Mass Shooting at DK premiere in CO!

[trish]

1. What weapons to ban fully?

How about we just start by reinstating the assault weapons ban. There is no need to draw the dividing once and for all. As our needs and our technology advances the line will no doubt move to fit the situation.

2. What are we to make of the 2nd amendment if we start to infringe on it?

What do you mean by "start to infringe on it"? Is the law so sharply drawn that any regulation or restriction on who can bear what arms could constitute an infringement? Newborns to American citizens are citizens. Is it an infringement of their 2nd Amendment rights to keep guns out of their hands? Does a six year old have the right to bear arms or to they have to have a guardian's permission? The 2nd Amendment gives the people the right to bear arms. Since a fetus is a person does a fetus have 2nd Amendment rights? The Constitution gave citizens the right to vote, but by citizens they didn't mean women. Did the framers of the 2nd Amendment mean to give women the right to bear arms or is that a modern construal? Is it an infringement of an individual's 2nd amendment right to deny them the right to own a shoulder held surface to air missile? How about the 1st Amendment, is it okay to yell fire in a crowded theater? Is it okay for a pharmaceutical to lie about the outcome of it testing of a drug? I think it's safe to say that even the founders would not have regarded some restrictions and regulations on gun ownership an infringement of Constitutional rights. It's not like there's a sharp line of demarcation and to step beyond it is to slide down a glass slope into the grip of tyranny.

If you had 100% consensus and certain styles of firearms were outlawed on say August 1, what are you going to do about the tens of millions of firearms in the hands of private citizens ?

If there was a 100% consensus on which guns to ban one would think 100% of the owners the banned guns would agree to turn them in. After all the presumption is they agreed to the ban.

[kittyKaiti]

GUN OWNERS or those that support the purchase and ownership of assault type/automatic guns.
Where would you draw the line on weaponry? Any gun that that military currently uses? Types of ammos? Grenades or grenade launchers? Where is the line?

The line is simple. But first of all, "assault type" and "automatic" are not at all the same weaponry. "Assault type" was poorly defined in the expired assault weapons ban, as pointed out by loren, would technically have included a shitty black powder musket with a bayonet being classified as an "assault weapon" and therefore illegal. The government is simply full of idiots and the majority of those who wish to ban guns or "certain guns" know nothing about them more than "OMG FULL AUTO" and throw around words like "ASSAULT".

A semi automatic (one shot per pull of the trigger) rifle, like my AR-15 should be completely legal. Limitations of its magazine capacity are senseless. I am capable of exchanging mags easily and quickly whether it being 30 rounds or 10 rounds. This does not slow me much, nor inhibit my ability to induce damage against a target. A shotgun alone, can be fired by a person well enough to throw 5 or 6 rounds of buckshot into a crowd within several seconds. Should this be considered an assault weapon? Even a person armed with a bolt action rifle, magazine fed or not, can learn to reload fairly quickly and do significant damage in a spree. The ability to take down mass targets is not just dependent on walking into a crowded theater and spraying a full auto gun into it. Any person with a bolt action rifle could go rooftop and pop one after another into people like a sniper attack. This significantly impaired speed and capacity weapon is still capable of inducing dozens of deaths and injuries until police or a carrying civilian can stop the suspect. You can ban all the guns you want and this will not stop crazed people from using them to their tactical advantage in these types of attacks.

What kind of weapons should we ban? Is full auto necessary? It's all based opinion on what uses they would have and for when and why. Would overthrowing a violent regime be a reason like in Syria? Could the people in Syria or Libya even been capable of overthrowing the regime if they were totally unable access to full auto weapons? Unarmed populouses make for easy control. We can claim that places like the U.S. or Britain are perfect and could never ever turn against their people, but this has happened across the globe repeatedly for decades. Being prepared or thinking outside the box (just because I'm in America does not imply we will always be free and safe from tyranny). The right to bear arms was instated for this very reason. Not because our founders wanted them to hunt or shoot at targets for sport, but to defend themselves and the "PEOPLE" from those who wish to threaten the way of freedom and Democracy.

We keep saying that only trusted people should have guns. So everyone here says only cops and soldiers deserve them. Yet the Fort Hood massacre was done by a soldier. How many cops have unjustifiably murdered a civilian? How often do we hear of police or soldiers using excessive lethal force against unarmed people? How many civilians were killed in Iraq by our soldiers and how many war crimes have been covered up over the many decades our country has been at war across the globe? Why are civilians the only people who require such regulation and "trust"? The wearing of a badge or the wearing of a camouflage uniform does not imply superior trust and sanity, yet many of you seem to act like it does.

While owning grenades and bombs and nuclear weapons and a tank my be excessive for the typical civilian, a semi-automatic rifle, handgun, shotgun and the varied ammunition types that go with them are acceptable in my mind. Because I know better that in America, hundreds of other things will kill me long before I ever get shot by anyone.

Someone asked the question if an AK-47 is really necessary to defend your apartment. Well this depends on where you live. Gang violence and drug use are a growing threat in the country and the ability to defend your home with maximum ability to ensure holding off a horde of insane gangbangers is a reality in many cities around the country. Places like Chicago, Philly, Baltimore and border towns in Texas near Juarez, are hotspots of group gang violence and attacks in which one or two people are targeted by groups of violent offenders. While we can always dial 911 and expect the police to save us, response times are a joke in many areas and in my own experience, not fast enough to make me give up my arms for the idea that police can arrive to stop home invaders, kidnappers, rapists, murderers or other violent offenders in time. I am not the kind of person to give up my arms for that BS.

I've had my run ins with violent or what could have become violent situations on my property in the past. And dialing 911 only results in sitting on my ass holding off the morons for 15 minutes before one car rolls up and officer dipshit steps out to deal with the situation. This also implies that police are capable of not only arriving in time to save you, but also to arrest, charge, convict and imprison the offenders so that they will be incapable of ever being a threat to you again. It's not like you can call the cops on some idiot and they will never bother you again. I also know this from personal experiences that calling police is NEVER a deterrent. The only way I was capable of stopping offenders who targeted me for years when I was a teenager was to use threat of violent force against them as a deterrent. These bullies who harassed me with violence, threats and other verbal abuse and property damage NEVER stopped no matter how many times the police were called. The only reason these idiots gave up on me was my choice to acquire a weapon and threaten them with death, at which point I was never bothered again.

[trish]

We should adopt the Kennedy/Oswald Rule: Ban all guns that can fire one shot every 2.7 seconds.

[Quiet Reflections]

Chinese teen kills nine in knife attack


http://news.yahoo.com/chinese-teen-k...102629246.html

[shaustin]

Chinese teen kills nine in knife attack


http://news.yahoo.com/chinese-teen-k...102629246.html

Asians don't need bullets to kill people.

[onmyknees]

How about we just start by reinstating the assault weapons ban. There is no need to draw the dividing once and for all. As our needs and our technology advances the line will no doubt move to fit the situation.
What do you mean by "start to infringe on it"? Is the law so sharply drawn that any regulation or restriction on who can bear what arms could constitute an infringement? Newborns to American citizens are citizens. Is it an infringement of their 2nd Amendment rights to keep guns out of their hands? Does a six year old have the right to bear arms or to they have to have a guardian's permission? The 2nd Amendment gives the people the right to bear arms. Since a fetus is a person does a fetus have 2nd Amendment rights? The Constitution gave citizens the right to vote, but by citizens they didn't mean women. Did the framers of the 2nd Amendment mean to give women the right to bear arms or is that a modern construal? Is it an infringement of an individual's 2nd amendment right to deny them the right to own a shoulder held surface to air missile? How about the 1st Amendment, is it okay to yell fire in a crowded theater? Is it okay for a pharmaceutical to lie about the outcome of it testing of a drug? I think it's safe to say that even the founders would not have regarded some restrictions and regulations on gun ownership an infringement of Constitutional rights. It's not like there's a sharp line of demarcation and to step beyond it is to slide down a glass slope into the grip of tyranny.
If there was a 100% consensus on which guns to ban one would think 100% of the owners the banned guns would agree to turn them in. After all the presumption is they agreed to the ban.

Refer to Kitty's Post.


You're living in an alternate universe if you think anybody's turning any gun in after legally purchasing it. Your counter arguments are inane, and you draw illogical inferences. There are restrictions in place already...have you applied for a pistol permit in NYC recently? Or have you turned all your firearms in to the Mayor along with your 20 oz. slurpie cups?
A fetus as a person? Are you conceding that...or just using it for another illogical argument ?

[trish]

A fetus as a person? Are you conceding that...or just using it for another illogical argument ?

Neither. The astute reader will notice I gave a number of examples that illustrated a couple of points. First, the very framers did not intend the right to bear arms to extend to each and every citizen; and they understood the document was to be interpreted by accordingly. Hence the fact that very young children could be denied the opportunity to bear arms was not viewed as an infringement of their rights. We do not know if there was a consensus on whether the 2nd Amendment was to be extended to women. Second, other examples given illustrate that the 2nd Amendment is unclear as to which arms the 2nd Amendment applies. Scalia, for example, is of the opinion it did not apply to canon. I know gun nuts who disagree. Scalia is not so sure about surface to air missile shoulder launchers. Some liberal judges are pretty sure they aren't covered by the 2nd Amendment. To my mind it is not a matter of becoming clear on the intentions of the framers. Modern weaponry was beyond their comprehension and the question of where they would have stood on the issue of shoulder launched missiles is intrinsically indeterminate. It is up to us to decide, either through the courts or legislation. I suggest we start by reinstating the ban against assault weapons.

You're living in an alternate universe if you think anybody's turning any gun in after legally purchasing it.

If you read your own post astutely it was you who asked us to consider the scenario where there was 100% consensus on which weapons to ban. I merely did the math.

There are restrictions in place already

Yes there are and no I don't subscribe to the Mayor's ban on 20 o.z. servings of pop, if that is at all relevant here. In the former case the law under estimates the risk to the general populace posed by those who would needlessly carry dangerous firearms into public spaces. In the latter case the law over regulates an individual risk that endangers no one else (though the supporters will point out that insurance costs__not risk__ will generally rise if self-inflicted diabetes is not kept in check).

[Femboyurge]

Asians don't need bullets to kill people.

If you are a maniac and just want to kill many people at random, you'd kill more by simply driving a car into a crowd at very high speed. That will kill more than with a semi-automatic weapon, at least.

It's pretty absurd that most Europeans (at least so it seems) and many Americans as well think that private citizens shouldn't have an undisputable right to own and carry guns but cops and soldiers should.

[Femboyurge]

Refer to Kitty's Post.


You're living in an alternate universe if you think anybody's turning any gun in after legally purchasing it. Your counter arguments are inane, and you draw illogical inferences. There are restrictions in place already...have you applied for a pistol permit in NYC recently? Or have you turned all your firearms in to the Mayor along with your 20 oz. slurpie cups?
A fetus as a person? Are you conceding that...or just using it for another illogical argument ?

It happens in Sweden from time to time that people turn in old unlicensed guns. Those guns weren't bought by the ones who turns them in, though, but rather by their grandfathers, since we have had "gun control" here since the 1920's.

Though my countrymen are pretty naïve and trusting the authorities. I hope that most Americans will never get that naïve.

There are also a few places in Europe where people have a sound view on guns, like Switzerland and the Czech Republic. The Czech Republic is by my knowledge the only country in Europe where any unpunished citizen can still get a license to carry. In the rest of Europe you might own a gun on the mercy of the authorities, but you can't legally carry it in self-defense, at least not by the letter of the law.

[trish]

my countrymen are pretty naïve and trusting the authorities.

If you trust that the person carrying a concealed weapon next to you in the subway didn't leave a round in the chamber, or remembered to slide the safety into the "on" position, or doesn't have the barrel oriented toward your torso, or isn't a lunatic who will fire willy-nilly at the slightest provocation, then you're pretty naïve and trusting of paranoid strangers who want to carry lethal weapons in total secrecy.