Parkland School Shooting

[Oklahomahawk]

Paul Ryan n Ronald Reagan were also fatherless children

Well Reagan turned out OK, at least for the most part, though I do disagree with him on some things. Ryan is such a tool Black and Decker is considering suing him.

[CK86]

Is it your position that it was the truck that killed those people in Niece, and not the driver?

Both did. The driver used the vehicle to kill people much like the shooter used the gun to kill people.

[57Brave]

There are some on this board that would argue there is no such thing as a "fatherless child "

[CK86]

CK86 implied it was the weapon, and only the weapon, that killed those kids.

He said



I am simply asking if he is consistent with that logic... I suspect he's not. The left rarely is

I simply asked how the kids were dying since thethe said "the weapon is not what's killing these children". Then I asked if it was magic?

[sturg33]

I simply asked how the kids were dying since thethe said "the weapon is not what's killing these children". Then I asked if it was magic?

hey don't backtrack now.

clearly... the gun - not the shooter is the issue. This is what you were responding to, after all:

The weapon is not what's killing these children and if the fbi would do their job many of these would be prevented.

Now... if your point was literally the weapon was the tool that killed the children, but is not the reason the children died... I'd agree.

Is that what you meant?

[sturg33]

[bravesnumberone]

The kid wanted a lot of people dead. The gun, the type of gun it was and his ability to purchase it legally helped him carry that out pretty quickly. ****ty job by law enforcement also played a role here. That can't be said for every case, though.

[sturg33]

The kid wanted a lot of people dead. The gun, the type of gun it was and his ability to purchase it legally helped him carry that out pretty quickly. ****ty job by law enforcement also played a role here. That can't be said for every case, though.

I hope Jaw is OK with me quoting him here...

The FBI knew or had been warned about the Fort Hood shooter, the Aurora shooter, the Oregon shooter, the Orlando shooter, the Chattanooga shooter, the San Bernadino shooters, the Texas church shooter, the Las Vegas shooter, and now the Parkland shooter....but gun owners and the NRA are the problem, and we need "stronger background checks" and "common sense gun control laws." Whatever that means.

[mqt]

Funny, but ultimately irrelevant to the discussion of gun control.

[BedellBrave]

Because the end of the day there is one common theme running through ALL of these horrible instances.
One ----

Until that one is addressed -- this will happen again and again

Yep, sin.

[mqt]

The FBI knew or had been warned about the Fort Hood shooter, the Aurora shooter, the Oregon shooter, the Orlando shooter, the Chattanooga shooter, the San Bernadino shooters, the Texas church shooter, the Las Vegas shooter, and now the Parkland shooter....but gun owners and the NRA are the problem, and we need "stronger background checks" and "common sense gun control laws." Whatever that means.

Well, there's the option of both enacting more stringent gun control measures AND re-evaluating how law enforcement handles tips on potential terrorists.

[BedellBrave]

Just been reading through the last few pages of this thread. Why? I have no clue. Keep up the fine conversation y'all are having. Smh.

[BedellBrave]

Guys, this place really does bring out the worst in most. I've posted less and less for numerous reasons, but I think I'm pretty close to being done. If so, I bid you all adieu. May you each come to know the love and grace that I know and don't deserve.

[sturg33]

[The Chosen One]

There is a way but it takes sensible people to be able to push that through. That's not what our government is about though.

Please do expound.

Interested in what you think is sensible that would help fix this, since you rarely post in politics.

[thethe]

Guys, this place really does bring out the worst in most. I've posted less and less for numerous reasons, but I think I'm pretty close to being done. If so, I bid you all adieu. May you each come to know the love and grace that I know and don't deserve.

Be well sir. I'm sorry that I have contributed to that.

[Julio3000]

Well, there's the option of both enacting more stringent gun control measures AND re-evaluating how law enforcement handles tips on potential terrorists.

Yeah, I'm not sure why people are so dug in on a particular position that they have to view everything as zero-sum. "If a particular piece of legislation or law enforcement policy wouldn't have stopped x event, it's useless." Why not view it more holistically? I don't think that reinstating the assault weapons ban will end mass shootings or school shootings (and I've noted how relatively rare, in the universe of gun crimes, that crimes with those weapons are). But I am fairly certain that it would go a ways towards ameliorating the problem.

Sturg, you've highlighted the failure of the FBI to act effectively on tips in some of these cases. How comfortable are you, as a libertarian, with Feds knocking on your door to chat with you about your purported plans to murder a bunch of folks? Should they be granted warrants to investigate your communications based on anonymous citizen tips? Should they or local law enforcement be able to detain you, take away your guns, put you on a no-buy list, or forcibly commit you to an institution? I ask because this side of the issue is fraught with questions of that nature, and you seem to suggest that there was action that should have been taken.

I have a hard time following the logic. If it's your right to stockpile guns and ammo (and afaik, that's all, say, the LV shooter was "known" to be doing) where and how would you see it as appropriate for law enforcement to be involved?

[Jaw]

IMO, that's where the whole thing falls apart. Once you're on the slippery slope that admits that you want access to battlefield weaponry to protect you from a gummint that could kill you, if it wanted to, via joystick from a bunker in Nebraska, you're in a logically untenable position.

I think there is some confusion about what a battlefield weapon is. The picture below shows the selector on an M-16, an actual battlefield rifle:


The three options are for semi-auto fire (1 shot with 1 pull of the trigger), burst fire (3 rounds with one pull of the trigger), and automatic fire (the gun shoots non stop with 1 pull of the trigger, and is empty in about 2 wildly inaccurate seconds.)

Below is a civilian rifle based on the frame of the M-16, known as an AR and often lumped together as an AR-15, whether it is actually an AR-15 or not:

The two options are for safe (don't shoot even if I pull the trigger), and fire (1 shot with 1 pull of the trigger.)

This is what many gun control enthusiasts and media are misidentifying as an assault weapon, or lately as a battlefield weapon. Please note that they would never mis-characterize the gun below as an assault or battlefield weapon, even though it is also a semi automatic rifle:


The difference is that one looks like a military rifle and the other does not.

Here is another one that frightens people with its appearance:


This one, of course, is a BB gun, not scary at all once you get past those military looks and judge it based on what it actually is.



Here is another fun experiment. These guns are both semi-auto shotguns:





The first one obviously looks meaner, but their rate of fire and magazine capacity is the same.

This is one of the things that I find really frustrating about this entire debate, and Julio I know you're a good dude who isn't being dishonest. But the people in politics and media who are framing this as an "assault weapons" or "battlefield weapons" issue either lack sufficient knowledge to comment on the issue, or are being deliberately dishonest. There is no other explanation. We already have an assault weapons ban, it's called the National Firearms Act, and our politicians set that one up so that if you can both afford the prices and pass the screenings then you are either a politician or someone with a politician in their pocket.

What they are pushing for now is a semi automatic rifle ban, and yes, there are plenty of legitimate uses for semi-auto rifles. Watch youtube videos of hog hunting in Texas or any of the other southern states where the hog population is out of control. Think of hunting in the Rockies and coming between a mother grizzly and her cubs, or just of squirrel hunting for food. This idea that they only exist to kill people is just mind boggling when one considers that hundreds of thousands of them have been sold in this country, and less than a dozen have been used for evil purposes.

[Jaw]

So you need battlefield weapons that are more often used to murder children in schools to protect you from a purely hypothetical event that has never actually happened. But the mean old leftists are using emotion in this argument.

I won't get into EMPs or their likelihood, or even the Congressional testimony (link) that has been made about how ill equipped our nation is to handle them, but a similar event happened just over 150 years ago:

https://news.nationalgeographic.com/...event-science/

[Jaw]

To discount that any civilization can take a turn for the worst is crazy to me.

Me five minutes ago...

I totally understand the slippery slope fear when it comes to gun control measures

I'm simply advocating that its possible to restrict certain type of gun ownership and still champion second amendment rights. I've never understood how this issue turned black and white.

I get that. But realize that there are already restrictions on gun ownership, so we are already part of the way down the slippery slope. Try to buy an automatic rifle. Try to get a concealed carry permit in a liberal enclave. Now we're going to add my squirrel gun to the list? Sounds like we're sliding even faster on the slippery slope. I might not think that's so crazy if we were actually doing a competent job on the existing safety measures like background checks (hello FBI!), or reporting of violent crime (there you are Air Force!), or if we weren't under reporting crime for political reasons (looking at you Broward County!)