Guns, the NRA, the constitution and senseless shootings

I was merely clarifying it.

 

Bud-

There's not the slightest possibility that your view might be the one that's wrong on this issue? I mean, if somebody had been in possession of a concealed weapon and killed the shooter before he unleashed his most serious mayhem, that person would have been subjected, as I understand it, to a year's suspension. No matter that he or she would have been a hero.

I'm willing to say that I think there are potential problems with concealed carry laws on campus ... can you examine your beliefs and consider the possibility, however slim, that there might be some potential advantage, as well?

 

Any potential advantage is far, far, far outweighed by the potential damage. Far more likely to wind up with drunken testosterone-laced 20-year-olds squeezing off rounds at frat parties than any "hero" situation.

More guns = more dead people. That's the whole thing here: If this guy did not have ready access to handguns, he would not have been able to kill 32 people in less than two hours. If this guy did not have a handgun, it wouldn't be "necessary" for you or me to have one. If he has a handgun, and I have a handgun, pretty good bet that someone's going to wind up dead.

If somebody had been in possession of a concealed handgun, yeah, there's the slightest possibility he or she would have taken out this guy. Or maybe he or she would have taken out somebody else. Or himself or herself. There's the slightest possibilty than an asteroid would have come down from heaven and landed on the shooter's head at the exact moment he drew his weapon. There's the slightest possibility of a lot of things. There's a far better than slight possibility, however, that concealed weapons on campus would cause many, many more problems.

The thing about this whole situation -- and the hundreds of people dying every day recently in Baghdad -- that scares me is that the value of human in life in general seems to be plummeting. It's a bleak future we're facing if that trend continues.

 

Lyman's always been the least contemptible Pug on this board, and has hung in there in the face of insurmountable numbers, which now and forever makes any Southern heart proud.

God bless you, my friend, and a belated Happy Easter.

 

One soldier's take (from media Matters/Altercation.)
Name: Lt. Col. Bob Bateman
Hometown: Capitol Hill, Washington DC

I am sick of stories about guns, and how the blessed Founding Fathers wanted every little patriot baby to grow up with a Kentucky long-rifle over the mantle. It is a lie. It is a myth. The very idea is a concoction by people who want to believe something, regardless of the facts, and the fact that the lie has deep roots does not make it any more accurate.

I am sick of stories about people who claim that "guns don't kill people, people kill people." Bullshit. You do not see 70+ people, or even 40, or 20 ... or, (you get the picture) randomly gunned down in any of the countries where the tools of violence are confined to the authorities.

I am sick of idiots with an agenda pretending that what happened at Virginia Tech is not because we have too many damned guns in this country. Muzzle-loading blackpowder rifles, single-shot breech-loading hunting rifles, and single-barrel breech-loading shotguns, and that is about it, are all that should be allowed. Those tools can be used, legitimately, to hunt. You want more, move. Leave the United States to those who know the difference between something that is useful for hunting, and something that replaces the manhood you never attained. If you want more, join the Army. If you can't do that, and if you still want something that reloads quickly and gives you plenty of shots, BUY A DAMNED BOW!

But what really puts me over the top is one particular brand of NRA stupidity. That is the myth of the Wild West. In other words, if I hear one more stupid gun-loving sonuvabitch talk about how, "Well, if they just had allowed all those students to have guns, this lunatic at Virginia Tech wouldn'ta got far," I am going to slap his dumb ass on the first plane smokin' for Iraq, where I would like to personally drop him off, with as many guns as he would like, in Dora (that's a particularly nasty South Baghdad neighborhood with which I am familiar).

Yes, Dora would be perfect. In my mind's eye I am imagining plopping said gun nut off outside the blue-painted major police sub-station, just about six or seven blocks from another walled-in compound which is now a police barracks (or, at least it was, last year.). As a microcosm, Dora should be the NRA's dream town, as it perfectly matches the NRA "Wild West" theory of what is needed in a society: honor is important to the individual; the family is the most important part of society; all of the inhabitants are very religious (except for when they are not); and absolutely everyone has at least one gun.

In fact, I would very much like to personally place the CEO of the NRA, Mr. Wayne LaPierre, there right now. What'ya say, Wayne? Want to experience a world where everyone has a gun? C'mon, buddy, I'll even let you hump the pig.

(That means, "Carry the M-240 7.62 mm machine gun," people. Get your minds out of the gutter.)

 

I'd feel hopeful that this post would suffice to bring some order and rationality to Lyman and Yawn, but instead I'm dejected to realize it just won't.

 

Count on it. You smug, self-rightous one.

 

Then keep it here, where you're close to your, um, buddies.

Stay out of my personal inbox.

 

Why don't you give him something a little more attainable, Lyman, like touching his nose with his finger? Hopefully, without the blinders he wears regularly.

 

I heard you liked having your personal inbox penetrated, Yawn ... again and again. "Spam me, baby, spam me."

 

Dish it out to some of your boyfriends.

 

As an outsider to this debate, I have only one thing to say: you guys are nuts.

I hate to say it, but most, if not all of the Western World, thinks your debate over the "right" to own handguns is ludicrous.