99blancoSS

iTrader: (115)

George K. wrote: 2m ago
Everyone can calm down because the NRA is on the job!! They have evaluated this shooting and determined it could have been avoided if all those students had been armed. The NRA has therefore annouced a new program to provide free guns to those who cannot afford them.

It is estimated that there are currently 250 million guns in our great nation but the NRA has promised to double it to 500 million before Bush leaves office. The NRA recognizes that the only way to stem violence in America is to arm every man, woman, and child (over 12-years-old). Therefore they are doing everything in their power (including contributing millions to pro-gun legislators) to ensure that millions more guns flood the streets of America.

God + Guns + NRA = The American Way!!!

___________________

4 incidents in one week, not to mention how many other kids have been slaughtered at schools in the past ten years. This **** didnt happen when I grew up. We need to re-think a few things, anything else is pure ignorance. Not saying get rid of guns, but lets look at the situation and evaluate and act. Anything else is irresponsible and telling our kids they are on thier own.

I see kids in action everyday. They act without thinking and then regret later. Bullets are to final to allow kids to be making mistakes with them that they regret later.

Even insurance companies recognize the volitility of young single men. They pay the most in insurance premuims for a reason.

Can't we come up with a better plan? Flame suit on.. the many republicans in here will be pro-gun arm them all.

NW94Z

40 years ago school were turned into "gun free" zones. 40 years ago innocent people began turning into victims in school zones.

Believe it or not there are documented cases of bad guys with the intent to kill bringing guns to school only to be stopped by just as much as a legal gun carrying citizen brandishing there gun. The last incident i can recall didn't happen at a school but rather at a church that seats thousands in Colorado. Crazy goes on the attack with a gun and a woman member of the congregation that was carrying a concealed weapon drew her gun and killed the shooter. Unfortunately he was able to kill a couple of innocent people before they got him but she DID save lives. The last kid in Illinois slowly and methodically fired all four of his guns into the assembled class. If one of the those students had been carrying a concealed weapon they would have had the time to potentially save lives. The FACTS are when there are legally armed citizens in the presence of a shooter that lives are saved. The FACT is when you disarm the populace they can no longer protect themselves and turn into victims.

Trust me it seems counterintuitive to me also but a legally armed populace is better than an unarmed populace. Ban every gun in the country and the bad guys will still have guns. Then we all become hostages in our own country.

WAHUSKER

iTrader: (4)

FACTS TO PONDER:

(A) The number of physicians
in the U.S. is 700,000.

(B) Accidental deaths caused by
Physicians per year are 120,000.

(C) Accidental deaths per physician is 0.171.

* Statistics courtesy of U.S.
Dept of Health Human Services.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Now think about this:

Guns:

(A) The number of gun owners in the U.S.
is 80,000,000.

(Yes, that's 80 million)

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

(B) The number of accidental gun deaths
per year, all age groups, is 1,500.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

(C) The number of accidental deaths
per gun owner is 0.000188.

* Statistics courtesy of FBI

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

So, statistically, doctors are
approximately 9,000 times
more dangerous than gun owners.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Remember, "Guns don't kill people,
doctors do."

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

FACT: NOT EVERYONE HAS A GUN, BUT ALMOST EVERYONE
HAS AT LEAST ONE DOCTOR.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Please alert your friends
to this alarming threat.

We must ban doctors before this gets completely out of hand !

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Out of concern for the public at large,
I have withheld the statistics on lawyers
for fear the shock would cause people to
panic and seek medical attention.

NW94Z

In addition to banning my doctor and lawyer, I am going to go a step further and ban kitchen knives (they're sharp, duh) and cars because I recall a ton of people were killed last year because of them. A

Anyone else want to suggest another ban or two so we can all be better protected from ourselves?

Tranzor

I don't consider myself a "republican" (I'll vote for whoever I think will get the job done), but I know that strict gun control isn't the answer. Do you know who will follow the laws of strict gun control? That's right, the people who you didn't have to worry about anyhow. The ones who won't... those are the ones that aren't following current laws anyway.

Taking away a tool that's simply a means to an end isn't going to stop that end. Think about it... it's not like mass killing was a new invention that coincided with the gun. If you banned guns, if you completely wiped them off the face of the earth, guess what? People would still kill each other. They'd do it with swords and clubs... if you banned swords and clubs, they'd do it with knives. If you banned knives, they'd do it with rocks. And good luck banning the earth from creating rocks.

Point is, when a suicide bomber creates a homemade bomb, the answer isn't to ban fertilizer or whatever else they used to create it. The answer is to find the root cause of what makes people do these types of things, and work to solve that. Treating the result isn't going to stop it from happening.

crazylane

iTrader: (19)

I would like to banned wifes..... Jets just make them Friends with Benifits.

Get what we want from them, and tell them to hit the street.. And to make sure they stay next to a pay phone for when I need something. Lol.

Mikey 97Z M6

iTrader: (37)

Here is a debate essay I wrote for my college English class last year. Would have liked to do more research on this topic, but it was only supposed to be a 5 page essay, and I had a limited time frame to do so. I could have easily made it a 10 or 20 page essay arguing both points. In the end, I don't believe banning guns or making stricter gun control laws is the answer to gun related crimes.

I have to post this in two posts because of the text limt LOL....

Mike




Gun Control Should Mean Using Both Hands

Gun laws of today are gearing toward a total confiscation for all guns. It starts slowly at first; making small advances to reduce, or make illegal, only certain types of firearms. For example, the last decade or so, the push from lobbyists has been to limit, or even make illegal, the production and/or purchase of semi-automatic assault-type rifles. Handguns, like pistols, have also been a hot button issue for years from the pro-gun-control lobbyists. But does the reduction of guns necessarily mean there will be a reduction in violent crimes using guns? The book “More Guns, Less Crime”, written by John R. Lott, used comprehensive data research from 1988 to 1996, and shows the opposite of what most people tend to think, which is that more guns equal more crime. Stricter gun laws will not reduce gun related crimes; they will only remove guns from the law-abiding citizens leaving them defenseless against real criminals.

It wasn’t too long ago that you could walk into your local gun dealer and purchase an AK-47 knock-off over the counter without any sort of identification. Those days are long gone, and now there are laws in place that make you wait for a specified period of time before you can purchase a new gun over the counter. This law gathers your personal information, which is then sent through a comprehensive federal database to do background checks. The law is designed to prevent violent crimes that happen in heat-of-the-moment scenarios. It is supposed to limit access to guns for people who don’t already own a firearm, and may find themselves enraged enough to purchase a firearm for all the wrong reasons. In that respect, the law actually does have merit. But that percentage of circumstances is very small, and there are those who would like to believe that this law is actually preventing crimes from hardened criminals. This just simply isn’t the case. The real criminals are not going to purchase a new firearm. Those criminals will acquire a weapon off the street, which has probably been stolen from a law-abiding citizen, to use for their crime of choice.

The question of whether or not a reduction of firearms will reduce crime has been an on-going debate for over 40 years. Ian Ayres and John J. Donohue dissected the article written by John R. Lott titled “More Guns, Less Crime” and they wrote that, “Looking at the results from 1988 and 1996 presidential election polls, Lott estimates that gun ownership rose from 26 percent of the population to 39 percent in 1996. His estimate of a 50% increase in gun ownership in eight years might seem alarming, but it is worth noting that crime was substantially lower in 1996 than in 1988.”

It is true that guns are more likely to be used in suicides than any other form. But are they a major contributor to suicide rates? According to Chris Mooney (Gun Violence p.57), suicide happens to be the 8th leading cause of death among Americans in the U.S., and he also adds:
Guns are also the most deadly weapon used in suicide attempts; guns kill more than 9 out of 10 people who attempt suicide with them, according to one study. Since many suicide attempts are the result of impulsive behavior, this means access to a gun can easily turn a passing bout of depression into a tragedy. “If they didn’t have [a gun] handy, they might try suicide by other means, but they’d be more likely to survive and get counseling,” says Kristen Rand, federal affairs director at the Violence Policy Center.

But, does this necessarily mean that eliminating access to guns would deter a suicide? People are not dumb; they know what works and what doesn’t. If guns are not available to someone contemplating suicide, they’ll quickly figure out another means by which to commit suicide. I would venture to say that a gun is chosen for suicide because it is thought to be a quick and painless way to effectively eliminate your own life, not just because it happens to be available at the time. Nicki Fellenzer (Gun Violence p.65) suggests that the suicide rates are higher in countries that don’t have access to guns when Fellnzer states: “According to the Center for Disease Control, in the United States, the 2002 crude suicide rate per 100,000 among males was 17.95”. He then goes on to write:
In Australia, where the government continues to tighten its grip on gun owners and guns are becoming less and less readily available, 21.2 men per 100,000 committed suicide in 1999.
In Austria—another gun control paradise—that number was 27.3.
In Belgium, in 1996, the suicide rate among men was 29.4 per 100,000.
In Denmark—20.9 per 100,000 in 1998.
In Finland, where guns are strictly regulated, and you must have a damn good reason for owning one (apparently protection is not considered a valid need), 34.6 men per 100,000 killed themselves in 1999.

So, in turn, this essentially tells us that, even if guns were eliminated, people are still going to find ways to commit suicide effectively.

Would eliminating guns altogether reduce the crime rate? Let’s take a look at some countries that have, in fact, tried that very scenario. Australia passed a law in 2002 eliminating private handgun ownership. They confiscated all handguns within the country, or at least all the registered handguns. Remember, only the law-abiding people will register a gun. Since that time, according to Samuel Francis who wrote the article “Gun control will not reduce violent crime”, Australia’s homicides increased 3.2% since the ban. Furthermore, assaults have risen 8.6% and armed robberies have increased 44%! Francis goes on to write, “In one state [Victoria] homicides with firearms have risen 300%, despite the government ban.” That is an incredible increase in violent crimes within one year of the ban on handguns. Japan also instituted a ban on all firearms in general. Since 1991, the country has implemented tougher laws, and even having a bullet in your possession will get you 15 years in prison, according to Francis. Those are some pretty tough laws, and yet in 2002, Japan had the highest gun related crimes in the nation’s history, again according to Francis. He goes on to write, “Similar statistics come from Great Britain, long the gun controllers’ showcase country. There, where privately owned handguns were effectively banned a few years ago after a mass shooting by a crazed homosexual, crime figures show an increase in England and Wales for the first time in six years.” Francis goes on to write, “The number of robberies, mostly mugging, increased by 19%. Violent offenses increased by 5% and sexual offenses rose by 2%.” Those statistics are hard to argue against and further prove that, just because you make gun ownership illegal, it will not decrease the amount of crime. As a matter of fact, it seems to have quite the opposite affect.

Mikey 97Z M6

iTrader: (37)

The bottom line is that guns certainly pose a risk in our society, but that risk applies to both ends of the gun control argument. With the presence of guns, anyone that has little or no knowledge of them is at risk of seriously injuring himself or herself when handling them. This is especially true when you consider the movies of today, and how the moviemakers, and rap videos tend to glamorize guns to a point that our youth may start to think of them more as toys than a dangerous weapon that can actually kill. Then there is the other side, which is the risk to the criminals from people who are armed with their own firearms. Imagine, at least for a moment, that we lived in a society where firearms were a natural part of growing up, and that everyone was taught the proper way to use and handle one from a very young age. Some may say this is absurd to even fathom, but put that thought aside and humor me. Now that every man, woman, and child knows that a gun should be handled with care and respect, imagine that every man and woman carried a firearm, or at least had one present in their car and home. Now try to imagine how that would affect violent crimes committed with guns. I know that if I were a criminal, I’d be looking into another form of work, since my personal gains from crime would be far outweighed by the possibility of being shot, and maybe killed, by someone I’m trying to rob. That would be a huge risk, and probably not one that many would be willing to take. Here is something else to ponder for a moment also; most of us drive an automobile, and those autos can be very dangerous. A car can very easily be used as a weapon, and nearly everyone owns one and knows how to operate it, yet it’s very uncommon for people to use their vehicle for a crime. You are nearly 2 times more likely to die in a car accident than being shot and killed by a gun related crime, and yet people don’t have an overwhelming sense of fear from autos. Why is that so? It is probably because everyone is familiarized, with them, from a very young age, and is also taught that a vehicle should be respected, and not feared.

Now please don’t get me wrong here; I’m not trying to make a direct comparison between gun related deaths, and automobile related deaths, but merely point out that many more people die from autos than guns, and yet guns are still feared more so than autos. What we need in this country is a more pro-active education on firearms, not more laws prohibiting their use.

Works Cited

Ayres, Ian, and John J. Donohue. 10 November 2006.
<http://islandia.law.yale.edu/ayers/pdf/lottreview.pdf#search='concealed%20weapons%20stati stics%20nra'>


Cothran, Helen. Gun Control. Farmington Hills: Greenhaven Press, 2003.


Haerens, Margaret. Gun Violence. Farmington Hills: Greenhaven Press, 2006.


Lott, John R. Jr. More Guns, Less Crime. University of Chicago Press, 2000.


“More Guns, Less Crime 12 November, 2006.
<http://www.nraila.org/Issues/FactSheets/Read.aspx?id=206&issue=007>

Crisisman

iTrader: (1)

Amen. Most of those 1,500 accidental firearm deaths each year are caused by idiots who don't follow basic rules of firearm safety...don't keep a loaded gun in the house!!!

Tails

Of course we have the highest gun deaths of all the industrialized nations along with one of the highest infant mortality rates and the lead in most deaths due to not seeing a doctor. The only ban that I can see working is to ban death.

NW94Z

Ban death....I like it. Ok, so who is going to start a petition?