Tighter gun laws in Canada do not work

[Squire]

Watch the NDP and the CAVEAT lesbians make hay of it anyways.

[xrtoronto]

Talk about a small world...I was visiting a neighbour of mine who just returned after being away since June and while I was there he got a phone call from a friend who's brother-in-law's sister was mother of the girl who died in this shooting.

[Pongo]

It didnt really happen ripsnort, it was just an elabortate ruse to find out who the most crass, ignorant, brainwashed republican in the US was.

But if it did happen its a great example of why not to allow AR 15s in the country, a guy with an oversized Barreta pistol made to make idiot gun lovers in the states feel tough is a lot less dangerous then a guy with an AR 15 or AK.

[Charon]

But if it did happen its a great example of why not to allow AR 15s in the country, a guy with an oversized Barreta pistol made to make idiot gun lovers in the states feel tough is a lot less dangerous then a guy with an AR 15 or AK.

Most mass killers tend to use gasoline and a match, and generate far higher body counts.

Julio Gonzalez (87) Cuban born Gonzalez came to the United States in the 1980 Mariel boat lift. Ten years later, in a fit of jealousy, he killed eighty-seven partiers. Pissed off at his ex-girlfriend, Lydia Feliciano, who was dancing with someone else, Julio bought a buck's worth of gasoline and torched the Bronx's Happy Land Social Club killing nearly everyone inside. Only six survived. As luck would have it, one of them was lucky Lydia, his ex-girlfriend.

Humberto de la Torre (25) 21-year-old Humberto torched the Dorothy Mae Apartment Hotel in downtown Los Angeles in 1982 after a dispute with his uncle who managed the building. The blaze killed 25 residents and got Humberto a 625-year sentence.

Then there are the ones who use diesel fuel and fertilizer. Or a box cutter and a 767.

He probably would have been better off using a car like this guy:

LAS VEGAS (AP) - The driver of the stolen car who police say deliberately plowed into a crowd of pedestrians on the Las Vegas Strip will face multiple murder charges after a second person died from injuries Thursday, authorities said.

Mark Modaressi, 26, of Irvine, Calif., died late Thursday morning at Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center, the county coroner's office said. Six of the 12 people injured in Wednesday's crash remained hospitalized.

"The charges are going to be amended to reflect two counts of murder and 12 counts of attempted murder, and if anyone else dies the same will happen," Deputy Police Chief Greg McCurdy said.

Witnesses said the driver, Stephen Michael Ressa, 27, of Rialto, Calif., accelerated as he drove down the crowded casino sidewalk, McCurdy said.

One witness described it as "humans being mowed down like a lawnmower," McCurdy said. "It appears he did this intentionally. The reason is questionable."

Ressa was arrested Wednesday at the chaotic scene that stretched for yards under the marquee of the Bally's hotel-casino. Injured people were strewn along the sidewalk and treated in the street by emergency workers as stunned tourists looked on.

Police said Ressa was not being pursued when he veered his mother's burgundy Buick onto the sidewalk. The car had been reported stolen Monday in California.

The Wednesday evening crash also killed Gordon Kusayanagi, 52, of Hollister, Calif. All but three of the victims were tourists.

And if he really wanted to do the job, there's nothing like a hunting shotgun. The San Ysidro killer actually killed most of the victims with a shotgun, and not the UZI pistol that the Brady campaign highlights. The Kileen Killings didn't involve assault weapons either. Just pistols with high capacity magazines that save all of about 3 seconds compared to reloading an extra low capacity magazine. Same for the Colombine crowd, where the shotgun was the main killer.

Fortunately, the risk of dying in such a mass killing firearm incident pales in comparison to, say, your risk of getting hit by lightning. You generally have far more to worry about from a drunk driver than any firearm (unless you live in an inner city high crime area and are actively involved in the illegal drug trade); and in a city such as Chicago, your risk of dying from an "assault" weapon (or any type of rifle) is roughly comprable each year to that of being beaten to death by a baseball bat.

Sad for the victims, but good for the TV ratings and politicians looking to "do something." To bad you can't pass legislation against lightning.  And for more fun, this guy was into vampirism and violent video games. Magic the Gathering and fans of FPS now have something to worry about as well.

Charon

[Nashwan]

Most mass killers tend to use gasoline and a match, and generate far higher body counts.

Average murders in arson attacks in the US per year: about 150

Average murders with firearms in the US per year: about 11,000

[Elfie]

This is a tragic event, my condolences to the victims and their families.

idiot gun lovers in the states

[Charon]

Average murders in arson attacks in the US per year: about 150. Average murders with firearms in the US per year: about 11,000

The arson figures I've seen are closer to 700 [edit: and I believe the firearm death statistics are higher as well], but that's not the point. You forgot the "mass" modifier in my post. A big issue with assault weapons bans is the claimed "mass carnage" factor. Arsonists can and often do kill tens to hundreds at a time -- easily.

So for every headline generating event like this, as tragic as it is, there is a DuPont Plaza hotel fire in 1986 that killed 97 people. Or the other examples cited. Just one of these events can cause more loss of life than the entire Brady Campaign "outrage" list of asault weapon mass killings (which typically also include victims killed by weapons they claim to have no interest in, like Shotguns). It seems to me the common link to these events is a deranged person, and they don't seem to mind what weapon they use to generate the headlines, or get their revenge or whatever.

BTW Nashwan, with about 75,000 people killed in Alcohol related deaths each year in the US, would it be correct to assume that you favor similar prohabitions on Alcohol as well?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6089353/

In fact, about as many people die from Alcohol in the UK each year as die from gun homicide in the US [edit: using your figures]. Isn't it time to stop the madness? Close the pubs? limit the brits to a monthly small ration of US manufactured light beer in limited quantities and only at home?

Charon

[Toad]

Originally posted by Charon
In fact, about as many people die from Alcohol in the UK each year as die from guns in the US. Isn't it time to stop the madness? Close the pubs? limit the brits to a monthly small ration of US manufactured light beer in limited quantities and only at home?

Charon

No, deaths from alcohol get a free pass.

Society needs alcohol so any amount of carnage, loss of life and expense is fully justified to allow people to drink.

Any other questions?

[Charon]

Any other questions?

No Toad, I think you answered it. Thanks!

Charon

[straffo]

Originally posted by Charon
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6089353/

In fact, about as many people die from Alcohol in the UK each year as die from gun homicide in the US [edit: using your figures]. Isn't it time to stop the madness? Close the pubs? limit the brits to a monthly small ration of US manufactured light beer in limited quantities and only at home?

Charon

apple
and
orange
comparaison
.

[Charon]

apple
and
orange
comparaison
.

How so? Because you like to drink?

The death toll is real. And it not only includes drinkers killing themselves, but non drinkers who are victimized by people who criminally misuse alcohol.

I get the impression that "High-handed morality ends, where my habits begin..."

So if we really want to make people safe from themselves, how can just discriminate between one of these very comprable "sourges" of society?

Charon

[Goomba]

Some folks are still missing the real point;

"Guns don't kill people, People kill people" This is the truth.  Ever see a gun leap up off a table and shoot someone of it's own volition?  

Substitute anything else that's ever proven lethal to human beings for 'Guns' -

Gasoline, fuel oil, fertilizer, cars, trucks, knives, axes, screwdrivers, hammers, lumber, rocks, water, pillowcases, plastic bags, balconies (as in pushed off of), windows (pushed out of), fire, prescription medicine, dynamite, bricks, broken broomsticks, sharpened toothbrushes, alcohol, and on and on and on...  Oh, yeah...don't forget the bare hands you were born with.

Outlaw everything, destroy what you can't outlaw, and cut off everybody's hands at birth...and people will still try to kill each other, or have cause to 'snap' and go homicidal.  They'd try to kick each other to death, for Cod's sake.

Trying to abolish guns would be just as successful as Prohibition was.  The true, yet unaddressed, root cause of this kind of horror is people, and what pushes them to this state.

We'd be better off with sensible gun regulations, and a lot more time and effort looking at the most important part of the equation...PEOPLE.

I hope those poor kids and their families can pull through.

[straffo]

Originally posted by Charon
How so? Because you like to drink?

The death toll is real. And it not only includes drinkers killing themselves, but non drinkers who are victimized by people who criminally misuse alcohol.

I get the impression that "High-handed morality ends, where my habits begin..."

So if we really want to make people safe from themselves, how can just discriminate between one of these very comprable "sourges" of society?

Charon

nope.
Because the subject is gun law.
Not alcohol law.

[lazs2]

ok straffo... how bout....

When we have eliminated all the more important causes of death we can look at gun laws?

Also... it is estimated that guns save more lives than they take sooooo....

lazs

[Charon]

nope.
Because the subject is gun law.
Not alcohol law.

That's very convenient. Now, let's "hijack" the thread for a minute. Not that I really think it's a hijack. This issue is fundamentally about the good of society vs. individual rights -- not a gun vs. a bottle of scotch.

Gun law is supposedly based on the "common good." And with alcohol you have a practice that generates roughly the same negative impact on society. In fact, I can guarantee that my life is at far greater risk on a daily basis from alcohol than from guns. I have certainly put far more people's lives at risk though my misuse of alcohol (between ages 16 and 28) than through my use of guns. And that rare potential for criminal behavior is still there today for me, though I am mature enough now to work hard to prevent it from happening when I know the situation exists where Mr. Hyde might show his head.

I have friends who have died from alcohol, yet none from guns. It is not uncommon to find a drunk driver, at least monthly, causing 3-5 deaths at a pop. Sometimes wiping out entire innocent families in the process. Hard to distinguish that from the ****head in the campus shooting. Certainly no accident when a drunk climbs behind the wheel. I gurantee there will be about as many articles in the paper this week about alcohol related fatalities as inner city, criminal drug turf homicides.

Yet I imagine a lot of people who support tougher gun laws, down to prohibition, would not actually support similar efforts directed at alcohol. It could be argued, I suppose, that neither is an absolute need, though guns do have formal Constitutional protection in the US (unlike alcohol, so there is an apple and orange deal there) and firearms serve a variety of real world human need/functions from personal protection to hunting. The best similar argument that can be made for alcohol is as an industrial solvent.

So, in an equitable, non-hypocritical society, those working real hard to protect us from ourselves would fully endorse similar prohibitions on alcohol. Even, of course, if it eliminates their abilty to enjoy something that they personally enjoy.

However, with alcohol we set an age limit, and set usage limits that define criminal behavior. Drive with a blood alcohol level over X amount and you commit a criminal act. You lose privileges and perhaps go to jail. Kill someone while drunk, and it's murder. Yet, if you are a law abiding, responsible adult drinker, there are no limits on you ability to possess and consume alcohol. You can even drink yourself to death, as long as you do not drive or stumble around in public while doing it. There is no logical reason to treat Firearms any differently. Unless, of course, "My High-handed morality ends, where my personal habits begin..."

Charon


[edit: Don't get me wrong, I still like to social drink, and occasionally get bent. I'm not promoting alcohol prohabition.]