Omaha Doctor calls for assault weapons ban

[bluestarlizzard]

so, liko, your saying that we shouldn't care that the public doesn't understand that a gun is a gun and let them make public policy based on an false understanding about the guns in question?

 

[marksman13]

Liko, your argument makes sense to the anti-gun crowd and the politically correct crowd, but it just isn't going to fly here. People on this board are concerned with facts and logic. No amount of emotional plea will convince me that I need to give in to the anti's attempts to take my big scary guns. If we give up on one issue we may as well give in on every issue. That is where this is headed my friend. You can not compromise with an enemy which desires only your total destruction. The Brady's and the politicians supporting them don't care about making the American people any safer. They are simply pushing a political agenda. Unfortunately, many Americans have bought into these ridiculous beliefs. The only way to win the fight is by refusing to compromise, pushing legislation of our own, and re-educating the American people in the ways of the gun. Compromise over gun control benefit only the antis.

 

[Liko81]

so, liko, your saying that we shouldn't care that the public doesn't understand that a gun is a gun and let them make public policy based on an false understanding about the guns in question?

No. Quite the contrary, if you'll read the post and not just look for ways to chip away. I'm saying you SHOULD care, very deeply, that the majority does not hold your opinion, if you as a gun owner want decisions made by that majority to benefit you. But the arguments I hear in response to a gun crime are a broken record:

- It's not the gun's fault...
- If others had guns they could have stopped it...
- A gun is just a tool...
- Guns protect people...
- The Second Amendment...

These arguments are quite simply not working. They appeal to logic, and logic, though the strongest argument and one of the only unassailable arguments, is the last thing people are expected to apply when a gun crime happens. A death is a highly emotional event, and when guns are defended as not being the cause, and when you advocate to the contrary that having more of them in the area would have been a good thing, you defend the very thing that, in the eyes of victims and the general public, enabled a killer to be as deadly as he was. If this were the National Explosives Association and the arguments were along the lines of "Bombs don't kill people..." you would not have many supporters after someone used a pipe bomb to kill 50 schoolchildren. The argument that other bombs could have stopped a bomber is ludicrous, and even though the argument stands up when you talk about guns, people are looking at high-powered rifles, and indeed any firearm commonly used to murder, as we would regard bombs used for that same purpose. We want as few of them in our society as we can get away with, restricted to licensed professionals, who would be required to account for every last ounce of plasticene or C4 and every detonator used in a demolition.

...Wait, we do that. And nobody complains about the RKBE. An explosive, most in the army would say, is definitely an armament. Our guns are heading that direction; to be kept only by licensed professionals who must account for every weapon and every last cartridge spent.

If you want to keep assault rifles, and as you say, if we want to keep anything that has a barrel, then there need to be more intelligently-thought-out responses than some variation of "It's not the gun". That's a simple refutation of the opposing position, and that doesn't help people understand what it actually WAS: a senseless act committed by an emotionally lost person on the borders of what we would call sanity. The gun may have been a tool, but I'll say it again; even if it was not technically an AK-47, it looked like one, and the first question is "how did he get a Russian assault rifle?", the obvious answer being they're widely available as hunting weapons and he stole his Dad's legally purchased rifle. The two solutions arrived at by that answer are both anti-gun; you secure your firearms at all times, or you don't own AK-47s.

You guys and the good doctor may BOTH be right; It wasn't the kid himself, nor the gun in his hands. An ordinary kid does not wake up one day, pick up a gun and start shooting. An ordinary kid does not wake up one day, build a bomb and take it to show & tell. Now I mention it, an ordinary kid doesn't do anything out of the ordinary. These are not ordinary kids, and what they do before such an act, which happens over many weeks or even months, MUST have been visible to someone. If the argument was that he was a good kid, then the onus should be on finding out where he went wrong so that it won't happen in future. If the argument was that he was a bad kid, the onus should be on figuring out why the kid wasn't already or still in juvenile hall or prison. And in both cases the onus should equally be on finding out how a troubled kid got access to whatever he used to kill, and why nobody noticed anything out of the ordinary, or if they did, why they didn't say anything. Focus on the kid; the argument that he could have used anything to kill himself and others is simple enough to grasp, but by itself it is does not help. It MUST be followed by an appeal to find the cause, otherwise you are simply reinforcing the focus on the means. An argument to find the cause is both logical AND emotional, and it places focus EXACTLY where it should be without immediately placing blame. It's the kid, but the kid wouldn't have done this without good reason. Find that reason, and fix it.

If you stand firm and bleat the party line, you are nothing more than a brick wall, and it's actually easier than the analogy might indicate to destroy a brick wall with a good solid blow. Instead, you have to absorb and redirect the blow where you want it to go. As gun owners we will face blows. But to simply stand there and take it is to be a building being torn down by a wrecking ball.

 

[Robert Hairless]

RNB65:

I love some of the low road, knee-jerk responses in this thread. The man is a trauma surgeon, which means he's more intelligent than probably 99% of THR members. You may not agree with his politics, but don't question his intelligence.

Besides me, which other members of The High Road are less intelligent than a trauma surgeon? Are there any people in addition to trauma surgeons whose intelligence should not be questioned?

Most of us like to do the right thing but of course we need to know the rules first. Is it okay to question your intelligence or are you among that 1% of the people here who are as intelligent as a trauma surgeon?

Are the remaining 99% more or less intelligent than the chief trauma surgeon of Victoria, Australia, Thomas Kossmann, who is under investigation now on a charge of multiple frauds? Or are Australian trauma surgeons less intelligent than American trauma surgeons and don't count?

Does Texas count? Dr. Larry Gentilello complained that trauma residents have been performing surgery without proper supervision on poor and uninsured patients at Parkland Memorial Hospital, which doesn't sound intelligent to me but might to real smart people like trauma surgeons.

I'm so dimwitted that I make distinctions. It appears to me that trauma surgeons are competent to develop information in their areas of special competence. But it does not appear to me that trauma surgeons have any special competence to set political or social agendas, and it seems wrong to me if they identify themselves as trauma surgeons when they state views that imply a connection between the two.

I do think that trauma surgeons have the right to express their political views. I do not think that trauma surgeons have the right to associate those views with either their professional affiliations or their training as trauma surgeons. Many professions recognize that it is unethical for a professional to cross that boundary. It surprises me that trauma surgeons are free to do so. Perhaps that's because they are so intelligent.

Perhaps a trauma surgeon might find that a great many patients required immediate surgery as the result of automobile crashes and that most of them had alcohol in their bloodstream at the time. Who could object to that trauma surgeon demanding a ban on automobiles and alcohol as well as on drunk driving? Few of us are smart enough to make that objection even if our own meager intelligence leads us to conclude that automobiles aren't "meant to kill people" and alcohol isn't "meant to kill people," and that all blame lies with only with those who abuse alcohol and drive. It seems to me that it's essentially rather stupid to sort of mush essentially discreet factors together into a Ban Stew, but then I am reminded of the prohibition against questioning the intelligence of a trauma surgeon.

A Certified Public Accountant I know has stated that all doctors are charlatans, registered nurses are merely their lackeys, and that the entire medical profession is incompetent. He based his professional opinion on working through many of their financial affairs. The Licensed Realtor who was present at the time agreed on the basis of her own dealings with them. A Concealed Weapons Permit instructor volunteered that his experience was that they know nothing about firearms and are too arrogant to take instruction because they are convinced that they are more intelligent than other people. I disagreed, of course, but what am I to make of a situation in which representatives of three professions have come to the same conclusion? I am too dimwitted to challenge them and the bases for those conclusions, so maybe they're right.

It's good to see you object to "some of the low road, knee-jerk responses in this thread." Tell us how to behave. That's how we learn.

 

[Larry Ashcraft]

Liko87,

You seem to be of the opinion that a little bit of the RKBA may be negotiable. Maybe assault weapons, or maybe, something else.

I disagree.

None of my rights are negotiable.

None.

Period.

 

[DENALI]

I'm somewhat in agreement with Liko81. You need to study your opponent's posistion before attacking it! I've posted in several different threads pertaining to just this sort of episode and as a former mental health professional I feel that I'm uniquely qualified to do so! The majority of Americans are clueless as to mental health care and the same can be said as to there knowldge of firearms and the 2nd Amendment, and as such they are vulnerable to emotional but well coordinated socialist attacks. Therefore these are the logical starting points for committed well prepared riposte!!!

 

[siglite]

You guys and the good doctor may BOTH be right; It wasn't the kid himself, nor the gun in his hands.

I'm sorry. But I just can't find validity in someone who would type the above. It WAS the kid himself. Period.

The mounting lack of personal responsibility in this country is appalling, and a clear signal of our decline into obscurity. However, some folks in this thread (and the good doctor) are clearly experts. They're experts at misdirection. Instead of focusing on the kid as a monster and the factors that made him that way, sure, let's blame the guns.

It's really that simple. The. kid. pulled. the. trigger. Apparently, it takes a rocket trauma surgeon scientist to divert a forum full of intelligent people from such a simple, plain as day fact. FACT. Yes, you read that. FACT. THE KID PULLED THE TRIGGER.

It's not the rifle.

It's not the bullets.

It's not a flash suppressor.

THE KID PULLED THE TRIGGER.

This doctor's a moron. Period. His words are indefensible. My ten year old son can take him apart.

There's some truly artful and skilled trolling going on in this thread. Bravo.

 

[Liko81]

None of my rights are negotiable.

Suit yourself. Advocate violent overthrow of the Bush Administration. Yell fire in a crowded theater. Invoke Satan or the Spirits of the Wood in a Catholic church. Call me the N-word (I dare you). It's your right under the First Amendment to freely express yourself with any word, anywhere.

Rights conflict. Period. Your free and untethered right to free speech can endanger my health, safety and welfare. My life, liberty and property must therefore trump any of your rights under the Constitution, 7 days a week. The right of the government to continue to exist, which I guarantee you it will fight for, also trumps your rights. Those restrictions apply to ANY right, including the RKBA; if your right, or the general right of individuals under the RKBA to own a particular weapon endangers me, my loved ones or my property, that weapon will be prohibited and removed from society. Also, if your right to keep and bear arms threatens the government or any of its agencies or agents, at any level, your weapons will be taken from you, and resistance will be met with deadly force. That means if you can outshoot a SWAT team, you are a threat and will be dealt with accordingly. The government must defer to the people, but it must also exist; without government there is anarchy.

Now, it's not "me" whi has the problem with your right to have a military rifle. It's my neighbor, or his neighbor, or whoever else thinks a particular weapon poses a clear and present danger to life, liberty or property simply by existing. There are some weapons for which that danger can be clearly articulated and which have already been banned. Your right to own a fully automatic FN P90, for example, was "negotiated" away a decade before the gun was even invented. I personally don't think a high-powered semi-automatic rifle poses a clear and present danger to me no matter what it looks like. It's the guy using it in a public place who poses a clear and present danger. Antis say the problem goes away with an AWB. I disagree; I've seen enough suicide bombers to know that a guy who has nothing left to lose will find any way he can to take as many with him as possible. But you can't deny that if military rifles were banned and not grandfathered for civilians, the percentage of crimes committed with them would drop drastically. It's not the answer; the last AWB proved it, but boy is it attractive to someone who sees no need for them in daily life.

Therefore, to combat any threat to your RKBA, you must be able to convince my neighbor and his neighbor that a gun is no more or less than a gun; it acts according to the will of its handler. The handler, therefore, is criminal. "Guns don't kill people..." is true, but so cliche'd that it has a ready answer: "yeah, but the gun sure helps". The solution to the problem is however still to reduce occurrences of criminal activity with any weapon or no weapon. Why do people become criminals? School shooters, snipers, and the various mall gunmen can clearly be defined as insane. That abandonment of reason for madness did not happen overnight, and somebody had to be aware of it who did not think anything of it before it was too late. You can blame the shooter; that's where blame for any such action should rest, but I assure you, IT DID NOT HAPPEN OVERNIGHT; somebody knew about it, somebody could have reported it, somebody could have stopped it. For others its financial or a simple matter of survival; you cannot get what you want, or need, and so you steal it. That problem is solved with simple opportunity, but unless the government brings back the Depression-era programs like the WPA and the CCC, and make "alternative careers" like drug dealing and pimping unprofitable, you're not going to tackle even a percentage of that problem. You can still however start looking for when good kids go bad. You can turn kids around, even when they're on the brink. Some cannot be saved however, and those that survive their first criminal act will not find themselves looking at blue sky for a long time. If any of this had been done, Omaha would not have happened in the first place. The kid would be in a mental hospital getting counseling, or in prison. Either way, he is no longer a danger to society.

 

[Lone_Gunman]

A Certified Public Accountant I know has stated that all doctors are charlatans, registered nurses are merely their lackeys, and that the entire medical profession is incompetent. He based his professional opinion on working through many of their financial affairs. The Licensed Realtor who was present at the time agreed on the basis of her own dealings with them. A Concealed Weapons Permit instructor volunteered that his experience was that they know nothing about firearms and are too arrogant to take instruction because they are convinced that they are more intelligent than other people.

As I mentioned before I am a general/vascular/trauma surgeon. Here is my take on the above comments, most of which I agree with, but there are certain things to consider.

I agree many, possibly even most, doctors know very little about financial matters, real estate, etc. There are a couple of reasons for this. First, their training provides absolutely no education in these areas. There are no classes in medical school about how to run a business.

Additionally, medical school is an 18 hr a day job. Residency is much worse than that. When I was a surgical resident, we were on every other night call, and what that meant was you arrived at about 5 AM on Monday morning, and worked until about 8pm Tuesday night. So out of 48 hrs, you were in the hospital 40 of the those hours. This lasted for 5 years. The point of all this is, there is not a lot of time to pursue other interests.

Then when you get out of residency, and enter practice you are in the unusual situation of having more money than spare time. So doctors tend not to negotiate well on purchases like cars and houses. I know doctors who have paid full MSRP for cars, and who have actually paid more than asking price for houses. It is absurd, but they do it, and the main reason is they don't think they have time to negotiate, and don't have time to learn the market. Its been especially interesting to see doctors from California and the North East move to the south, and be willing to pay California prices for land and houses in small town Georgia.

Also, I would like to state for the record that in general, surgeons are much more likely to be pro-gun than pediatricians, psychiatrists, and most of the non surgical specialties. Also, almost all of the trauma surgeons I know are decidely pro gun. When you deal with society's worst in the ER, you tend to develop a certain paranoia that is palliated somewhat by the presence of cold steel in your waistband.

It think the Omaha trauma surgeon, who I don't know and have never heard of, has as much right to speak his mind on the issue as anyone else. He is wrong. But I wouldn't ask him not to express his opinion to the media. The issue of boundary violation is not applicable, as the liberals in charge of organized medicine have decreed this is a legitimate talking point for physicians when the AMA declared guns a public health problem.

 

[Deanimator]

P.S. And I definitely wouldn't mention "there are more powerful weapons in the hands of most hunters".

Why? Because it would irresistibly compel anti-gunners to admit that they want to ban THOSE too, giving away the game and arousing the ire of the hunting lobby?

There isn't a common deer hunting rifle that isn't at LEAST as powerful as an AK type rifle; and most are far MORE powerful.

I don't NOT tell the truth because it makes things uncomfortable for liars.

 

[Deanimator]

You need to study your opponent's posistion before attacking it!

Been doing it since 1986. I can play them like a violin.

I usually know what they're going to say before they do and can get them to say [usually something embarrassing or incriminating] just what I want them to to defeat their own arguments.

They're as predictable [and dismally dishonest] as Holocaust deniers, and use the SAME lame tactics.

 

[Robert Hairless]

What we have here, Lone Gunman, is a failure to communicate.

I keep saying that Joseph Stothert most certainly is entitled to proclaim his opinion about the AK-47 or anything else he has in mind. As you put it, he "has as much right to speak his mind on the issue as anyone else." We agree completely on that subject.

I also believe that Dr. Joseph Stothert has the right to express his professional opinion on any subject which he is professionally competent to assess in that capacity.

But when Joseph Stothert the citizen assumes the role of Dr. Joseph Stothert the medical director of Nebraska's Medical Center Trauma Center to express his personal opinion on political matters he exploits that platform to gain authority for his personal opinions by masquerading them as professional opinions. That is unethical and it is an abuse of his positions as a medical doctor and as a medical director. Moreover he does it intentionally, with the aim of misleading people into confusing the two. I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't see the distinction, because he's probably much too intelligent to be concerned about such matters.

My own inferior intelligence, however, leads me to conclude that it is impossible for either of those Joseph Stotherts to know what any firearm means to do. I figured that out on my own by dissecting numerous firearms of many kinds, including some AK-47 rifles. I have not yet found one with a brain or a soul, or any intelligence at all.

I also have doubts that the maker of each and every AK-47 tells it to go out into the world and kill people. I've met Mikhail Timofeevich Kalashnikov and although I readily admit to a language barrier that made subtleties of communication difficult, I don't recall him saying "I meant for the AK-47" to run around committing murders.

Not to demean Dr. Joseph Stothert's intelligence, which of course is impossible for a dunderhead to do, I doubt most sincerely that he even knows what an AK-47 is or that he knows the difference between a real AK-47 and what passes for one among civilian gun owners, or could tell the difference between either of those versions and any of the many variants if they all ran up and bit him in his superior ass.

Dunderhead that I am, what I see in the quoted statement from Dr. Joseph Stothert, Medical Director and so on, is evidence of a man who is out of his depth and doesn't have the brains or the humility to know it. He makes a statement about the effect of a particular bullet without stating its caliber and generalizes from it to one rifle from which it could be fired. Is Dr. Stothert talking about a 7.62 X 39 cartridge or a 5.45 X 49? Is he really talking about an AK-47 of some kind or an AK-74 or other bad rifle?

In fact such things don't matter at all to Dr. Joseph Stothert, Medical etc., because he's really talking about something he calls "high velocity weapons." High velocity weapons must be any weapon that flies through the air very fast. Look up in the sky on some clear spring day and you, like Dr. Joseph Stothert, might see the flocks of AK-47s winging their way through the air en route to their breeding grounds.

That's much of the problem with medical doctors who violate the boundaries of their professional competence: they talk real stupid about things they don't know, and don't know they don't know, and they are applauded for it by those whose special interests they serve.

I do know that the AMA declared guns a public safety problem. The AMA is a bunch of doctors who don't know what they don't know, and don't care either. It's not unusual.

It impresses me not at all that the noted and much more distinguished physician Dr. Karl Brandt, Commissioner for Health and Sanitation, was joined in his political opinions by a great many equally distinguished medical doctors such as Dr. Karl Gebhardt and Dr. Joachim Mrugowsky, or that all of the distinguished medical organizations endorsed and sponsored their conclusions. I understand that their professional judgment was supported by years of intensive scientific research and that they were more intelligent than 99% of the people in The High Road.

Nevertheless they violated the boundaries of the medical profession when they concluded that Jews are untermenschen who lead lives unworthy of life, can be used as unwilling subjects for medical experimentation, and should be exterminated from the face of the Earth as quickly as possible. They were hanged, only not before they murdered many people and spurred other physicians to assist in the murder of still others.

Of course they had the right to express their personal opinions and of course they had the right to express their professional opinions. But either they couldn't recognize that the two were distinct or they could recognize the distinction and didn't care. I'm not sure why anyone would think it matters.

The AMA is not the same as the medical associations in Nazi Germany and the medical doctors in the United States are nothing like those Nazi physicians. I know that. I can see that the countries are different and the years are different and I know that the "American Medical Association" is spelled differently.

But it's violating the boundaries of medicine by twisting it for political reasons and encouraging its members to do the same, and they are doing it.

"Basically the faster the bullet is going the more damage it does, that's a basic, physical principle,” says Nebraska Medical Center Trauma Medical Director Dr. Joseph Stothert. “These are very high velocity weapons that are only meant to destroy tissue and kill people."

As for a doctors' long, hard struggle for five years, I sympathize so much that I am willing to lend any physician the sympathy chit a kind Army chaplain gave me about fifty years ago. I've had a rough life too, though, so it's only a loan and I'll want it back. It has been of such comfort to that I advise all medical doctors and everyone else who feels sorry for himself to acquire one of their own. If I had one to spare I'd give it as a gift but I never went to the Chaplain's office to get another one.

 

[ArfinGreebly]

You See, The Thing Is . . .

Well, the man certainly can sling words. Prolific, even. Makes specific responses more difficult and time consuming. I will post any (coherent) argument I might formulate separately.

From Post #20

Makes sense; they're the ones who have to clean up the mess when bullets collide with bodies.

False. They only fix the patient. There are many people who clean up the mess.

The AMA for instance was instrumental in the withdrawal of the Black Talon . . . a particularly nasty round that puts the doctor at risk as well as the patient.

False. Debunked.


From Post #36

A Black Talon is so named because when it hits, it expands into a claw-like arrangement of "talons", each of which are razor-sharp. [. . .] The other half is to increase penetration just that tiny bit more by decreasing barrel friction (increasing muzzle velocity) and easing initial penetration.

False. Debunked. Extensively.

Before you say that no doctor would be stupid enough to poke a finger around in a bullet hole, <. . .>

<. . .> The Black Talon is, in short, a very nasty slug, and the controversy, not the least of which came from the AMA, . . .

False. Debunked -- by a surgeon no less.


From Post #47

Probably, but it's not his intelligence you should question, but his wisdom. Intelligence is book smarts; knowing that you know stuff. Wisdom is world-smarts, which includes knowing that you DON'T know stuff.

Glib. Self-serving definitions.

<. . .> while a .308 is a hunting round . . .

What an odd thing to say. Given the history of the .308 round, that is.

<. . .> But those crazies are sociopaths, the proactive detection of which is slightly beyond modern science.

No. It requires observation and recognition and a refusal to engage in denial. Not a whole lot of science required.

Post #51 is essentially a defense of doctors' intellects. Summary: people who achieve PHds in very specialized fields are smart -- probably smarter than "you" -- because they have to be.

Meh. Essentially appeal to authority, with a cool red herring twist. Lawyers are smart. Whoopee. (They're also frequently dishonest, especially those in politics and those who litigate, because it isn't about truth, it's about winning and power.)

Smart dishonest people do not make the world better and have no business making policy for others. Smart-but-only-in-my-speciality people are practically iconic. They, too, need to butt out of public policy.​

From Post #63

<. . .> I do not however advocate a "they're wrong because they're antis" position on every anti-gun statement made, as many on this board do. Those who are anti-gun are not unintelligent, knowledgeable, or otherwise unqualified mentally to speak on the subject.

Maybe not, but they are dishonest. Again, being "smart" is not a qualification.

To say so is an insult to the majority of the people in this country, who either do not support gun rights, or who support them much the same as they support gay rights; You can do it, they just don't want to see it. <. . .>

Uh, no. To call the ignorant ignorant is not an insult. To call the dishonest dishonest is not an insult. To distort the words of the law and pretend to believe the lie thus engendered is dishonest. "Mentally qualified" or not, when you lie to me, I'm going to call you on it. Don't expect me to be polite.

I don't argue against the RKBA; I argue against ignorance, and gun nuts can be just as guilty as antis. I also argue for rights other than, as well as including, the RKBA. The irresistible force meets the immovable object every day in political discourse, especially concerning the BoR. SOMETHING HAS TO GIVE.

Nah. Self-serving sophistry.

The laws you oppose, and the Brady Bunch itself, exist so that infamous heinous crimes can never happen again, and thus peaceful, law-abiding citizens much like yourselves who DON'T feel the need to carry have a good likelihood of living out their lives having never been proved wrong.

This is just straight-up crap. The Brady crowd does not exist for any such reason. It's about power and control. Remember, like you intimated earlier, they aren't stupid. They have to know that what they're doing can't work, thus their stated motives are false. And they're lying. And I'm not buying. And not willing to be polite about it either.

The same drive gave us Son of Sam laws (profits from criminal activity are forfeited to victims), Amber Alerts . . ., Jessica's Law . . ., and Teri's Law . . . The Brady Bunch has the same drive to make murders using firearms, unarguably an attractive mix of ease, range, shock value, and repetitiveness, a thing of the past.

No, that's not their drive. And if you actually believe it is, then you have been well and truly fooled.

That in and of itself is laudable. I disagree with their focus. Ban guns and criminals use knives. However, the opposite holds true as well; give everyone guns and criminals use bombs.

Patently absurd. Simple speculation.

Therefore the Brady Bunch is wrong only in that they focus on guns and not criminals. However, if you will not entertain the fact that the Brady Bunch might have a point, even though they follow it to the wrong conclusion, then all you're doing when you dismissively insult the arguments and those who raise them . . . It's unintelligent-sounding, insulting to the majority of Americans, and self-defeating.

Actually, no. They DON'T have a point. Their entire point is disarming the population to change the balance of power and control. It has nothing to do with crime.

That's THEIR red herring.

The RKBA is not a globally-recognized right. Citizens of many countries, including our own, look at the RKBA as an antiquated remnant of an unorganized, "frontier-law" nation.

Which is wrong-headed and very sad for them.

The assault weapons you wish to protect possession of and free access to appear all the time in the hands of terrorists, religious extremists, murderers, drug lords, dictators, and the forces loyal to the above.

Lovely mis-characterization. Guilt by association. Note, the WEAPONS are guilty by association. Nice.

When an M4 or an AK-47 appears on the streets of a U.S. city, no matter whose hands it is in, s*** is hitting the fan.

What a bizarre thing to say. At all.

They are icons of all that is hated by peaceful law-abiding citizens. To defend them sounds to an anti a lot like "rationalizing the irrational".

Translation: guns are scary. Make them go away.

To argue against permits for concealed carry, while at the same time recognizing that having a permit shows you have demonstrated sufficient proficiency and situational knowledge to safely carry a handgun in public, sounds a lot like implying that you do not think such proficiency or knowledge is necessary.

Starting to get squirrelly here. You generalize that which cannot be generalized. I object to permits. Period. I may use the fact that I had to endure a lot of crap (to get a permit) to my own ends, and this is not a conflict, it is a form of judo. When confronted with force that can do you harm, use what you can of it to your own advantage. The permit process interferes with the exercise of a right, and is anathema.

To argue against "gun-free zones", trumping a property owner's right to control said property with the all-important RKBA, sounds a lot like "I want to be Gary Cooper".

Okay, that's just silly.

Using the philosophy of "anything can be a weapon" to attempt to reduce gun control arguments to absurdity sounds a lot like "I don't know the difference between a gun, whose primary purpose is to kill things and break stuff, and a kitchen knife whose primary purpose is to chop vegetables".

And that's just plain dishonest.

I support the RKBA. But I realize that the RKBA is the SECOND AMENDMENT. It was neither included in the original document, nor did it trump the list of the freedoms our Founders guaranteed.

Wow. That's worse than just ignorant, it's false on its face. The amendments, uh, you know, like, AMENDED the constitution, and were REQUIRED for its ratification. Yes, the Second Amendment DOES trump other stuff. That's what amendments do. And if your argument is that it doesn't "trump" the rest of the BoR, that's a fine strawman, but also nonsense.

There are more important things on that document than to give you the right to have a gun wherever and whenever you want, with no restrictions as to type, size, caliber, ammo capacity, muzzle energy or the explosive or armor-piercing capability of the bullet.

Another red herring. Life is more important than free speech. Big deal. It doesn't invalidate free speech.

For example, how about the very first sentence appearing on the Constitution, the reason it was written and the basis for EVERYTHING ELSE on that parchment. You're too busy "providing for the common Defense" and "securing the blessings of Liberty" to realize that the government must also "insure domestic Tranquility" and "promote the general Welfare". The government must balance ALL FOUR THINGS, in addition to forming "a more perfect Union" and "establishing Justice".

Uh, don't forget, the amendments occur LATER and add a bias that says, "while all this other stuff is true, thou shalt not mess with the guns, dude."

<Long exposition omitted.> And believe me, as bad as the gang problem is there, a battle fought between dozens or even hundreds of civilians armed with automatic weapons, with a lot of heart but no military training, would be like nothing any U.S. city has seen since the 1870's. It is untenable; you most certainly would not want to live in a world where the Second Amendment was the supreme law of the land.

What makes you think that? The Second Amendment already IS the supreme law of the land. Further, your imaginary world where the presence of guns leads to epidemics of violence? Pure unfounded speculation.

If you want pro-gun words out of my mouth, chew on these: Guns are equalizers. It is limits on guns that MAKE them equalizers.

And THIS statement is truly scary. Partly because it's untrue, and partly because it's socialist thinking. Looks to enforce equal outcomes.

If Auntie Sue sleeps with a .357 under her pillow she can aquit herself well against one or two robbers, even if they have guns of their own, but not against one or two robbers with automatic weapons. If automatic weapons are legal to own, they WILL be owned, they WILL be stolen, and they WILL be used by criminals against law-abiding citizens, even law-abiding gun owners. . . . [snip] . . . And that bodes ill for someone who, like Auntie Sue, cannot afford, cannot feed, cannot control, and/or cannot see the need to own an M60 and thus just sleeps with a .357 under her pillow. If a good night's sleep is only bought with superior firepower, only Number 1 is going to sleep soundly in his bed, surrounded by armed guards with The Button on his bedside table.

Blather. It is from this fabric that the emperor's new clothes are made.


From Post #75

However, I'm also a realist; unlicensed open carry will probably not happen, so if the compromise of licensed open carry comes along, as is currently the case in 13 states, I will take it.

And hopefully continue to strive for elimination of the licensing process.

Here's another news flash; nobody's always right. I'm not. You're not. [. . .] In addition, a statement doesn't have to be wholly true or wholly false. "Guns are evil" may be a false statement logically, but it doesn't negate the fact that a majority of Americans think that way, and even if it's totally fallacious to act on an ad populum argument, that happens to be exactly the way decisions are made in this country. "Guns kill" is also false in the literal sense. Load and chamber a pistol and set it down on a bench and you will die of old age long before the gun goes postal and kills everyone in the area. That does not negate the fact that a firearm is one of the best-suited tools for that particular job in the hand of someone so inclined. ANYTHING can be a weapon from the keys in your pocket to a stick of dynamite, but very few objects can be picked up, held in one hand, in one self-contained package, and with the pull of a lever can virtually instantaneously end a life at 25 yards, no specialist training required. In fact, it requires training for a person NOT to end up doing that unintentionally.

Guns are dangerous. People are afraid of them. We should allow them to be regulated to keep them happy.

You may have forgotten that the whole reason for the BoR was to prevent tyranny of the majority. And the 2nd is insurance.

I personally do not think guns are evil. I think if I could afford to own an AR-15 or an AK-47 it would be nice to have for a variety of reasons. It happens not to be a high priority; a Mossberg HD shotgun would definitely be higher on my "gotta-have guns" list, being cheaper, more powerful, and less threatening in profile (only face-on).

The emotions of other people determine how I choose to defend myself.

I merely state that many people are uncomfortable around guns, and all the more so when the silhouette of said weapon used to be, and still is, the icon of our greatest enemies, seen on the news every night for the last 40 years in the hands of people who would party tomorrow and for a long time thereafter if the U.S. ceased to exist tonight. Or, alternately, a silhouette of a weapon normally in the hands of people that, even though they're on our side, are still very deadly, war-oriented people, capable of taking life, in some cases as easily as if were a video game.

Guilt (of an inanimate object) by association. Look, the exercise of a right isn't a matter for "approval" by people who frighten easily or who are confused about symbols.

<rambling appeal to emotion omitted> . . . We as gun owners have to appeal to emotion (yet another fallacious argument), appeal to statistics, and appeal to what to us is blatantly obvious common sense; that one gun, or class of guns, or guns in general, are merely the tool, and there are MANY others that could be used that have absolutely no place in civilized society.

Many others? Other what? Other guns? Other tools? Sorry, but this lacks coherence, so it's hard to respond.

From Post #83

Suit yourself. Advocate violent overthrow of the Bush Administration. Yell fire in a crowded theater. Invoke Satan or the Spirits of the Wood in a Catholic church. Call me the N-word (I dare you). It's your right under the First Amendment to freely express yourself with any word, anywhere.

The term for this kind of hyperbole and theatrics is "trolling."

He didn't imply any such thing.

Rights conflict. Period.

That's a false assertion.

Your free and untethered right to free speech can endanger my health, safety and welfare. My life, liberty and property must therefore trump any of your rights under the Constitution, 7 days a week.

Arguing the strawman.

The right of the government to continue to exist, which I guarantee you it will fight for, also trumps your rights.

Now, you see, that's just WRONG. The government doesn't have rights. It has powers. And those are supposed to be limited.

Those restrictions apply to ANY right, including the RKBA; if your right, or the general right of individuals under the RKBA to own a particular weapon endangers me, my loved ones or my property, that weapon will be prohibited and removed from society.

Rights don't endanger. Mens rea endangers. Quit ascribing motive to inanimate objects. It's dishonest.

Also, if your right to keep and bear arms threatens the government or any of its agencies or agents, at any level, your weapons will be taken from you, and resistance will be met with deadly force.

Yeah, we know that. Nonetheless, that's precisely why we have the Second Amendment. To keep government in check. The fact of government's assuming unto itself unwarranted authority doesn't change that, rather it emphasizes the need.

That means if you can outshoot a SWAT team, you are a threat and will be dealt with accordingly. The government must defer to the people, but it must also exist; without government there is anarchy.

And government by force is tyranny.

Now, it's not "me" who has the problem with your right to have a military rifle.

Evidence to the contrary notwithstanding . . .

It's my neighbor, or his neighbor, or whoever else thinks a particular weapon poses a clear and present danger to life, [. . .] Antis say the problem goes away with an AWB. I disagree; I've seen enough suicide bombers to know that a guy who has nothing left to lose will find any way he can to take as many with him as possible. But you can't deny that if military rifles were banned and not grandfathered for civilians, the percentage of crimes committed with them would drop drastically. It's not the answer; the last AWB proved it, but boy is it attractive to someone who sees no need for them in daily life.

So, it's not you. It's your neighbor who's an idiot. Yet, here you stand, instead of educating your neighbor, you're arguing his case to us.

You have accepted and adopted the thinking processes of an enemy of liberty.

Therefore, to combat any threat to your RKBA, you must be able to convince my neighbor and his neighbor that a gun is no more or less than a gun; it acts according to the will of its handler. The handler, therefore, is criminal.

Or YOU could convince your neighbor.

"Guns don't kill people..." is true, but so cliche'd that it has a ready answer: "yeah, but the gun sure helps".

Thank you, Eddie Izzard.

The solution to the problem is however still to reduce occurrences of criminal activity with any weapon or no weapon. [. . .] IT DID NOT HAPPEN OVERNIGHT; somebody knew about it, somebody could have reported it, somebody could have stopped it.

Which has precisely nothing to do with the right to be armed.

For others its financial or a simple matter of survival; you cannot get what you want, or need, and so you steal it. [. . .] If any of this had been done, Omaha would not have happened in the first place. The kid would be in a mental hospital getting counseling, or in prison. Either way, he is no longer a danger to society.

See above.

 

[ninjashoes]

I agree most peopel are uncomfortable around guns but not in Texas.

 

[ryan in maine]

Robert Hairless: Look up in the sky on some clear spring day and you, like Dr. Joseph Stothert, might see the flocks of AK-47s winging their way through the air en route to their breeding grounds.

Epic.

 

[ArfinGreebly]

Not Professional Enough

I was going to write something substantive, but I fear I am, sadly, too intelligent to get it right.

I am cursed with superior intellect, and have no hope of fielding a valid thesis on this subject.

I will therefore bow to the inferior intellect of Robert Hairless.

Would that I, myself, could match his inferiority.

Dude. I am not worthy.

 

[mekender]

- May 18, 1927: Andrew Kehoe killed 45 people and injured 58, most of them children, after he bombed the local school in Bath, Michigan.
- 1933 – 1945: Approximately 11 million Jews and others deemed “undesirable” were killed by the Nazis during the Holocaust. Most died in gas chambers while others were subject to Nazi experiments or died from various diseases.
- April 6, 1976 – December 12, 1978: John Wayne Gacy confesses to 33 murders of young men and boys in the Chicago, IL area that he choked with a rope or board while he sexually assaulted them.
- July 7, 1986: Juan Gonzalez attacked passengers on the Staten Island Ferry in New York City with a machete. Two were killed and nine were injured.
- March 20, 1995: Members of Aum Shinrikyo killed twelve, severely injured fifty, and caused temporary vision problems for nearly a thousand people after they unleashed Sarin gas in the Tokyo, Japan subway.
- April 19, 1995: The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, OK was destroyed by a bomb planted by Terry Nichols and Timothy McVeigh, resulting in 168 deaths and 800 injuries.
- July 27, 1996: Two people died and 111 were injured when a bomb was detonated in Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, GA by Eric Robert Rudolph.

- September 11, 2001 thousands of people die after multiple airplanes are hijacked by persons wielding box cutters... the planes are subsequently intentionally crashed into large buildings in the middle of high density population centers

also dont forget the unibomber attacks, and almost every serial killer, with 2 exceptions... the DC "sniper" (he wasnt a true sniper) and the son of sam... almost every other serial killer has use methods other than firearms

 

[bluestarlizzard]

by the by, Liko.
i may be an unintelligent, ignorant redneck, so forgive me for slowing you down.... but what exsactly IS your argument to KEEP your RKBA rights? i really want to know....

 

[Deanimator]

by the by, Liko.
i may be an unintelligent, ignorant redneck, so forgive me for slowing you down.... but what exsactly IS your argument to KEEP your RKBA rights? i really want to know....

Sounds like the ones they tried in Britain and Australia....

 

[ArfinGreebly]

Hey, It's Tomorrow . . .

So, following last night's hasty deconstruction . . .

It occurred to me that our new friend, Liko81, isn't so much proposing that we "give in" to the desires of those who want to take our guns, but rather lamenting that we have such poor arguments with which to persuade them.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

There was a lot of verbiage to sort through, so it's just possible that I missed the main thrust.

Given this assessment, and without using a (verbose) structure of "I support RKBA, but [opposing viewpoint] and [discussion & exposition] and therefore [reasons why we're doing it wrong]" I would be interested in seeing, as two completely separate (brief) statements of 1) what you personally believe is the scope and nature of the right to keep and bear arms -- not expressed as the views of a third party, and 2) what is the best approach to persuading those who would infringe upon this right to cease such infringement and instead support one of the original civil rights.

We're striving for clarity here, so the portmanteau approach to discussion will not serve this end.

Anyway.

Gotta head out to work.

 

[Deanimator]

It occurred to me that our new friend, Liko81, isn't so much proposing that we "give in" to the desires of those who want to take our guns, but rather lamenting that we have such poor arguments with which to persuade them.

Seems more to me that he wants us to argue on their terms, without hint of irony.

As I've said elsewhere, if you concede the terms of debate, you concede the debate itself...

 

[Tommygunn]

My life, liberty and property must therefore trump any of your rights under the Constitution, 7 days a week.

None of our rights conflict with those. You are setting up a false comparison. You don't "yell fire in a crowded theater" because the results would be dangerous to the people running to the exits in fear and trampling each other as they fell. Your life isn't endangered by anyone else's rights because there is no right to endanger you. The fact I may own a gun, be it a kentucky Longrifle or a machinegun doesn't endanger you. If I had either and aimed it at you I'd be endangering you; but my right to own said gun doesn't give me the right to aim it at you.

Rights conflict. Period.

No they do not. (Oh, and, uh, "period.") It's been said my "right to swing my fist ends where your nose begins." Every individual owns rights. They are circumscribed only by the existential ends they're intended to protect. My right to own a firearm doesn't conflict with any of your rights. What I do with it, should I be a dishonest person, might conflict with your right to life or property, should it turn out I was a thief or murderer. But then, I don't need a gun to kill you or rob you, so that is really on me and not the inanimate object.

The right of the government to continue to exist, which I guarantee you it will fight for, also trumps your rights.

Oh, really?

"Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just power from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it."

I guess the Founding Fathers had other ideas .....
Although I do agree with one thing; the govt. will certainly fight to try to preserve its own continued existance. Things don't happen easily; even the British didn't surrender sovereignty over America without a fight.

 

[Deanimator]

You don't "yell fire in a crowded theater"

No, you don't "yell fire in a crowded theater" THAT'S NOT ON FIRE.

And even if you do create a false alarm, you're punished AFTER THE FACT. The Constitution looks unkindly on prior restraints.

So he's wrong on multiple levels... as though we didn't know that already.

 

[Tommygunn]

No, you don't "yell fire in a crowded theater" THAT'S NOT ON FIRE.

And even if you do create a false alarm, you're punished AFTER THE FACT. The Constitution looks unkindly on prior restraints.

... and I never said otherwise. In point of fact, most crimes I can think of are punished after the fact. If we could punish crimes that were going to happen tomorrow, we'd be living in a movie like "Minority Report."

 

[30 cal slob]

i guess not many of you have open carried a loaded EBR in Virginia.

yeah. in public.