rumitoid

Before Obama took office and for the eight years of his presidency we got a constant barrage by the NRA, Republican legislators, Conservative Media, and alt-Right conspiracy theorists that he was going to take away all guns (with "black helicopters" confiscating them in the middle of the night and taking the owners to "FEMA concentration camps"). He didn't do that. He did tighten gun control by executive order in January of 2015. Obviously, it was not enough.

The rate of murder or manslaughter in America by firearm is the highest by far in the developed world. We have had 18 school shootings in the first 45 days of 2018. Is it really right to do absolutely nothing to try and curtail this excessive violence? Or are more and more guns the answer? "Thoughts and prayers" are falling short and come always too late to save our children. And the nuclear argument that any control means the eventual end of Second Amendment rights to cease all discussions on the subject is wrong and irresponsible. The subject needs, demands, open and sincere dialogue for the sake of our nation's innocents and all citizens.

Debating the actual intent of the wording of the Second Amendment is useless; it no longer matters. You and I both know the Founding Fathers could not have possibly envisioned our present state and this is not 1776. What matters are American lives. We keep our guns, yet make sensible universal controls to try to insure greater safety for all. If there was a pandemic, and this rampant violence is a pandemic, Federal measures would be taken to protect the general public. Safeguards to help reduce this epidemic of murder and mayhem is simply just and wise. Help me see why we shouldn't act on better precautions. Or are we just to accept these tragic loses as "the cost of freedom," as O'Reilly said, willingly sacrificing our sons and daughter's for the "un-infringed" right to keep and bear arms?

saltwind 78 Loc: Murrells Inlet, South Carolina

rumitoid, Just check out the responses to my post AR15 knockoffs. As long as these people want to keep their play toys that make them feel powerful, kids will continue to die.

proud republican Loc: RED CALIFORNIA

So what is your suggestion,Rumi???Take all the guns away???Do you really think if you will take all the guns, some idiot is not gonna find another way to kill innocent people???...Are you gonna band cars next???..Maybe knives should go too???What is you suggestion??? Realisticly??

proud republican Loc: RED CALIFORNIA

So are you blaming Republicans for this tragedy??? Not the murderer himself???Figures!!!!,,,,,,Its called obammyeffect!!! Blame everybody else except the person who caused the problem to begin with.....

rumitoid

The AR15 is described as a "highly efficient killing machine." WTF. It can have adopted magazines of 60 to 100 rounds. What other purpose than the right choice for terrorists and the mentally disturbed? Or hunting herds of sheep? There is no defense for owning a weapon like this except for the deranged, delusional, or the disturbed.

Crayons Loc: St Jo, Texas

Um Hmm; all of you lefty lucy home grown commies are all led by corporate see'eye'aye CNN/MSLSD
propagandists WHO ARE THEMSELVES ARMED, and as the media hypocrits all Virtue Signal to You
lefty lucy cult followers/suckers <> they Themselves are Conceal Carrying and hiring Armed bodyguards.
Yer cult leaders are always laughing behind yer back.

BigMike Loc: yerington nv

Because what you propose won't work.

Why are kids turning into Frankensteins?

Why are people freaking out?

rumitoid

Proud Republican, I clearly stated "we keep our guns." I also said the tired trope of "take away all guns" paraded by many on the Right is no excuse to end discussions with so much at risk. Please re-read.

permafrost Loc: Minnesota

Obama attempted to make some changes, His measure to keep mental patents from having guns may have helped in this specific case of the Florida shooting, but trump removed that controll in the very first days of his term..

For myself, I would like to have most of the Clinton gun law to have stayed on the books..

Now, the horse is long out of the barn.. finding something to help is a bigger problem then ever.. but something must be done..

do not think we are in a "all or nothing" situation. I am not for gun confiscation or in anyway removing 2nd amendment rights.. But we can find some form of regulation that should help.

maybe as simple as an age restriction for owning guns.. Iwould like to have not assault style rifles around, but as we have at least 3.5 million of the things, that is impossible..

Unfortunately, if congress ever does anything, I would bet that they would put a tax on guns.. Like our tax on cars, and nearly everything we have..

No, I do not like that idea.. Hope someone get some idea...

rumitoid

Saltwind78 never once mentioned Republicans or Conservatives or the Right. Get your eyes checked.

JFlorio Loc: Seminole Florida

Be nice if just once these liberals didn’t start out by lying. Common sense should tell you, there hasn’t been 18 school shootings. Why haven’t we heard if each and everyone when it happened? Trolls like rumi and his buds are worthless for honest conversation.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/no-there-havent-been-18-school-shooting-in-2018-that-number-is-flat-wrong/2018/02/15/65b6cf72-1264-11e8-8ea1-c1d91fcec3fe_story.html?utm_term=.59e86e328f28

rumitoid

And that is your idea for an open discussion?

permafrost Loc: Minnesota

This is a reprint from way back after the Sandyhook shooting..

I think it is very accurate in what an AR-15 is and what it is designed for..

I would also like to have all of these Asault style guns out of civilian hands.. But that can never happen at this late date.. It is impossible to remove over 3.5 million guns of the type.


http://www.slate.com/blogs/crime/2013/01/02/gun_control_ar_15_rifle_the_nra_claims_the_ar_15_rifle_is_for_hunting_and.html


The NRA Claims the AR-15 Is Useful for Hunting and Home Defense. Not Exactly.
By Justin Peters


According to Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel, an AR-15 rifle was believed to be used in a school shooting Wednesday at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, in which at least 17 people were killed. The AR-15 is the same weapon used by Adam Lanza, who killed 26 people, 20 of them children, at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012. After the Sandy Hook shooting, Justin Peters wrote that “the AR-15 is very good at one thing: engaging the enemy at a rapid rate of fire.” The original piece is reprinted below.

Justin Peters
JUSTIN PETERS
Justin Peters is a Slate correspondent and the author of The Idealist: Aaron Swartz and the Rise of Free Culture on the Internet.

On Dec. 24, in Webster, New York, an ex-con named William Spengler set fire to his house and then shot and killed two responding firefighters before taking his own life. He shot them with a Bushmaster AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle—the same weapon that Adam Lanza used 10 days earlier when he shot and killed 26 people at Sandy Hook Elementary. James Holmes used an AR-15-style rifle with a detachable 100-round magazine this past summer when he shot up a movie theater in Colorado. (Though the AR-15 is a specific model of rifle made by Colt, the term has come to generically refer to the many other rifles built to similar specifications.)

Three makes a trend, as we all know, and many people have reacted by suggesting that the federal government should ban the AR-15 and other so-called assault weapons. Gun advocates have responded with exasperation, saying that, despite appearances, AR-15-style rifles are no more dangerous than any other gun. In a piece today on humanevents.com titled “The AR-15: The Gun Liberals Love to Hate,” NRA president David Keene blasted those critics who “neither understand the nature of the firearms they would ban, their popularity or legitimate uses.” Keene noted there are several valid, non-murderous uses for rifles like the AR-15—among them recreational target shooting, hunting, and home defense—and argued that law-abiding firearms owners shouldn’t be penalized because of homicidal loners who use semi-automatics like the AR-15 for criminal purposes.

I generally consider myself a Second Amendment supporter, and I haven’t yet decided where I stand on post-Newtown gun control. I would own a gun if New York City laws didn’t make it extremely difficult to do so. But I nevertheless find Keene’s arguments disingenuous. It’s odd to cite hunting and home defense as reasons to keep selling a rifle that’s not particularly well suited, and definitely not necessary, for either. Bolt-action rifles and shotguns can also be used for hunting and home defense. Unfortunately, those guns aren’t particularly lucrative for gunmakers. The lobby’s fervent defense of military-style semi-automatic weapons like the AR-15 seems motivated primarily by a desire to protect the profits in the rapidly growing “modern sporting rifle” segment of the industry.

The AR-15 was designed in 1957 at the behest of the U.S. Army, which asked Armalite to come up with a “high-velocity, full and semi auto fire, 20 shot magazine, 6lbs loaded, able to penetrate both sides of a standard Army helmet at 500 meters rifle,” according to ar15.com. When it entered Army service in the 1960s, it was renamed the M16, in accordance with the Army Nomenclature System. “AR-15” came to refer to the rifle’s semi-automatic civilian equivalent. From 1994 to 2004, AR-15-style rifles were subject to the now-expired Federal Assault Weapons Ban. Since then, the rifle and others like it have become tremendously popular. Last month, I estimated that upward of 3.5 million AR-15-style rifles currently exist in the United States. People like the rifle because it is modular and thus customizable (one article calls the AR-15 “perhaps the most flexible firearm ever developed; in seconds, a carbine can be switched over to a long-range rifle by swapping upper receivers”), because it is easy to shoot, and because carrying it around makes you look like a badass.

But the AR-15 is not ideal for the hunting and home-defense uses that the NRA’s Keene cited today. Though it can be used for hunting, the AR-15 isn’t really a hunting rifle. Its standard .223 caliber ammunition doesn’t offer much stopping power for anything other than small game. Hunters themselves find the rifle controversial, with some arguing AR-15-style rifles empower sloppy, “spray and pray” hunters to waste ammunition. (The official Bushmaster XM15 manual lists the maximum effective rate of fire at 45 rounds per minute.) As one hunter put it in the comments section of an article on americanhunter.org, “I served in the military and the M16A2/M4 was the weapon I used for 20 years. It is first and foremost designed as an assault weapon platform, no matter what the spin. A hunter does not need a semi-automatic rifle to hunt, if he does he sucks, and should go play video games. I see more men running around the bush all cammo'd up with assault vests and face paint with tricked out AR's. These are not hunters but wannabe weekend warriors.”

In terms of repelling a home invasion—which is what most people mean when they talk about home defense—an AR-15-style rifle is probably less useful than a handgun. The AR-15 is a long gun, and can be tough to maneuver in tight quarters. When you shoot it, it’ll overpenetrate—sending bullets through the walls of your house and possibly into the walls of your neighbor’s house—unless you purchase the sort of ammunition that fragments on impact. (This is true for other guns, as well, but, again, the thing with the AR-15 is that it lets you fire more rounds faster.)

AR-15–style rifles are very useful, however, if what you’re trying to do is sell guns. In a recent Forbes article, Abram Brown reported that “gun ownership is at a near 20-year high, generating $4 billion in commercial gun and ammunition sales.” But that money’s not coming from selling shotguns and bolt-action rifles to pheasant hunters. In its 2011 annual report, Smith & Wesson Holding Corporation announced that bolt-action hunting rifles accounted for 6.6 percent of its net sales in 2011 (down from 2010 and 2009), while modern sporting rifles (like AR-15-style weapons) accounted for 18.2 percent of its net sales. The Freedom Group’s 2011 annual report noted that the commercial modern sporting rifle market grew at a 27 percent compound annual rate from 2007 to 2011, whereas the entire domestic long gun market only grew at a 3 percent rate.

As the NRA’s David Keene notes, a lot of people do use modern sporting rifles for target shooting and in marksmanship competitions. But the guns also appeal to another demographic that doesn’t get nearly as much press—paranoid survivalists who worry about having to fend off thieves and trespassers in the event of disaster. Online shooting message boards are rife with references to potential “SHTF scenarios,” where SHTF stands for “shit hits the fan”—governmental collapse, societal breakdown. (Adam Lanza’s mother, Nancy Lanza, has been described as “a gun-hoarding survivalist who was stockpiling weapons in preparation for an economic collapse.”) An article on ar15.com titled “The Ideal Rifle” notes that “the threats from crime, terrorism, natural disaster, and weapons of mass destruction are real. If something were to happen today, you would need to have made a decision about the rifle you would select and be prepared for such an event. So the need to select a ‘survival’ rifle is real. Selecting a single ‘ideal rifle’ is not easy. The AR-15 series of rifles comes out ahead when compared to everything else.” Depending on where you live, it’s perfectly legal to stockpile weapons to use in the event of Armageddon. But that’s a far different argument than the ones firearms advocates have been using since the Newtown shootings.

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As I said, I generally think of myself as a Second Amendment supporter, and a month ago, I would’ve probably agreed with the NRA’s position. But the Newtown shooting caused me to re-examine my stance—as is, I think, fitting—and to question some of the rhetoric advocates use to defend weapons like this. In his piece at Human Events, Keene ridiculed the notion that AR-15-style rifles ought to be banned just because “a half dozen [AR-15s] out of more than three million have been misused after illegally falling into the hands of crazed killers.” But the AR-15 is very good at one thing: engaging the enemy at a rapid rate of fire. When someone like Adam Lanza uses it to take out 26 people in a matter of minutes, he’s committing a crime, but he isn’t misusing the rifle. That’s exactly what it was engineered to do.

permafrost Loc: Minnesota

What they should say is we have had 18 events of gun fire in schools.

9 of those have been accidental.. One of those ( in Minnesota resulted in injury).

The other 9 were indeed attempts to kill and injure..

JFlorio Loc: Seminole Florida

My 2 cents. Now days when you apply for a job most boss’s search the applicants Social Media. I would suggest the feds do the same with the background check. Armed, trained guards and metal detectors. Problem of course, expense.

Here’s a real outside the box idea. We spend more per students education than any country in the world. How about giving parents a choice of letting their children take their classes at home. Money could be spent on Wi-fi and laptops. We, none of us are safe because we have police. If your hurt or killed you or your estate can’t sue the police. Proving you and only you are responsible for your personal safety.