After yet another mass shooting (this time in an Oregon community college) that has been sensationalized to the extreme by our media, the usual players (e.g. left-wing media pundits and gun-control advocates) make this tragedy, which is felt with equal pain no matter what end of the political spectrum you stand on, into an "us versus them" political talking point. They outright blame the NRA (and gun owners who support the 2nd Amendment) for this tragedy and all shooting tragedies before it, which is as ludicrous as blaming AAA for car-related deaths, Beeradvocate.com for alcohol-related deaths, or the NAACP for when a Black gang member kills someone. It is obvious to anyone with half a brain that an organization advocating for the right of using an object in a lawful and responsible manner does not mean that organization applauds when a criminal uses this object in a unlawful, reckless and deadly manner: Quite the opposite, actually. Today, the POTUS personally adopted this sickening trend from left-wing media pundits in a vomit-inducing speech that essentially blamed those the Congress who did not support the 2013 Manchin Toomey Bill (which, by the way, failed with bipartisan support against it) for the deaths of these innocent people. What makes me want to pull the hair out of my head when I heard the speech is that Obama himself admitted on multiple occasions that the Manchin-Toomey Bill (and similar proposed gun-control legislation) would not have stopped, or even hindered, similar mass shooters. Thus, how can he sink so low as to make this a partisan issue? By making this an "us versus them" issue, the president created unnecessary animosity between two sides of a political issue, when a real leader would try to bring everyone together in the face of such a horrible even. People foolish enough to believe his garbage will blindly jump on the president's hateful crusade, and it is dangerous to knowingly spread such ignorance and hate, especially against innocent people that have absolutely nothing to do with the tragedy. What does everyone else think about Obama's speech?
I did not catch all of the speech but in general I thought he did a good job. Now it is no surprise to me that many on the right will have a much different view as political perspective influences our view in general. I really like his comments about when we have a mine disaster we effect changes to mitigate future disasters... but not so with mass shootings, we just seem to embrace the status quo rather than look for ways to mitigate future tragedies. I think American in general has has come to terms with the status quo of mass shootings as we in general place the 2nd Amendment above human life... which is immoral by my measure of morality. Make no mistake gun control is a partisan issue so it seems silly to me to be shocked when the president makes it so. The Republicans from my perspective are content with the status quo while the Democrats are not.
It's not so much a "different view" that I have, but rather a feeling of revulsion as the POTUS spouts lie after lie and uses a horrible tragedy to malign those who believe in the Bill of Rights and were against the Manchin-Toomey Bill. That's a terrible analogy: One doesn't purposely overlook the Bill of Rights to implement safety procedures in a mine. Also, the POTUS simply ignored proposals put forth by the GOP and NRA because he is immature and a sore loser (e.g. After he couldn't get his anti-gun agenda passed via the Manchin-Toomey Bill, then he refused to listen to, let alone endorse, any other idea that didn't involve gun registration). Gun control is not the only option. There were calls for increased armed security guards at schools and college campuses, an idea that Obama scoffed at. There were calls to improve the mental health system, so that dangerous people with obvious mental defects could be more swiftly committed to an inpatient psychiatric facility, but Obama ignored this idea too. Face it, Obama himself is as guilty as any of those in Congress that he cast aspersions upon for failing to pass meaningful laws that would help protect innocent people from madmen. First of all, mass shootings have nothing to do with the 2nd Amendment (just like inciting a riot or stampede in a crowded area have nothing to do with the 1st Amendment). Second of all, to say that Americans have "come to terms" with mass shootings is a foolish thing to say. The facts, which are evident from the nationwide outcries from people of both extremes of the political spectrum, belie this statement. It would be more accurate to say that Americans AND Europeans have come to terms with drunk-driving fatalities, which number about 10,000 annually in the European Union Territories and 10,000 annually in the USA (compared to 8400 firearm-related homicides annually). After all, we could essentially eliminate nearly all of these drunk driving deaths by legislating that all cars must come equipped with a breathalyzer and that a car cannot be started without the driver first blowing into the breathalyzer. However, nobody seems to care about the scores of people that die due to reckless drunk drivers, mainly because the media does not sensationalize drunk driving fatalities like they do with shootings. So please, spare me your crocodile tears. People like Obama and yourself don't care about human life: You care about turning law abiding citizens into criminals. My third point is that your view of morality is skewed. I believe that self-defense (and hence the Second Amendment) is a moral and natural right, and anyone advocating otherwise would be advocating for something completely immoral. Again, I am not shocked (because he and his ilk have shamelessly stood on the graves of the dead many times before to score political points), but merely disgusted that after admitting (on multiple occasions) that the Manchin-Toomey Bill would not have stopped similar massacres, he had the ability, like someone with an antisocial personality, to look straight into the camera and lie repeatedly to the American public whilst slandering his political opponents and Second Amendment supporters. It takes a very twisted person to do that. Moreover, what if the Manchin-Toomey Bill passed in 2013? It would have done nothing to stop any of the mass shootings that followed, so what would Obama say today in his lovely speech, after getting the gun control law that he wanted? Like I mentioned, the Republicans and the NRA had multiple proposals that Obama scoffed at. Just because you ignore them does not mean that they do not exist. Hence, your "perspective" is no better than that of an Ostrich with its head in the sand. It is interesting that you quote Frank Zappa, a libertarian and strong supporter of the Second Amendment (e.g. he produced one of the most pro-gun songs ever - Grand Funk Railroad's "Don’t Let’em Take Your Gun").
It is "us" (people who want sane gun laws) vs. "them" (Republicans and NRA). And "they" win every time. Hopeless!
What a coincidence that one of the servicemen who stopped the Muslim terrorist on the Belgium train went to school AT THE SAME COLLEGE where Chris (a guy who was into Muslims) did his killing. Tell us how your European gun control laws would help in Syria and Iraq where ISIS rules? Why don't you demand that ISIS leaders ban all assault weapons, or at least have registrations for anyone wanting a gun, with background checks? Why don't you demand that gun free zones be respected for all the non-Sunni areas they are taking over? Well, never mind, the Islamics will soon be making your laws.
To you "us" is "we the government" and "them" is "we the people" that you want to be required to be victims and defenseless. You side won again in a successful next mass killing of those unarmed defenseless peasants. Is there ANY limit to how many defenseless people you want murdered for your "we the government" agenda? Long ago the USA had "sane" gun laws - and therefore there were not the mass killings. You government control freaks created the mass killings by disarming people and creating FREE KILLING ZONES - targeting young people. But, then, Democrats like turtles more than children and young people.
Correct. There are not enough mass killings for Democrats and in the status quo the entire country isn't a FREE KILLING ZONE of 100% defenseless victims for which Democrats have assured it is a criminal offense for anyone to be able to defend themselves. Only when everyone is 100% defenseless and the government of absolute total control will Democrats be satisfied. Of course, this will necessitate even another massive increase in law enforcement - as was necessary when Australia banned handguns and murder rates increased radically as a result. Then it will be more police killing innocent people at a rate of over 500% greater than citizens with firearms do.
Why not? We become like Syria when the government bans guns. The most violent countries in the world all have banned weapons from the civilian population.
You must be able to defend your universally stupid gun control laws universally. If you can't then, you must concede that gun control only works in certain areas for certain groups.
I honestly didn't see/hear the speech. I do plan on trying to find it on youtube relatively soon. The only thing right now that I can say is, I wouldn't expect anything worthwhile from the POTUS on this issue. It doesn't matter who is in office at the time of these tragic events either. Democrat, Republican doesn't matter. Also, can't expect President Obama to do anything different. Let's create a speculative reality here for discussion sake. Say a Republican was advocating for lax gun laws. Don't you think that Republican POTUS in this theoretical reality would put in the speech something to hint towards that? I would expect it. Promoting an agenda has no reason to have a back bone because all that matters is getting the agenda to the masses. These moments are used by politicians to promote their agenda. So what they say is pointless. Let's face it, whenever these happens, how do the media, the populace or the politicians react? We bury the issue in either the populace all of sudden becoming 'constitutional amendment experts' about the 2nd amendment or we wipe the slate clean by attributing it to mental illness and not realizing what the exhaust fumes of having the 2nd amendment freedom actually is. We think we should start talking about arguing for more regulation and blame something that is not an entity in of itself or we blind ourselves from the the counter affects of the 2nd amendment freedom with the excuse of mental illness. I simply wish politicians, media, the populace would just mourn for those that lost lives and if they feel the urge to take it to a civic level, advocate the state that the crime happened to overlook its gun laws in relation to the gun crime rate that state has to deal with.
First of all, do you honestly think that the Republicans or NRA supporters want innocent people to die? If so, why? How is does advocating for the right to use a firearm safely and responsibly (a right that is codified in the Bill of Rights) equate with wanting innocent people to die via getting shot by a maniac? I fail the see the relationship. Second, like I mentioned in my OP, Obama himself has stated on multiple occasions that the failed Manchin-Toomey Bill (which he alluded to in his speech) would not have stopped previous massacres, and the facts have again demonstrated that it would not have stopped (or even remotely hindered) this most recent mass shooting. Thus, how is it "sane" to be advocating for a law that would have been utterly useless in stopping/slowing these mass shootings? To me, blindly pushing for a policy that is known to be completely ineffective (whilst slandering those who disagree with you for very logical reasons) is the definition of insanity.
This entire gun control debate pretty much boils down to one simple thing. People in general are just getting flat out sick and tired of being punished for the mishaps of the few. I'm not trying to be insensitive here but we have to look at reality. Yes these mass shootings are tragic, they really are, but in the grand scheme of things they ARE rare. Even with the recent spike in mass shootings you are still VERY unlikely to ever find yourself in the middle of one. You are still WAY more likely to die in your car on the way to school then you are finding yourself in the crossfire of a maniac with a gun at your school. We are trying to kill a cockroach using a cannon here. For example we have plenty of fatalities resulting from people driving drunk. It's common knowledge that people tend to get more drunk drinking hard liquor than beer. So we can try to fix that problem by banning hard liquor altogether. Would that help the problem? Yeah it probably would, but that solution is WAY overkill. We could implement massive restrictions on alcohol sales. Since approximately 2 beers will put you at the legal BAC limit in most states then we should make a law stating that no establishment is allowed to sell a single person more than 2 drinks, period, no if ands or buts, doesn't matter if you are driving or not. No store can sell you more than a single 6 pack of beer per person per day. Having a party? Too bad, nobody needs to drink that much, getting drunk only results in problems. What? You're saying you've never gotten a DUI, you've never even thought about driving under the influence? You like to sit at home minding your own business and get drunk on your couch and pass out? You are a responsible adult who isn't bothering nor hurting anybody with your enjoyment of kentucky bourbon? You enjoy going out with friends on Sundays and watching football at the bar and always have a designated DD or take a cab home? Too bad, there are people out there who are not like you, who get DUI's, who get drunk and punch out their spouses, who try to make it home because they don't live too far. Because of these people we have a new rule, 2 beers max, 1 whiskey max, one glass of wine, thats all you get. Sorry but those rare few screwed it up for you. ^^Should we do that? The answer is no, we should not, but THAT sort of thing is what people are getting sick of. The majority is getting sick and tired of the minority dictating policy because of their stupidity. So many people advocate punishing the masses for the actions of the few and the masses aren't having that anymore. Because a VERY TINY percentage of nutcases out there use firearms to commit mass murder doesn't mean the other 99.8% of gun owners should have to pay for it. Chances are you don't even know anybody who knows somebody who knows somebody who heard about a person they used to know ever committing a mass murder with a gun. Why stop at guns? Since we have no problem punishing the majority for the actions of the minority then lets apply that to all aspects of life, why do guns get special treatment? Yesterday on the news some teenage kid smashed his little rice burner Honda Civic into the back of a van on the highway. Killed himself and the passenger in the van, injured the rest of the family. What was he doing? Police say they found his phone, they think he was texting and driving and witnesses say the kid was doing what so many kids do with those little fast and furious wannabe cars they build. Swerving through traffic being reckless on the highway because it's "fun". So lets use a fire hose to put out this candle as well. Ban all children from driving cars period, nobody under the age of 18 can drive. Ban the modification of any production vehicle period. No aftermarket exhaust, no turbo chargers, nothing. If your car didn't have it when it came off the production line then you can't put it on there. New production vehicle regulations, no car can come equipped with more than 200hp. Nobody NEEDS a car with more hp than that and even 200hp is more than you really need. Yes 400hp sports cars are fun but they are just too dangerous and pose too great a threat to others on the road. Not everybody is responsible enough to drive one safely. Your vehicle will be for transportation only. Sorry car guys and gals, but since there are a tiny minority of morons out there who drive like maniacs we are taking away your ability to own fast cars. ^^Why don't we do that? People ball up there cars all the time for driving like idiots killing themselves and others every single day. Why don't we put heavy restrictions on cars? Why don't we make it mandatory for anybody wishing to purchase anything above a simple Toyota Camry to attend a sports driving course to learn how to drive properly? We don't we do background checks on people before they can buy the new Ford Mustang Boss 302? Hell why don't we just flat out make it illegal for anybody to buy a Boss 302 if they have ever gotten so much as a speeding ticket? Why don't we make it illegal to drive or purchase a Boss 302 if you are under the age of 25? Why don't we do all of these things I mentioned? Why are we so willing to apply this irrational logic to firearms? Simple. People don't care about things that don't affect them. The majority of those pushing for super strict gun regulations or gun bans don't actually own guns themselves nor have any desire to own guns so they have no problem pushing for laws to punish the owning of something they don't own. But start putting heavy restrictions on things that they own and watch them come up with a multitude of reasons why "those" laws would be outrageous. A huge chunk of people in America have a sports car or a motorcycle sitting in their garage. Go tell them that we are making it illegal to drive them because too many people are killing themselves and others. Go tell them that and watch what they will say, "But I'm not hurting anybody, I'm not irresponsible I've never even gotten a ticket in this thing". Ohh so NOW it's not fair to punish you for what somebody else did is it... People have no problem punishing "everybody" until "everybody" includes them.
Somewhere in your distillation you missed that parents are tired of having to worry about their kids getting shot if they go to a theater or to school...fear knows no probability.
I'm tired of worrying about dying on the way to work because society finds it perfectly acceptable to allow children who hit puberty 4 years ago to drive 2 ton vehicles around me. I was t-boned by a child driving a vehicle because he wasn't paying attention and ran a stop sign going a good 40mph. It hit the passenger side, if I would have been going the opposite direction he would have hit me on the drivers side at 40mph and I very likely would not be here typing right now or possibly seriously injured or paralyzed or something. Fear knows no probability, then how about we actually fear what makes the most sense. It's like people who are terrified of flying yet have no issue driving to work on the interstate every morning. People are free to be afraid of whatever they please, but irrational fear is the problem. If people want to be afraid of dying then wouldn't it make sense to go after the things that are most likely to actually kill you? Your kids are more likely to get killed in the back of your car on their way to school than they are of getting shot at school. We have extremely loose regulations and borderline laughable driving standards which allow very dangerous roads in this country. Why don't we go after those things? Why are firearms getting targeted when in all reality they are literally, statistically, very far down the totem pole of things that are likely to kill you everyday?
And this is one of the reasons some states like mine have raised the age at which people can drive with full priviledges. We are becoming more proactive on cars, why not guns? "Statistically" does not matter when it is not just an issue of school shootings. Access to cheap guns on the streets is something the right brags about in response as a defense to to the possibility that outlawing them will stop shootings. School shootings may not happen often, but suicides, murders, drive-bys happen every day and parents and grandparents know their little angels are also dumbasses because, as you pointed out, they are barely out of puberty.
Please tell us what specific law you would put in place that would have stopped recent mass shootings.
Banning guns would have an effect, a more violent one. You don't just have to look at the violence created in the prohibition period, or the failed "war on drugs", you can look at the overall violence of countries that have outright or de facto banned guns. There is no correlation between suicide and firearms. The countries with the highest rates of suicide also have the lowest rates of gun ownership. Are you suggesting that the people out there committing drive bys would stop their murderous ways if guns suddenly disappeared from the earth? If anything they would be emboldened knowing that victims did not have an equalizer. A better question is why is our government not removing violent criminals and the criminally insane from our society and instead letting them roam the streets. Banning guns is just a lazy attempt to fix a much deeper problem.
The right doesn't brag about access to cheap guns on the street with easy access. Outlawing guns wouldn't stop shootings but it would probably reduce them in the long run, and I mean the VERY long run because unlike places like Europe and Australia the citizens of America just flat out are not going to give back their 300+ million guns. Plenty of people keep saying we should adopt the strict gun policies of places like Europe and Australia, the problem is that we are different cultures. The reason that worked in those countries is because the citizens allowed it to work. The citizens agreed to give up their firearms. America is not that type of country. As I've said before laws only work as well as people are willing to follow them. I believe people have a misconception as to how exactly implementing such laws in the US would actually work. I believe they greatly underestimate the amount of people who would just flat out refuse to comply. In a perfect world we could MAKE people follow the law, but this is the real world here. Then some will say things like "well then we put them in jail, or we fine them heavily, etc". That works in smaller numbers, when you have millions of people in the nation simultaneously telling you where to shove your gun laws then doing things like "putting them in jail" doesn't work. Its pretty much like if tomorrow 1/3rd of all drivers decided to start driving 100mph on the interstate. The cops could arrest a few but then when they realize that there are about 80-100 million people all driving 100mph all over the country tomorrow then what are you going to do about it? You literally can't arrest everybody, you can't fine everybody, you can't really do anything except ask them why they aren't complying with the speed limit and try to solve the issue. As you know there is power in numbers. The main problem in America in regards to gun regulation is the fact that we simply have too many guns to regulate. Too many people have guns that won't give them back and since a good 200 million or so of them are unregistered authorities couldn't take them even if they wanted to because they don't know who has what. Here is where you and I agree yet disagree. As you said we have become more proactive on cars in some places, stop letting children drive, raising the age limit, etc. But in that case you are going after the PERSON, not the object. So why can't we apply the same logic to guns? Go after the PERSON, not the guns themselves. We already have laws in place that go after the person, we just need to do a better job of enforcing these laws. Making laws that go after the object doesn't make any sense when talking about fast cars so why does it make sense when talking about guns? IIRC an 18 year old kid can walk into the Ford dealership and buy a 500whp V8 Mustang. They do it all the time, I see it all the time. No dealership is going to say "No we won't take your money because we don't think you are responsible enough to drive this thing". They don't care, you are paying them. Should we allow the government to step in and regulate what kind of car you can drive? Should the government step in and put a horsepower cap on production vehicles and ban the aftermarket modification of vehicles? Why not? Vehicle regulations are laughable when it comes to safety precautions and danger to others. Sure they have certain safety features they must have and all that but they are still allowed to manufacture and sell 500whp cars to 18 year old kids. THAT is more dangerous to society than any firearm yet nobody seems outraged over that. When was the last time there was a news story with people wondering if we should even allow 500whp cars to drive on public roads? Children and elderly lead the charge when it comes to vehicle accidents yet where are the regulations saying maybe we should stop letting children and elderly folks drive? If we have no problem telling people they shouldn't be allowed to have 30 round magazines or AR-15s then why can't we tell people they shouldn't be able to have 500hp cars? Why don't we draw a line on legal street worthy horsepower? Lets draw it at 200hp, no car needs more than that to take you to work and home. Why do I need a 500hp car? I take it to the track, I don't drive it fast on the public roads. Why do I need a 30 round magazine? I take it to the range, I don't shoot it in the backyard. But we have no problem telling one guy he can't have that but nobody is out there telling the guy with the 800hp Evo X that he can't have that. My question is...why. As you said school shootings may not happen everyday but suicides, murders, and drive bys do. Fatal vehicle accidents happen every day, even more often than shootings, yet why is nobody out there trying to do anything about that. If we want to start targeting the object and not the person then we have to do it all the way, can't pick and choose when its the objects fault and when its the persons fault. Cars don't drive themselves and guns don't shoot themselves. Tell the government to put a hp cap on all vehicles, put governors on all vehicles restricting top speed of 90mph, you can't legally go faster than that on any public road. Ban the aftermarket modification of any vehicle, require everyone who wishes to obtain a drivers license to attend a 2 week course on proper driving techniques and procedures to learn how to operate it effectively and safely. If they do that then I'll register my guns and give up my AK-47s. Since targeting the object itself is perfectly acceptable then it's only fair that we do it for everything else in society that we deem dangerous to ourselves and others.
Nobody is confiscation anyone's guns in the south, Midwest, or plains states. If New England and the pacific coast states want to good luck to you. #1 the states are passing laws basically saying any new federal gun laws won't be enforced and places like Texas might outright rebel. #2 you would need 3/4 of the states to get it done and that will never happen
