects for weighting and sample design.

In addition to sampling error, question wording and practical difficulties in conducting surveys can introduce error or bias into the findings of public opinion polls.

For more details on Gallup's polling methodology, visit www.gallup.com.
.
firefly
 
  1  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 12:13 pm
@BillRM,
Quote:
When real world suggestions to make children safer in schools such as a programs similar to the armed pilot program for teachers you do not wish to hear of it.

Do you know how many people in this country are wounded or killed by guns every day?

The problem with gun violence isn't just about that latest school massacre, or about the other mass shootings that took place last year, which is why just putting armed guards in schools won't solve the problem.
Quote:

Banning rifles with a pistol grip or a flash suppressor will not save one person and given that the changing out a mag is a two second job and mass murder had been done with pistols with smaller mags that solution is not likely to be all that helpful either.


Right, that's why it's very good that the new congressional task force to prevent gun violence includes many gun owners and people knowledgable about guns. They can explore the issue of better gun regulation from the perspective of trying to reduce our societal problem with gun violence, rather than engaging in nonsensical discussions of "cosmetic features". And they can address other issues, such as factors that might promote violence by the use of guns. The aim is to reduce gun violence in this country,

Do you have any interest in trying to reduce gun violence in this country, BillRM?

Exactly what is your "cause"?
oralloy
 
  0  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 12:17 pm
@firefly,
firefly wrote:
When I want to make a difference in the real world, I act in the real world. Every single one of my elected representatives, on both a state and federal level, has already heard from me asking them to take action to reduce gun violence. Those are the people I want to convince, not anyone here.


Luckily, the NRA has far more power over those people than you do.
oralloy
 
  1  
Sat 5 Jan, 2013 12:20 pm
@firefly,
firefly wrote:
Do you know how many people in this country are wounded or killed by guns every day?


It would be better if the dead were all killed with knives?



firefly wrote:
Exactly what is your "cause"?


Some people care about the Constitution and civil rights.
 

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