Summations Only

But the point is, that's a non-sequitur. Banned firearms doesn't mean fewer firearms, just as banning drugs in the United States didn't lead to less drugs in the United States. In fact, it led to more drugs and it led to more guns as well.If you want to reduce the amount of gun crime in the United States, legalize drugs and make abortion fully legal. But again, the UK, Norway, and Sweden - which, like almost anywhere in Europe, have a higher rate of crime (particularly violent crime) than the United States - never substantially reduced the number of guns in their society; they simply instituted steps to "lock in" gun ownership rates at existing low levels. There's never been any country that has gone from a rate of gun ownership comparable to the United States to a rate comparable to the state of Connecticut. Both the number of guns "on the street" and the number of gun homicides are already slowly declining.

So if the vast majority of gun owners already follow this practice, what's the point in legislating it? Under what regime do you anticipate creating the first law that would be followed with 100% compliance?

Well, I am, which is why I'm basically arguing with everybody. I currently favor gun registration, ballistics fingerprinting of all weapons, magazine size limits, "bullet button" requirements on magazine-loading weapons, and possibly annual ammunition purchasing limits. I'm less convinced about the last one. A mass shooter usually only "needs" about a hundred rounds, and his mass shooting is usually the last time he ever fires a gun in his life (since he's usually caught, shot, or suicided.) But it doesn't sound unreasonable to me that someone like a competitive target shooter might expend hundreds of rounds in a year.

But at what cost?Violent crimes per 100,000 individuals: US, Canada, Australia, and the US: I mean, I'm all for gun control, but not at the cost of having the US spiral into lawlessness like Europe, like the UK, where home invasion robbery is "the new normal" that people accept is going to happen, it's a legitimate mode of employment, maybe you could be a mate and help the guy cart off your goods, but god forbid you be so impolite as to use anything approaching force to prevent him from helping himself to your possessions, your wife, and maybe your life.Edited by Admin, : Make image readable.

No, it is true. (You're not.. calling me a liar, are you?) The permit-holder drew down but didn't fire, and the shooter retreated in response and killed himself.I mean, that's almost a textbook-perfect case of how concealed-carry could abort a mass shooting scenario. Otherwise you're left with arguing for the possibility that a guy stole an AR-15, loaded up with hundreds of rounds, a side-arm, and a fully-loaded tactical load-bearing vest, bagged all of two people, and said "huh, I guess that's enough" and decided to eat one.That doesn't make any sense to me. Clearly, the Clackamas shooter killed himself when he encountered armed resistance. That the permit-holder didn't have to fire a shot to save lives proves, to me, that the notion of an armed hero stopping a mass shooting event isn't as risible in every circumstance as you've made it out to be in the past. It remains to be seen whether you'll adapt your position to new information; my guess is, the answer is "no."

What's the alternative? He was driven to suicide by his remorse after only shooting two?He executed his planned suicide at the first sign of resistance. The loaded Glock pointed at him was that resistance. Textbook case of lives saved by concealed carry.You all sound so disappointed that it didn't turn into the shootout at the OK Corral, but isn't that exactly the scenario you all have said would be the worst outcome when concealed-carry permit holders try to stop active shooter events? I'm not understanding the criticism, here.

And from this other side, it seems like you've forgotten that your home is supposed to be a castle, a place of safety and refuge, not a shopping center ("centre" I guess you'd say) where people are free to force their way in and help themselves to whatever they want, including your life.I mean, that's what seems crazy to me - meek surrender to the "new normal" of vastly elevated burglary rates and hooliganism displayed in the UK.

Yeah, Dronester. Believe it or not, I know things you don't know. In fact, a lot of people do. http://io9.com/...es-about-why-americas-crime-rate-is-so-low

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The stereotype of Americans is that we are a violent lot, prone to shooting each other at random. And yet if you compare US crime rates to those in European countries, you can see that crime has been rising in Europe as it declines in the US.

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For a disaggregated view, you can go here: http://www.cepr.org/...s/wkcn/9/979/papers/Buonnano_etal.pdf

I exaggerate slightly, but its all based on real events in the UK - prosecuting homeowners who have used force to repel invaders, awarding compensation claims to burglars injured "on the job" by unsafe home conditions, and so on. You people are fucking crazy over there about what you're prepared to tolerate going on in your homes, and I don't understand it at all.

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But the trouble is that this kind of burglary - the kind most likely to go "wrong" - is now the norm in Britain. In America, it's called a "hot" burglary - a burglary that takes place when the homeowners are present - or a "home invasion", which is a much more accurate term. Just over 10 per cent of US burglaries are "hot" burglaries, and in my part of the world it's statistically insignificant: there is virtually zero chance of a New Hampshire home being broken into while the family are present. But in England and Wales it's more than 50 per cent and climbing. Which is hardly surprising given the police's petty, well-publicised pursuit of those citizens who have the impertinence to resist criminals.

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These days, even as he or she is being clobbered, the more thoughtful British subject is usually keeping an eye (the one that hasn't been poked out) on potential liability. Four years ago, Shirley Best, proprietor of the Rolander Fashion emporium, whose clients include Zara Phillips, was ironing some clothes when the proverbial two youths showed up. They pressed the hot iron into her flesh, burning her badly, and then stole her watch. "I was frightened to defend myself," said Miss Best. "I thought if I did anything I would be arrested."

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/...hmans-home-is-his-dungeon.htmlThe UK has an astronomical crime rate, double the crime rate of the US in every category, including violent crime:It's fine that you consider us Yanks to be a bunch of rootin'-tootin' Yosemite Sam's, but from my side of the pond you're the crazy ones - not only have you disarmed everybody but the criminals, you've put the law on their side, as well. Leaving your citizens so exposed to the predations of their fellow men is just insane. I never said that they were. The problem is, a gun death isn't the only bad thing that can happen to you. But not overall homicides:Unless you think a reduction in homicides eight years later can somehow be connected to the gun ban, but it's not obvious why that should be the case.

I don't expect I can convince anybody for whom it is an article of faith that a firearm is never an effective tool for self-defense. But it's nevertheless the case that the potential massacre in Chakamas was brought to a conclusion by the actions of a concealed-carry permit holder, without him even having to fire a shot.

In the UK it's the highest anywhere in Europe. The rate of burglary while the occupants are home is four times in the UK what it is in the US, because criminals in the UK know that they can come and go as they please so long as they grip something more dangerous than a butter knife with which to menace the occupants of whatever home they like. Why wouldn't they? It's not like they'll be shot by responding police, either. See, this is the insanity I can't wrap my head around. A guy breaks into your home while you're there and you think that's a petty crime? I don't follow that at all.

I'm not talking about theft. I'm talking about invasion. Your notion that a guy can just break into your home - where you live! while you're there! - and rifle through your things, take his pick, and it's no big deal, nothing as bad as assaulting a guy, certainly... that's just fucking insane to me, Rahvin.A guy is invading your home and everybody on your goofy island has just decided that's no big deal. But the violent crime rate is almost three times as high. No, Rahvin. But the sanctity of the home is worth more to me than human life. I can't understand the mindset that says it isn't.

But, as I've said before, Connecticut had a lower rate of firearms ownership than Canada and a lot of European countries. And yet, there's a guy shooting up a school. So clearly a low number of guns doesn't prevent these crimes.

Fully half of all burglaries happen while the home occupants are present. Fully half. That's a guy breaking into your home while you're asleep, armed with who knows what - even a firearm! - creeping around your sleeping body.I'm sorry but that is out of control. And according to your British Crime Survey, burglary is so commonplace that the police don't even bother to record it almost 60% of the time that it happens. That's page 7. Since 1981, again according to your source, violent crimes have been an increasing percentage of crimes.Plummeting levels of satisfaction with the criminal justice system. Plummeting levels of satisfaction with the police - until they changed the questions, at which point it started to rise. (Funny, that.)

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A violent burglar who called himself Lucifer and received a record-breaking sentence for his crimes won a partial victory today in his damages action against the Home Office.

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http://www.standard.co.uk/...r-injured-feelings-6952943.htmlApparently burglars filing suit against their victims is so commonplace that the UK has moved to ban the practice:

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Home Office lawyers are drafting an amendment to the Criminal Justice Bill now before Parliament to stop criminals obtaining compensation from innocent victims. However, it is not yet clear whether the proposed restrictions would apply in cases where the householder is also convicted of an offence...The Law Commission said that only in rare cases, to be justified on grounds of public policy or to aid consistency in the courts, should a criminal be prevented from making a claim for damages arising out of an illegal act.

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/...rglars-from-suing-victims.htmlTruly amazing. Topsy-turvy land. Well, congratulations on that, but you've constructed a society where people aren't safe in their own homes, and where criminals are allowed to file suit against those who resist their criminal predation. But, nobody's getting killed with a gun! Well, except about fifty people every year. But fuck those guys, right? Australia didn't "make guns illegal", they enacted gun control and then at a much later date, homicides were lower. You've not made the case that Australia's gun control actually caused there to be less homicides, and if you assign the credit for the eventual decline in homicides to Australia's gun control laws but not the immediate and precipitous increase in all other crimes, you're just cherry-picking stats.

It's like you don't read - as I said, we now know that he didn't acquire weapons by going across state lines. (Which state lines, Rahvin? Connecticut borders New York, Massachussets, and Rhode Island. Which one of those states, in your mind, is the free-fire gun owners paradise where Connecticut gun lovers flee to import weapons? The ownership rates of all three of those states are lower than Canada.) Because that's what Percy is talking about. He's saying that the mass shootings will continue while guns are super-plentiful.And I'm saying, recent events prove that mass shootings will continue regardless of how plentiful guns are, because this most recent one happened in a state where there were almost no guns at all.