And another liberal politician bites the dust. Racism is a big one - the legacy of oppression of a disarmed population by their neighbors, not some distant aristocracy. The overtly authoritarian agenda of the loudest gun control advocates is another. And sheer inertia - the US has been armed to its teeth for centuries, the first country in which an effective, high quality, essentially modern firearm was a normal possession of an ordinary citizen. Everybody else had more of a chance to think about it.
I have no idea of what to make of that remark vis-a-vis my comment to which it is a reply. Those are indeed reasons people have cited.
Because all grown men own firearms, it's a general responsibility - like owning tools, or driving a car. Their father, grandfather, uncle, etc, gave or bequeathed one to them. They have to drive or park their vehicle, carry money or tools, some place where they don't feel safe. They have to leave their dependents home alone, or their house is a possible robbery target. They don't trust their neighbors. They like to hunt. They live on a farm, and it comes in handy (to kill animals, etc.). They enjoy shooting, as a skill and recreation. They admire the technology, the craftsmanship of the object. As an investment, store of value, or hedge against inflation. Just in case - government breakdown, etc. Etc.
He could have done the exact same with the Glock (10mm) and Sig (9mm) handguns he brought, and for which he brought more ammo, could have operated at the same time (effectively doubling the rate of fire), and each had the same rate of fire and mag changes. Two 12-gauge shotgun magazines 10 30-round .223 magazines 6 30-round 9mm magazines 6 30-round 10mm magazines https://www.csgv.org/adam-lanza-took-didnt-take-sandy-hook-elementary/ And yes, .223 is a relatively low-power rifle round. Right between varmint and long range predators, and its .22 caliber projectile has similar or less penetration than a 9mm. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! So an AK47, at about 2,000 joules, isn't designed for human targets? 7.62 rounds regularly punch straight through their targets. Similar rate of fire to most handguns. AR-15: 45–60 rounds/min semi-automatic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M16_rifle 9mm Glock handgun: 40 rpm http://www.enemyforces.net/firearms/glock17.htmAnd in skilled hands: We’re at Desert Hills Shooting Club near Boulder City, and Paul Barrett steps up with a Glock 17. He fires the 9 mm semi-automatic pistol 18 times in about five seconds and hits the target every time. https://lasvegassun.com/news/2012/jan/17/five-second-glock/ The only real difference is recoil management in a heavier rifle. So you're talking about restricting most handguns when you talk about rate of fire. Not even Democrat politicians are dumb enough to go after those.
Why should law-abiding citizens pay for the actions of criminals with a reduced ability to defend themselves? Talk about not just blaming but punishing the victims. It is often a felony to threaten someone with a gun, and inciting a confrontation can very easily weigh against a claim of self-defense. But stand you ground laws also mitigate against a duty to flee. But Zimmerman won on a purely self-defense claim, as he had been severely beaten. You can't punish unintended consequences as intended actions.
Why would a leader use the military to squash the citizenry whose labors the leader and his/her military need to sustain themselves? It's irrational for a leader to do that. A nation needs more than government employees, after all.
Be that as it may, it still doesn't address extant 21st century realities about the sheer force available to military forces like the U.S.': Apologies for the screwed up formatting of the quote. I don't know why Xenforo is doing that.
If you plan on talking people into severely restricting a bunch of handguns, keep going. It can be done. What can be accomplished by the skilled is irrelevant. If you're willing to work with the reasonable to separate out the assault rifles from the others on rate of fire/control/lethality - the reasons those handguns aren't the preferred main weapons of any fighters or mass murderers anywhere, despite their manifest advantages in portability etc - then you have that option still. For a while. The status quo is going to change. It isn't acceptable to sane and reasonable citizens. Nobody needs the AR-15 rate of fire and lethality to keep and bear for any non-military purpose, not even a well-regulated militia. Your choice.
and it is the reality of that threat that I question. Does the threat actually exist or is it fearful speculation and paranoia? Does the taking up of arms by a civilian population exasperate that threat or minimise that threat?
Samuel was not unarmed. He was involved in a shootout with the marshals, one of whom also died. His mother was unarmed, but from what I understand, they were aiming for Randall Weaver and it struck her behind the door and killed her. Against the Weavers? Ya, I do. Dude involved with violent white supremacists fails to appear in court on weapons charges, is involved in an armed siege that lasted what? A year? All efforts made to end the siege peacefully failed. When the marshals attempted to see what was going on, his son and the son's friend engaged in a shootout with the officers. Do you expect the authorities to light a bonfire and sing Kumbaya? Or just ignore the law completely because hey, dude's a citizen and he has guns, so it's all good? Yeah, Vicki Weaver is just like Stephon Clark... I guess it comes down to people who claim to be for reasonable gun control, pitching a fit at the very mention of gun control. What do you think, iceaura? Yes, and citing Ruby Ridge, where after a year long siege because of a paranoid couple determined that the apocalypse was coming and decided to hunker down and defied a legal notice for the father to attend court, which started the armed siege, a teenage boy is shot and killed after he engaged in a gun fight with US Marshals, and his mother is also killed through a door as they were shooting at his armed father (by all accounts, the shot that killed her was accidental) and the father then made the remaining children remain in the cabin with the body of their dead mother in the hallway for over 10 days, is a really good thing to cite as an example of Government overreach... Ya, you are all making a huge amount of sense... Oh yeah, we are all thinking about it. Most Australians would remember where they were when they first heard something bad was going on at Port Arthur. I was walking through the common room at my university residential college and there was a group glued to the old picture tube television in the corner — strange for daylight hours. Scraps of information were seeping out from the windswept historical site on the southern shore of Tasmania, not far from the bottom of the world and already stalked by the ghosts of its brutal penal colony past. No one was Tweeting. Social media barely existed. Mobile phones were a luxury and spots as remote as Port Arthur had no coverage anyway. A gunman was on the loose. Five, ten, 15 people shot. Preposterous numbers that just kept growing. Local police scrambled down the narrow road in, unaware what horror they approached. In the end the toll from ‘the Port Arthur Massacre,’ as it’s etched into Australian vernacular, was 35 dead and 23 injured. April 28, 1996. Twenty years next year. It’s sometimes cheap to say an event changed a nation — but Port Arthur changed Australia. A whole generation of young Australians is now coming of age having never borne witness to a mass shooting in their own country. They don’t remember Port Arthur because they weren’t born when a 28-year-old with a low IQ stalked through a tourist attraction picking off innocent men, women and children with high-powered weaponry for reasons none of us will ever fathom. Young adults who have graduated high school, can vote, drive and legally drink alcohol (in Australia the drinking age is 18) have never walked on to campus fearing the weirdo from their economics tutorial might turn out to be a gun nut with a death wish. That’s freedom. But just not the way you think.
How comforting. I mean, I could point out that you are kind of making my point for me, but why would I? At this rate, you are like a walking advertisement for the need for gun control. So keep at it! Defend themselves from what, exactly? Why do they need these types of firearms to defend themselves from.....? The Government? A robber? Home invasion? I would understand the need for such weapons if you lived in say, oooohhh, I don't know, Aleppo. You know, a warzone, where military grade weapons are necessary for one's survival against armed insurgents and a Government that is actively trying to kill you. But the suburbs of the United States? Too bad about the fact that he followed and essentially stalked the boy and then incited the confrontation first, while armed before shooting Martin who defended himself against what had every appearance of an armed whack job who followed him, harassed him and threatened him on a dark night... And who has since gone on several rants, not to mention threatening others with firearms... Then in that case, you should be arming yourselves with nukes in your backyards. You know, since that is the threat you actually face. Not to mention your President is a lunatic inciting and threatening other countries with nuclear warfare. You know, you want to make sure you're up to date to face "any threat". Just don't forget the iodine tablets.
It could have been Notorious B.I.G. laying a beatdown on Zimmerman for all it matters, he had no business pursuing that confrontation in the first place and even the police told him to stay back. Maybe there's not enough evidence to convict him of murder, but it should be automatic prison time and loss of gun license just for pursuing that confrontation while armed in the first place, even if nothing had come of it.
Port Arthur Massacre: I think our hearts died with the death of Madeline 3, and Alannah 6, whilst being nursed by her mother. Callous shooting of all. It was the sheer brutality and callousness of his actions that shocked the nation so much as he calmly walked round killing. Very little is said about him in the press due to the nature of his severe narcissism. Media photos of him have been destroyed and he is kept in isolation from most media. Major national gun reform was introduced subsequently.
In a normal world, yes. Alas, we are talking about America, where Zimmerman got to tour the factory that manufactured the gun he used to kill Martin and where the NRA has brought out an insurance policy for people just like Zimmerman.
He killed Madeline and her mother. Then he hunted Alannah down after she fled into the bushes to hide. Literally. I think that was one of the things that was hardest to swallow. It was so different to in the cafe and carpark, where he shot randomly at anyone he saw moving. On that road as he drove away from his massacre, he stopped his car, killed the mother and her youngest child, then he hunted the 6 year old down to kill her after she tried to run and hide. I still feel sick imagining it, to be honest. I think all of us who were alive back then, still feel that sense of horror in the pit of our stomachs at what he did and how. As for images of him. The reason they do not exist is because they want to ensure his safety behind bars. The last time his photos were leaked (which wasn't that long ago), it was to report that he had become grossly overweight, was unhealthy and unhappy and depressed as the other prisoners are still threatening him when they realise they are in the same prison as Bryant. You can still watch the videos of his police interview online. There are still photos of him from back when he committed the mass shooting. They just try to restrict the more current photos of him from being published for his own safety.
Then that's clear, and won't be muddled again by you. I think you could not post honestly in response to me if you tried. I think you are actually incapable. As much as you - when you have me "citing Ruby Ridge", say. Which is my point - none of the true and accurate disparagements you level at gun nuts, any more than the lies and slanders and misrepresentations you shovel around, deal with my arguments at all. The entire mess illustrates, rather. Many reasonable people will refuse to hand political power to people who talk like you. And people who talk like you are currently dominating the one side - the ostensibly liberal, reason-based, good government side - of the gun control politics in the US.
