On 7/20/2015 3:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.

I guess it was more subtle than I thought, you usually pick up on things
better.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?

Same overall number, different methods.


Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

That people who want to kill themselves will succeed. Method is
irrelevant. Including suicide numbers in gun deaths is distortion.

David

On 7/20/2015 3:36 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

See above.

I did. You don't think people should be able to defend themselves? My
reluctance to kill is less than my reluctance to be killed.

No, you have a perfect right to defend yourself. And if you have to,
it's time to move.

Easy to say assuming unlimited funds and options. In the real world, not
so much. For that matter, the number of safe places to move to is
dropping rapidly.


One of the unintended consequences of the DDT ban is the rise of malaria
in countries where it had been in decline.

Yeah, like the US. We have malaria all over the place now.

When did you join the idiot brigade, David?

Not so far. So the rest of the world is ****ed as long as the US is OK?

The rest of the world can do what it wants with DDT.

Not if the program gets US funding, which many do.


You have to be a little more thoughtful and careful about these
absolute pronouncements. There are LOTS of bans that have succeeded.

Few that infringe on human rights, though.

It doesn't seem to matter. That isn't a factor in success.

Infringing on human rights matters to me, if not to you.

It doesn't matter in terms of whether bans succeed or fail.

In general, maybe, but in terms of specific bans, it matters.


Virtually all of them were purchased legally. You still haven't
addressed that.

Yes, a pistol is purchased legally in 1950, stolen in 2014, bought on
the street in 2014 and used in a crime in 2014. What's your point?

David

The point is that you aren't paying attention to the stats. According
to the FBI, the average time between a legal gun purchase and its use
in a crime is 2-1/2 years.

The actually time I used is irrelevant. Of course, this ignores that the
vast majority of legal purchases are never used in crime.

Among our many stupid laws, we have practically none regarding
responsibility to keep guns safe. Contrast that with Switzerland, for
example.

I'm sure that guns illegally owned by criminals are always safely stored.

David

On 7/20/2015 7:55 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 20:36:35 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:
[snip]
Virtually all of them were purchased legally. You still haven't
addressed that.

Yes, a pistol is purchased legally in 1950, stolen in 2014, bought on
the street in 2014 and used in a crime in 2014. What's your point?

David

The point is that you aren't paying attention to the stats. According
to the FBI, the average time between a legal gun purchase and its use
in a crime is 2-1/2 years.

I assume that you are not claiming that all legally bought guns end up
in criminal hands within 2.5 years, although one can read the statement
that way.

Only if you're disposed to read it in the least logical way, Joe. The
situation obviously is a case of looking backward, from the use of a
gun in crime back to its source.

The first time I read it I saw it the same way he did. I don't think
I'll accept blame for you stating it poorly, especially since you are
usually more careful about how you state things.

David

On 7/20/2015 1:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?


Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

The obvious one: guns don't cause the suicide rate to be what it is.

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:46:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.

I guess it was more subtle than I thought, you usually pick up on things
better.

"Subtle"? Not.



About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?

Same overall number, different methods.

You pulled that right out of your nose. You have no way of knowing
that.



Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

That people who want to kill themselves will succeed.

No, actually, they usually fail. (2008, US: 1.1 million suicide
attempts; 33,000 succeeded.) The ratio in the US is one success for 33
attempts, according to WHO. Based on surveys and psych research, as
many as 2/3 of those were "not very intent" on committing suicide. So
the ratio for *serious* attempts to success, in the US, is about 10:1.

Method is
irrelevant. Including suicide numbers in gun deaths is distortion.

You have absolutely no way of knowing that. You're pulling it out of
your nose again.

--
Ed Huntress

On 7/21/2015 10:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:46:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.

I guess it was more subtle than I thought, you usually pick up on things
better.

"Subtle"? Not.

Subtle enough that you see only the superficial question.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?

Same overall number, different methods.

You pulled that right out of your nose. You have no way of knowing
that.

It's not that hard to kill yourself. Distribute the 50% by gun over the
other methods. All you have to do is think about it. If you're willing to.



Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

That people who want to kill themselves will succeed.

No, actually, they usually fail. (2008, US: 1.1 million suicide
attempts; 33,000 succeeded.) The ratio in the US is one success for 33
attempts, according to WHO. Based on surveys and psych research, as
many as 2/3 of those were "not very intent" on committing suicide. So
the ratio for *serious* attempts to success, in the US, is about 10:1.

So? For those who choose to do so and keep trying, ratio is 1:1.

Method is
irrelevant. Including suicide numbers in gun deaths is distortion.

You have absolutely no way of knowing that. You're pulling it out of
your nose again.

Nope, just thinking about it, which you have apparently chosen not to do
when it doesn't support your reality.

David

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:38:19 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 1:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?


Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

The obvious one: guns don't cause the suicide rate to be what it is.

There is no connection that you could make. You're blowing it out of
your ass.

With a success ratio of 1:10 overall in the US, versus a ratio that's
close to 1:1 with guns in the US, it's obvious that suicides by
firearms leave almost no room for intervention and prevention:

"As mentioned in the section Most lethal methods of suicide, studies
have shown firearms to be between 73% and 92% effective to achieve a
lethal outcome in suicide. However, Stone2 notes from studies on
unsuccessful firearm attempts that the chances of a successful outcome
are as low as 50% if the firearm is aimed into the abdomen (tummy).
Shots to the brain have a much higher fatality rate likely to be
nearer 90%, or even higher if a shotgun is used."

Sources

RL Frierson and SB Lippman, "Psychiatric Consultation for Patients
with self -inflicted Gunshot Wounds" Pschosomatics 31 (winter 1990).

Geo Stone, Suicide and Attempted Suicide, 1999.

--
Ed Huntress

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:44:37 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:39 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 09:50:34 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:47 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:21:19 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 9:21 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

It's a fairly foolish comparison. People wanted to drink. It's not
true that many people want to shoot and kill each other.

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

Right. Paranoia runs deep.

Cut the ****. Maybe the man who was murdered by the thug black
teenagers in Philadelphia - you know, the guy whose murder is at the
root of this thread - should have been a little more "paranoid" when
walking his dog.

Everybody has a right to self-defense. And, after 67 years, many of
them working in big cities and walking home at night, never having
seen an altercation bigger than a shoving match, I'm glad I haven't
wasted my money or my time lugging a gun around, on the chance that my
one in a million number might come up.

If I lived or worked in some stinking pesthole, I'd behave
differently. I'd probaby carry a gun. It would give me some comfort
until I was shot by someone who knew he wanted to shoot before I knew
that he did.

Which is to say, all but a few. But such comforts, like paranoia,
aren't very rational.

I wonder about your "two handguns in a safe." I hope you remember the
combination in time, should you ever need it. d8-)

I don't have them for the possibility of getting to them in the middle
of the night if I hear the window break. They're a precaution against a
more foreseeable risk. A friend once pointed out that in the event of a
truly huge disaster like a magnitude 8.5 or higher earthquake, there
could very likely be a period of 48-72 hours during which civil
authority is basically non-existent. In that event, the gun safe will
remain open and the trigger lock will be removed from the pump shotgun.

Ah, so you're equipped for the marauding hordes, rather than the
window-breaking rapists.

The gun nutz would say you're really leaving yourself and your family
unprotected.

--
Ed Huntress

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:07:25 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 7:55 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 20:36:35 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:
[snip]
Virtually all of them were purchased legally. You still haven't
addressed that.

Yes, a pistol is purchased legally in 1950, stolen in 2014, bought on
the street in 2014 and used in a crime in 2014. What's your point?

David

The point is that you aren't paying attention to the stats. According
to the FBI, the average time between a legal gun purchase and its use
in a crime is 2-1/2 years.

I assume that you are not claiming that all legally bought guns end up
in criminal hands within 2.5 years, although one can read the statement
that way.

Only if you're disposed to read it in the least logical way, Joe. The
situation obviously is a case of looking backward, from the use of a
gun in crime back to its source.

The first time I read it I saw it the same way he did. I don't think
I'll accept blame for you stating it poorly, especially since you are
usually more careful about how you state things.

At some point, editors have to assume their readers have some common
sense. It isn't always true, but it's a practical working hypothesis
with most subjects.

However, I recognize that gun discussions often have nothing to do
with common sense.

--
Ed Huntress


David

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:01:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:36 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

See above.

I did. You don't think people should be able to defend themselves? My
reluctance to kill is less than my reluctance to be killed.

No, you have a perfect right to defend yourself. And if you have to,
it's time to move.

Easy to say assuming unlimited funds and options.

No, you don't need unlimited funds and options. What you need is the
good sense not to plant yourself and your family in a shooting
gallery.

In the real world, not
so much. For that matter, the number of safe places to move to is
dropping rapidly.

I can suggest a few if you're interested. Crime rates for nearly every
town in America are published online.



One of the unintended consequences of the DDT ban is the rise of malaria
in countries where it had been in decline.

Yeah, like the US. We have malaria all over the place now.

When did you join the idiot brigade, David?

Not so far. So the rest of the world is ****ed as long as the US is OK?

The rest of the world can do what it wants with DDT.

Not if the program gets US funding, which many do.

WTF? So we're responsible for malaria in Africa? We're supposed to
fund their mosquito repellants because of our domestic decisions? Let
them get their DDT from India -- they still make it -- and have China
pay for it.

We already give millions for malaria abatement. Bill Gates gives
millions more.



You have to be a little more thoughtful and careful about these
absolute pronouncements. There are LOTS of bans that have succeeded.

Few that infringe on human rights, though.

It doesn't seem to matter. That isn't a factor in success.

Infringing on human rights matters to me, if not to you.

It doesn't matter in terms of whether bans succeed or fail.

In general, maybe, but in terms of specific bans, it matters.


Virtually all of them were purchased legally. You still haven't
addressed that.

Yes, a pistol is purchased legally in 1950, stolen in 2014, bought on
the street in 2014 and used in a crime in 2014. What's your point?

David

The point is that you aren't paying attention to the stats. According
to the FBI, the average time between a legal gun purchase and its use
in a crime is 2-1/2 years.

The actually time I used is irrelevant.

No, it actually tells us quite a lot about the flow of guns from the
legal market to the crime market. There have been some analyses done,
which show it can't physically be the result of thefts. It's mostly
black market buyers in VA, SC, FL, etc., taking abvantage of their
laissez-faire attitudes toward gun running.

Of course, this ignores that the
vast majority of legal purchases are never used in crime.

Gee, ya' think? How did this ridiculous idea become part of the
discussion?


Among our many stupid laws, we have practically none regarding
responsibility to keep guns safe. Contrast that with Switzerland, for
example.

I'm sure that guns illegally owned by criminals are always safely stored.

It's not the criminals' storage methods that we have to worry about
it. It's the dimwits who make it easy to steal their guns.

--
Ed Huntress


David

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 14:30:25 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 22:35:34 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:05:38 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:21:45 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 08:40:08 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Sun, 19 Jul 2015 09:05:10 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Sun, 19 Jul 2015 14:09:57 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Sat, 18 Jul 2015 11:21:07 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

snip


While statistically you may be correct, I'm not that sure about the
relationship between gun availability and crime. For example, I read
that while criminals in England rarely used firearms in, say the '50's
- the Great Train Robbers were armed with clubs - while today, even
with more stringent firearm laws in the country, armed criminals are
more common. to the extent that arming the police seems to becoming a
more popular idea.

Yeah, they're having a hell of a wave of murders with guns in the UK.
Their rate is all the way up to 0.26/100,000. The rate for the US is
40 times higher.

They're just going to hell in a handbasket...

The point, or course, was that even with stringent gun laws the number
of armed criminals in the British Isles is increasing. What was it in
England, Scotland and Wales, say 20 - 30 years ago compared to the
present?

It's meaningless. When the numbers are so vanishingly small, even a
slight perturbation in the numbers causes a disproportionate change in
the percentages.


And, of course, in Northern Ireland where possession of a firearm
likely ensured a very unpleasant visit to the police station, at a
minimum, gun crimes were sky high for a while :-)

But as I previously mentioned, they banned alcoholic beverages in the
U.S. and that automatically stopped drinking in the entire country.
Right?

There's no connection.


I see...

Banning alcohol was thought to decrease the evils of that "Demon Rum"
and banning firearms is expected to decrease the evils of those
terribly dangerous guns.



The first didn't work and in fact is often claimed to be a major
reason that the "Mafia" grew from a little neighborhood protection
racket to a major factor in crime, but the second will be just so
effective, just like banning narcotic drugs has eliminated "dope
fiends" and outlawing cocaine had eliminated the use there of.

It's a fairly foolish comparison. People wanted to drink. It's not
true that many people want to shoot and kill each other.

Note what's happened in the UK and Australia when some or most types
of guns were banned.


Prostitution and gambling has been banned for years and years, so
obviously there are no hookers walking the streets and "the numbers"
were a figment of someone's imagination.

People like to ****. Far fewer want to kill.


Wake up and smell the flowers Ed. Banning something doesn't stop the
use of that thing. It just increases the cost.

It's a mixed bag, John. Some work, some don't. The DDT ban was very
effective. It's pretty hard to buy asbestos insulation these days.
And you don't see many stoles and jackets made of endangered species
any more.

You have to be a little more thoughtful and careful about these
absolute pronouncements. There are LOTS of bans that have succeeded.


Or did you think that all the evil doers running about and shooting
each other are using legally purchased guns and that all, each and
every one of them, has a State issued concealed carry permit?

Virtually ALL GUNS WERE PURCHASED LEGALLY. That's a key issue that gun
nutz refuse to address.

Exactly what I have been saying. Individuals who commit the majority
of the gun crimes do it with what might be termed "banned guns".

What guns are banned? They aren't banned. Any criminal can buy one.
Our gun laws are a joke.

Goodness, you mean there are no background checks and some bloke just
out of jail can walk right down to the gun shop and buy one?

No, I mean what I said -- guns aren't banned, and any criminal can buy
one, because our gun laws are a joke. And in private sales, in most
places, there are no background checks.

And than
apply to the state for his concealed carry permit?

He doesn't need one. Once he has your gun, he's all set.


But I agree about the gun laws. Perhaps the U.S. could get serious and
emulate Singapore where possession of an illegal firearm is a
mandatory death sentence.

And your argument apparently is that banning guns will reduce firearm
crimes

No, that's not my argument. I haven't made any arguments about what
should be done, or what the consequences would be. You're just making
it up in your own head.


Well, Ed, it doesn't seem to have.

Next, I assume, you will argue that "after all, if guns are banned
there won't be any here to buy", to which I will argue that "as cocoa
plants don't grow in the U.S. obviously cocaine is unobtainable here."

No, I wouldn't argue that. Only your strawman would argue that.

We hear a lot of stupid distractions and irrational comments about
guns on this NG, John, but yours are right up there with the dimwits.

Is it something that happens when you decide that you're okay with gun
crime, as long as it doesn't affect your guns? Does it short out
something upstairs?

--
Ed Huntress

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 11:06:34 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 10:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:46:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.

I guess it was more subtle than I thought, you usually pick up on things
better.

"Subtle"? Not.

Subtle enough that you see only the superficial question.

I don't read invisible ink.



About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?

Same overall number, different methods.

You pulled that right out of your nose. You have no way of knowing
that.

It's not that hard to kill yourself. Distribute the 50% by gun over the
other methods. All you have to do is think about it. If you're willing to.

And what do you think you get when you "think about it"? More
nonsense.




Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

That people who want to kill themselves will succeed.

No, actually, they usually fail. (2008, US: 1.1 million suicide
attempts; 33,000 succeeded.) The ratio in the US is one success for 33
attempts, according to WHO. Based on surveys and psych research, as
many as 2/3 of those were "not very intent" on committing suicide. So
the ratio for *serious* attempts to success, in the US, is about 10:1.

So? For those who choose to do so and keep trying, ratio is 1:1.

No. You need to read some of the stats instead of making it all up,
David.

"It is often estimated that about 10-15% of attempters eventually die
by suicide."

Source - Suominen et al. (2004). Completed Suicide After a Suicide
Attempt: A 37-Year Follow-Up Study. Am J Psychiatry, 161, 563-564.

The authors also note that suicide success rates decline after the
first attempt.


Method is
irrelevant. Including suicide numbers in gun deaths is distortion.

You have absolutely no way of knowing that. You're pulling it out of
your nose again.

Nope, just thinking about it, which you have apparently chosen not to do
when it doesn't support your reality.

Method is most certainly relevant. Take a look at the success rates
with different methods. Firearms are roughly 10 times more likely to
produce "success" than other methods.

What you call "thinking" is making up the world to suit your
prejudices. As for "reality," it's out there, David. Just look it up.
Suicide has been studied in a lot of depth.

--
Ed Huntress



David

On 7/21/2015 11:20 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:07:25 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

The first time I read it I saw it the same way he did. I don't think
I'll accept blame for you stating it poorly, especially since you are
usually more careful about how you state things.

At some point, editors have to assume their readers have some common
sense. It isn't always true, but it's a practical working hypothesis
with most subjects.

Which is why I reread what you wrote and understood what you had tried
to say while stating it poorly.

However, I recognize that gun discussions often have nothing to do
with common sense.

I see emotional arguments on both sides of the issue all the time. Very
few rational arguments for gun control, though. What the gun controllers
identify as "common sense" start and end with "guns are bad".

David

On 7/21/2015 11:32 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:01:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:36 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

See above.

I did. You don't think people should be able to defend themselves? My
reluctance to kill is less than my reluctance to be killed.

No, you have a perfect right to defend yourself. And if you have to,
it's time to move.

Easy to say assuming unlimited funds and options.

No, you don't need unlimited funds and options. What you need is the
good sense not to plant yourself and your family in a shooting
gallery.

It was what I could afford.


In the real world, not
so much. For that matter, the number of safe places to move to is
dropping rapidly.

I can suggest a few if you're interested. Crime rates for nearly every
town in America are published online.

Oh, good, and you're willing to help subsidize this move of course, or
should I just use money I don't have?


The rest of the world can do what it wants with DDT.

Not if the program gets US funding, which many do.

WTF? So we're responsible for malaria in Africa? We're supposed to
fund their mosquito repellants because of our domestic decisions? Let
them get their DDT from India -- they still make it -- and have China
pay for it.

We already give millions for malaria abatement. Bill Gates gives
millions more.

But not using DDT, which had almost eradicated malaria until Rachel Carson.


Of course, this ignores that the
vast majority of legal purchases are never used in crime.

Gee, ya' think? How did this ridiculous idea become part of the
discussion?

"The point is that you aren't paying attention to the stats. According
to the FBI, the average time between a legal gun purchase and its use
in a crime is 2-1/2 years."

The way you state this, it implies that any legal purchase is used in a
crime on the average 2-1/2 years later. I know that's not what you meant
to say, but that's the first inference I made.

I would have said "According to the FBI, the average time between the
legal purchase of a gun used in a crime and that use is 2-1/2 years."


Among our many stupid laws, we have practically none regarding
responsibility to keep guns safe. Contrast that with Switzerland, for
example.

I'm sure that guns illegally owned by criminals are always safely stored.

It's not the criminals' storage methods that we have to worry about
it. It's the dimwits who make it easy to steal their guns.

This depends on what you mean by easy. No security system will stop a
determined thief, the best it can do is slow him down or make it too
much trouble.

David

On 7/21/2015 9:06 AM, David R. Birch wrote:
On 7/21/2015 10:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:46:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to
guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the
highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have
killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods.
For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl.
S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders
how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W.
I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.

I guess it was more subtle than I thought, you usually pick up on things
better.

"Subtle"? Not.

Subtle enough that you see only the superficial question.

David 1, nsf eddy 0


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by
hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?

Same overall number, different methods.

You pulled that right out of your nose. You have no way of knowing
that.

It's not that hard to kill yourself. Distribute the 50% by gun over the
other methods. All you have to do is think about it. If you're willing to.

The Japanese manage to have a rate 2.5 times the American one without
using guns.



Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with
hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

That people who want to kill themselves will succeed.

No, actually, they usually fail. (2008, US: 1.1 million suicide
attempts; 33,000 succeeded.) The ratio in the US is one success for 33
attempts, according to WHO. Based on surveys and psych research, as
many as 2/3 of those were "not very intent" on committing suicide. So
the ratio for *serious* attempts to success, in the US, is about 10:1.

So? For those who choose to do so and keep trying, ratio is 1:1.

Actually, with the relatively easy access to guns in America, one of the
more certain methods available, I'd have to say that those 32 out of 33
attempts that fail must represent people who *don't* really want to kill
themselves.

Method is
irrelevant. Including suicide numbers in gun deaths is distortion.

You have absolutely no way of knowing that. You're pulling it out of
your nose again.

Nope, just thinking about it, which you have apparently chosen not to do
when it doesn't support your reality.

And because it's a little too subtle for him.

On 7/21/2015 9:16 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:38:19 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 1:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?


Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

The obvious one: guns don't cause the suicide rate to be what it is.

There is no connection that you could make.

It's an obvious connection, nsf eddy, but it's apparently too subtle for
you.

On 7/21/2015 9:19 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:44:37 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:39 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 09:50:34 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:47 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:21:19 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 9:21 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

It's a fairly foolish comparison. People wanted to drink. It's not
true that many people want to shoot and kill each other.

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

Right. Paranoia runs deep.

Cut the ****. Maybe the man who was murdered by the thug black
teenagers in Philadelphia - you know, the guy whose murder is at the
root of this thread - should have been a little more "paranoid" when
walking his dog.

Everybody has a right to self-defense. And, after 67 years, many of
them working in big cities and walking home at night, never having
seen an altercation bigger than a shoving match, I'm glad I haven't
wasted my money or my time lugging a gun around, on the chance that my
one in a million number might come up.

If I lived or worked in some stinking pesthole, I'd behave
differently. I'd probaby carry a gun. It would give me some comfort
until I was shot by someone who knew he wanted to shoot before I knew
that he did.

Which is to say, all but a few. But such comforts, like paranoia,
aren't very rational.

I wonder about your "two handguns in a safe." I hope you remember the
combination in time, should you ever need it. d8-)

I don't have them for the possibility of getting to them in the middle
of the night if I hear the window break. They're a precaution against a
more foreseeable risk. A friend once pointed out that in the event of a
truly huge disaster like a magnitude 8.5 or higher earthquake, there
could very likely be a period of 48-72 hours during which civil
authority is basically non-existent. In that event, the gun safe will
remain open and the trigger lock will be removed from the pump shotgun.

Ah, so you're equipped for the marauding hordes, rather than the
window-breaking rapists.

The gun nutz would say you're really leaving yourself and your family
unprotected.

I don't worry too much about what guys like gummy-bitch think.

Of course, you're just a rabid anti-gun-nut.

On 7/20/2015 1:36 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:47 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:21:19 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 9:21 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

It's a fairly foolish comparison. People wanted to drink. It's not
true that many people want to shoot and kill each other.

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

Right. Paranoia runs deep.

It hasn't crept into my life beyond paying attention.



Note what's happened in the UK and Australia when some or most types
of guns were banned.


Prostitution and gambling has been banned for years and years, so
obviously there are no hookers walking the streets and "the numbers"
were a figment of someone's imagination.

People like to ****. Far fewer want to kill.

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

See above.

I did. You don't think people should be able to defend themselves? My
reluctance to kill is less than my reluctance to be killed.

No, you have a perfect right to defend yourself. And if you have to,
it's time to move.

That's a lot like your bull**** view that if you don't like the politics
in the the USA, you can always emigrate.

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 13:07:45 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 11:32 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:01:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:36 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

See above.

I did. You don't think people should be able to defend themselves? My
reluctance to kill is less than my reluctance to be killed.

No, you have a perfect right to defend yourself. And if you have to,
it's time to move.

Easy to say assuming unlimited funds and options.

No, you don't need unlimited funds and options. What you need is the
good sense not to plant yourself and your family in a shooting
gallery.

It was what I could afford.

Nonsense. There are plenty of safe places that aren't expensive. That
was your choice.



In the real world, not
so much. For that matter, the number of safe places to move to is
dropping rapidly.

I can suggest a few if you're interested. Crime rates for nearly every
town in America are published online.

Oh, good, and you're willing to help subsidize this move of course, or
should I just use money I don't have?

You shouldn't have planted yourself in a dangerous place to begin
with. You're on your own.



The rest of the world can do what it wants with DDT.

Not if the program gets US funding, which many do.

WTF? So we're responsible for malaria in Africa? We're supposed to
fund their mosquito repellants because of our domestic decisions? Let
them get their DDT from India -- they still make it -- and have China
pay for it.

We already give millions for malaria abatement. Bill Gates gives
millions more.

But not using DDT, which had almost eradicated malaria until Rachel Carson.

Horse****:

"The program was successful in eliminating malaria only in areas with
"high socio-economic status, well-organized healthcare systems, and
relatively less intensive or seasonal malaria transmission".[33]

"DDT was less effective in tropical regions due to the continuous life
cycle of mosquitoes and poor infrastructure. It was not applied at all
in sub-Saharan Africa due to these perceived difficulties. Mortality
rates in that area never declined to the same dramatic extent, and now
constitute the bulk of malarial deaths worldwide, especially following
the disease's resurgence as a result of resistance to drug treatments
and the spread of the deadly malarial variant caused by Plasmodium
falciparum."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDT

More right-wing mythology. This has been known for close to 50 years,
David. And it wasn't even USED in sub-Saharan Africa! You're still
regurgitation bull**** that was demolished a half-century ago.



Of course, this ignores that the
vast majority of legal purchases are never used in crime.

Gee, ya' think? How did this ridiculous idea become part of the
discussion?

"The point is that you aren't paying attention to the stats. According
to the FBI, the average time between a legal gun purchase and its use
in a crime is 2-1/2 years."

The way you state this, it implies that any legal purchase is used in a
crime on the average 2-1/2 years later. I know that's not what you meant
to say, but that's the first inference I made.

If that was what I was saying, that would mean every gun in the US was
used in a crime. What kind of nut would think that?

And if you knew that's not what I meant, then what is all of this
gum-flapping you're doing?


I would have said "According to the FBI, the average time between the
legal purchase of a gun used in a crime and that use is 2-1/2 years."

How can you make a legal purchase of a gun used in a crime?

Maybe you want to try re-wording that sentence.



Among our many stupid laws, we have practically none regarding
responsibility to keep guns safe. Contrast that with Switzerland, for
example.

I'm sure that guns illegally owned by criminals are always safely stored.

It's not the criminals' storage methods that we have to worry about
it. It's the dimwits who make it easy to steal their guns.

This depends on what you mean by easy. No security system will stop a
determined thief, the best it can do is slow him down or make it too
much trouble.

Check out the security requirements and the gun-theft rates in
Switzerland. Doing there, what most people do in the US, would land
you in jail. And their gun-crime rates are much lower than ours.

--
Ed Huntress

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:20:28 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 1:36 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:47 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:21:19 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 9:21 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

It's a fairly foolish comparison. People wanted to drink. It's not
true that many people want to shoot and kill each other.

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

Right. Paranoia runs deep.

It hasn't crept into my life beyond paying attention.



Note what's happened in the UK and Australia when some or most types
of guns were banned.


Prostitution and gambling has been banned for years and years, so
obviously there are no hookers walking the streets and "the numbers"
were a figment of someone's imagination.

People like to ****. Far fewer want to kill.

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

See above.

I did. You don't think people should be able to defend themselves? My
reluctance to kill is less than my reluctance to be killed.

No, you have a perfect right to defend yourself. And if you have to,
it's time to move.

That's a lot like your bull**** view that if you don't like the politics
in the the USA, you can always emigrate.

It's more like your view that a person is responsible for what he
achieves in life, and the concommitant view that he chooses where to
live.

--
Ed Huntress

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:19:17 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 9:19 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:44:37 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:39 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 09:50:34 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:47 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:21:19 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 9:21 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

It's a fairly foolish comparison. People wanted to drink. It's not
true that many people want to shoot and kill each other.

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

Right. Paranoia runs deep.

Cut the ****. Maybe the man who was murdered by the thug black
teenagers in Philadelphia - you know, the guy whose murder is at the
root of this thread - should have been a little more "paranoid" when
walking his dog.

Everybody has a right to self-defense. And, after 67 years, many of
them working in big cities and walking home at night, never having
seen an altercation bigger than a shoving match, I'm glad I haven't
wasted my money or my time lugging a gun around, on the chance that my
one in a million number might come up.

If I lived or worked in some stinking pesthole, I'd behave
differently. I'd probaby carry a gun. It would give me some comfort
until I was shot by someone who knew he wanted to shoot before I knew
that he did.

Which is to say, all but a few. But such comforts, like paranoia,
aren't very rational.

I wonder about your "two handguns in a safe." I hope you remember the
combination in time, should you ever need it. d8-)

I don't have them for the possibility of getting to them in the middle
of the night if I hear the window break. They're a precaution against a
more foreseeable risk. A friend once pointed out that in the event of a
truly huge disaster like a magnitude 8.5 or higher earthquake, there
could very likely be a period of 48-72 hours during which civil
authority is basically non-existent. In that event, the gun safe will
remain open and the trigger lock will be removed from the pump shotgun.

Ah, so you're equipped for the marauding hordes, rather than the
window-breaking rapists.

The gun nutz would say you're really leaving yourself and your family
unprotected.

I don't worry too much about what guys like gummy-bitch think.

Of course, you're just a rabid anti-gun-nut.

Right. That's why I was an NRA certified rifle instructor and shot in
Bullseye competition with a .45, a .38, and a .22 for close to 20
years.

You really just make it all up as you go along, don't you, Ball?

--
Ed Huntress

On 7/21/2015 1:56 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:19:17 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 9:19 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:44:37 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:39 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 09:50:34 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:47 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:21:19 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 9:21 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

It's a fairly foolish comparison. People wanted to drink. It's not
true that many people want to shoot and kill each other.

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

Right. Paranoia runs deep.

Cut the ****. Maybe the man who was murdered by the thug black
teenagers in Philadelphia - you know, the guy whose murder is at the
root of this thread - should have been a little more "paranoid" when
walking his dog.

Everybody has a right to self-defense. And, after 67 years, many of
them working in big cities and walking home at night, never having
seen an altercation bigger than a shoving match, I'm glad I haven't
wasted my money or my time lugging a gun around, on the chance that my
one in a million number might come up.

If I lived or worked in some stinking pesthole, I'd behave
differently. I'd probaby carry a gun. It would give me some comfort
until I was shot by someone who knew he wanted to shoot before I knew
that he did.

Which is to say, all but a few. But such comforts, like paranoia,
aren't very rational.

I wonder about your "two handguns in a safe." I hope you remember the
combination in time, should you ever need it. d8-)

I don't have them for the possibility of getting to them in the middle
of the night if I hear the window break. They're a precaution against a
more foreseeable risk. A friend once pointed out that in the event of a
truly huge disaster like a magnitude 8.5 or higher earthquake, there
could very likely be a period of 48-72 hours during which civil
authority is basically non-existent. In that event, the gun safe will
remain open and the trigger lock will be removed from the pump shotgun.

Ah, so you're equipped for the marauding hordes, rather than the
window-breaking rapists.

The gun nutz would say you're really leaving yourself and your family
unprotected.

I don't worry too much about what guys like gummy-bitch think.

Of course, you're just a rabid anti-gun-nut.

Right. That's why I was an NRA certified rifle instructor and

That was then. Now, you're a rabid anti-gun-nut.

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:18:26 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 9:16 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:38:19 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 1:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?


Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

The obvious one: guns don't cause the suicide rate to be what it is.

There is no connection that you could make.

It's an obvious connection, nsf eddy, but it's apparently too subtle for
you.

So where's the subtlety? Tell us about the "connection" you've made.
Then I'll show you the stats that shoot it to hell.

Deal?

There is no connection. Between countries, suicide rates vary hugely.
Within the US, there is no doubt that a large part of our suicide rate
is the result of the easy availability of guns. No doubt at all.

But you apparently think you have an argument that contradicts it.
Let's see your facts.

--
Ed Huntress

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:17:20 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 9:06 AM, David R. Birch wrote:
On 7/21/2015 10:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:46:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to
guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the
highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have
killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods.
For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl.
S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders
how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W.
I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.

I guess it was more subtle than I thought, you usually pick up on things
better.

"Subtle"? Not.

Subtle enough that you see only the superficial question.

David 1, nsf eddy 0

Let's see the "subtle" point.

There isn't one. It's as heavy-handed as a ham bone, and rather
stupid. And you're just blowing smoke again.



About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by
hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?

Same overall number, different methods.

You pulled that right out of your nose. You have no way of knowing
that.

It's not that hard to kill yourself. Distribute the 50% by gun over the
other methods. All you have to do is think about it. If you're willing to.

The Japanese manage to have a rate 2.5 times the American one without
using guns.



Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with
hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

That people who want to kill themselves will succeed.

No, actually, they usually fail. (2008, US: 1.1 million suicide
attempts; 33,000 succeeded.) The ratio in the US is one success for 33
attempts, according to WHO. Based on surveys and psych research, as
many as 2/3 of those were "not very intent" on committing suicide. So
the ratio for *serious* attempts to success, in the US, is about 10:1.

So? For those who choose to do so and keep trying, ratio is 1:1.

Actually, with the relatively easy access to guns in America, one of the
more certain methods available, I'd have to say that those 32 out of 33
attempts that fail must represent people who *don't* really want to kill
themselves.

Method is
irrelevant. Including suicide numbers in gun deaths is distortion.

You have absolutely no way of knowing that. You're pulling it out of
your nose again.

Nope, just thinking about it, which you have apparently chosen not to do
when it doesn't support your reality.

And because it's a little too subtle for him.

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 15:21:42 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 1:56 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:19:17 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 9:19 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:44:37 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:39 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 09:50:34 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:47 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:21:19 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 9:21 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

It's a fairly foolish comparison. People wanted to drink. It's not
true that many people want to shoot and kill each other.

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

Right. Paranoia runs deep.

Cut the ****. Maybe the man who was murdered by the thug black
teenagers in Philadelphia - you know, the guy whose murder is at the
root of this thread - should have been a little more "paranoid" when
walking his dog.

Everybody has a right to self-defense. And, after 67 years, many of
them working in big cities and walking home at night, never having
seen an altercation bigger than a shoving match, I'm glad I haven't
wasted my money or my time lugging a gun around, on the chance that my
one in a million number might come up.

If I lived or worked in some stinking pesthole, I'd behave
differently. I'd probaby carry a gun. It would give me some comfort
until I was shot by someone who knew he wanted to shoot before I knew
that he did.

Which is to say, all but a few. But such comforts, like paranoia,
aren't very rational.

I wonder about your "two handguns in a safe." I hope you remember the
combination in time, should you ever need it. d8-)

I don't have them for the possibility of getting to them in the middle
of the night if I hear the window break. They're a precaution against a
more foreseeable risk. A friend once pointed out that in the event of a
truly huge disaster like a magnitude 8.5 or higher earthquake, there
could very likely be a period of 48-72 hours during which civil
authority is basically non-existent. In that event, the gun safe will
remain open and the trigger lock will be removed from the pump shotgun.

Ah, so you're equipped for the marauding hordes, rather than the
window-breaking rapists.

The gun nutz would say you're really leaving yourself and your family
unprotected.

I don't worry too much about what guys like gummy-bitch think.

Of course, you're just a rabid anti-gun-nut.

Right. That's why I was an NRA certified rifle instructor and

That was then. Now, you're a rabid anti-gun-nut.

Says the dimwit who keeps his defense guns locked in a safe. g

You really should look at that video. You'll see yourself in it.

--
Ed Huntress

On 7/21/2015 3:22 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:18:26 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 9:16 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:38:19 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 1:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?


Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

The obvious one: guns don't cause the suicide rate to be what it is.

There is no connection that you could make.

It's an obvious connection, nsf eddy, but it's apparently too subtle for
you.

So where's the subtlety? Tell us about the "connection" you've made.
Then I'll show you the stats that shoot it to hell.

Deal?

There is no connection. Between countries, suicide rates vary hugely.
Within the US, there is no doubt that a large part of our suicide rate
is the result of the easy availability of guns. No doubt at all.

Of course there's doubt, nsf eddy. You don't have any way of knowing
what those who use guns would do if guns weren't available. Well, we
*do* know: they would commit suicide by some other means, because
access to the gun is not what drives the suicide.

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 16:44:18 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 3:22 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:18:26 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 9:16 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:38:19 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 1:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?


Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

The obvious one: guns don't cause the suicide rate to be what it is.

There is no connection that you could make.

It's an obvious connection, nsf eddy, but it's apparently too subtle for
you.

So where's the subtlety? Tell us about the "connection" you've made.
Then I'll show you the stats that shoot it to hell.

Deal?

There is no connection. Between countries, suicide rates vary hugely.
Within the US, there is no doubt that a large part of our suicide rate
is the result of the easy availability of guns. No doubt at all.

Of course there's doubt, nsf eddy.

Nope.

You don't have any way of knowing
what those who use guns would do if guns weren't available.

Yeah, we know quite accurately what the failure rates are by method,
and what happens to people after they fail. I've posted most of the
numbers here today.

Well, we
*do* know: they would commit suicide by some other means, because
access to the gun is not what drives the suicide.

No, THAT's what we know is NOT the case.

You can search on some of the quotes I've posted to see how thoroughly
this has been researched. That is, unless you're not really
interested.

--
Ed Huntress

On 7/21/2015 5:03 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 16:44:18 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 3:22 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:18:26 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 9:16 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:38:19 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 1:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?


Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

The obvious one: guns don't cause the suicide rate to be what it is.

There is no connection that you could make.

It's an obvious connection, nsf eddy, but it's apparently too subtle for
you.

So where's the subtlety? Tell us about the "connection" you've made.
Then I'll show you the stats that shoot it to hell.

By the way, that claim about "stats" is stinkier than your usual
bull****. There are no such stats.


Deal?

There is no connection. Between countries, suicide rates vary hugely.
Within the US, there is no doubt that a large part of our suicide rate
is the result of the easy availability of guns. No doubt at all.

Of course there's doubt, nsf eddy.

Nope.

Yep.

You don't have any way of knowing
what those who use guns would do if guns weren't available.

Yeah, we know quite accurately what the failure rates are by method,

Irrelevant, nsf eddy. Boy, you're slower than usual today; arthritis
acting up? You have *no* way of knowing that if someone fails by one
method, that he won't try it again, or try another method, until he
succeeds.

That Japanese rate just screws you, nsf eddy.

Well, we
*do* know: they would commit suicide by some other means, because
access to the gun is not what drives the suicide.

No, THAT's what we know is NOT the case.

Baloney. There is nothing that shows access to a gun is what drives
suicide. What drives suicide is a wish to kill oneself.

On 7/18/2015 1:07 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:



The best solution is ALWAYS to punish the law abiding gun owners.

So what punishment did they give to you, Tom?



When they came to take away the Jews, I said nothing.....

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 22:26:41 -0400, Tom Gardner
wrote:

On 7/18/2015 1:07 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:



The best solution is ALWAYS to punish the law abiding gun owners.

So what punishment did they give to you, Tom?



When they came to take away the Jews, I said nothing.....

Gee, I didn't know you were German...or that old. g

This is nonsense. Nobody is being "punished." The only ones who are
"punished" in this case would be criminals who try to get guns.

Of course, certain lobbyists made sure there was no federal money made
available to enforce the federal laws by *state* law-enforcement
officers. So no one gets punished.

--
Ed Huntress

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 17:16:16 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 5:03 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 16:44:18 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 3:22 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:18:26 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 9:16 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:38:19 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 1:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?


Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

The obvious one: guns don't cause the suicide rate to be what it is.

There is no connection that you could make.

It's an obvious connection, nsf eddy, but it's apparently too subtle for
you.

So where's the subtlety? Tell us about the "connection" you've made.
Then I'll show you the stats that shoot it to hell.

By the way, that claim about "stats" is stinkier than your usual
bull****. There are no such stats.

No, I gave you plenty of info to see that it's been the subject of
clinical studies, and the success rates with guns and the success
rates after an initial failure. There's no way you don't recognize it;
you're just trying to bluster your way through again, Ball.



Deal?

There is no connection. Between countries, suicide rates vary hugely.
Within the US, there is no doubt that a large part of our suicide rate
is the result of the easy availability of guns. No doubt at all.

Of course there's doubt, nsf eddy.

Nope.

Yep.

You don't have any way of knowing
what those who use guns would do if guns weren't available.

Yeah, we know quite accurately what the failure rates are by method,

Irrelevant, nsf eddy.

No, dimwit, it leads to a quite clear conclusion. You know it; you
just won't admit it.

--
Ed Huntress

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 22:26:41 -0400, Tom Gardner
wrote:

On 7/18/2015 1:07 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:



The best solution is ALWAYS to punish the law abiding gun owners.

So what punishment did they give to you, Tom?



When they came to take away the Jews, I said nothing.....


Absolutely!!

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 06:55:06 -0400, "Jim Wilkins"
wrote:

"John B. Slocomb" wrote in message
.. .
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 22:35:34 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

............
But I agree about the gun laws. Perhaps the U.S. could get serious
and
emulate Singapore where possession of an illegal firearm is a
mandatory death sentence.
...
--
cheers,

John B.

How do they punish drug dealers?

-jsw


Singapore law defines "dealers" and "users" by the quantity of drugs
that they have in their possession. The drugs are sent to the
government testing laboratory and purified and the pure drugs are
weighed. The law sets out the quantity necessary to be labeled a
"dealer" and the amount varies depending on the specific drug.

If the quantity qualifies the individual as a "dealer" the penalty is
death. If a "user" there is a prison sentence.

If the death penalty is imposed there is an automatic appeal made to
the President who has the option of granting a pardon, confirming the
sentence or simply ignoring the request. If he ignores the appeal the
execution is carried out as scheduled.


--
cheers,

John B.

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:54:10 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 14:30:25 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 22:35:34 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:05:38 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:21:45 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 08:40:08 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Sun, 19 Jul 2015 09:05:10 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Sun, 19 Jul 2015 14:09:57 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Sat, 18 Jul 2015 11:21:07 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

snip


While statistically you may be correct, I'm not that sure about the
relationship between gun availability and crime. For example, I read
that while criminals in England rarely used firearms in, say the '50's
- the Great Train Robbers were armed with clubs - while today, even
with more stringent firearm laws in the country, armed criminals are
more common. to the extent that arming the police seems to becoming a
more popular idea.

Yeah, they're having a hell of a wave of murders with guns in the UK.
Their rate is all the way up to 0.26/100,000. The rate for the US is
40 times higher.

They're just going to hell in a handbasket...

The point, or course, was that even with stringent gun laws the number
of armed criminals in the British Isles is increasing. What was it in
England, Scotland and Wales, say 20 - 30 years ago compared to the
present?

It's meaningless. When the numbers are so vanishingly small, even a
slight perturbation in the numbers causes a disproportionate change in
the percentages.


And, of course, in Northern Ireland where possession of a firearm
likely ensured a very unpleasant visit to the police station, at a
minimum, gun crimes were sky high for a while :-)

But as I previously mentioned, they banned alcoholic beverages in the
U.S. and that automatically stopped drinking in the entire country.
Right?

There's no connection.


I see...

Banning alcohol was thought to decrease the evils of that "Demon Rum"
and banning firearms is expected to decrease the evils of those
terribly dangerous guns.



The first didn't work and in fact is often claimed to be a major
reason that the "Mafia" grew from a little neighborhood protection
racket to a major factor in crime, but the second will be just so
effective, just like banning narcotic drugs has eliminated "dope
fiends" and outlawing cocaine had eliminated the use there of.

It's a fairly foolish comparison. People wanted to drink. It's not
true that many people want to shoot and kill each other.

Note what's happened in the UK and Australia when some or most types
of guns were banned.


Prostitution and gambling has been banned for years and years, so
obviously there are no hookers walking the streets and "the numbers"
were a figment of someone's imagination.

People like to ****. Far fewer want to kill.


Wake up and smell the flowers Ed. Banning something doesn't stop the
use of that thing. It just increases the cost.

It's a mixed bag, John. Some work, some don't. The DDT ban was very
effective. It's pretty hard to buy asbestos insulation these days.
And you don't see many stoles and jackets made of endangered species
any more.

You have to be a little more thoughtful and careful about these
absolute pronouncements. There are LOTS of bans that have succeeded.


Or did you think that all the evil doers running about and shooting
each other are using legally purchased guns and that all, each and
every one of them, has a State issued concealed carry permit?

Virtually ALL GUNS WERE PURCHASED LEGALLY. That's a key issue that gun
nutz refuse to address.

Exactly what I have been saying. Individuals who commit the majority
of the gun crimes do it with what might be termed "banned guns".

What guns are banned? They aren't banned. Any criminal can buy one.
Our gun laws are a joke.

Goodness, you mean there are no background checks and some bloke just
out of jail can walk right down to the gun shop and buy one?

No, I mean what I said -- guns aren't banned, and any criminal can buy
one, because our gun laws are a joke. And in private sales, in most
places, there are no background checks.

And than
apply to the state for his concealed carry permit?

He doesn't need one. Once he has your gun, he's all set.


But I agree about the gun laws. Perhaps the U.S. could get serious and
emulate Singapore where possession of an illegal firearm is a
mandatory death sentence.

And your argument apparently is that banning guns will reduce firearm
crimes

No, that's not my argument. I haven't made any arguments about what
should be done, or what the consequences would be. You're just making
it up in your own head.


Well, Ed, it doesn't seem to have.

Next, I assume, you will argue that "after all, if guns are banned
there won't be any here to buy", to which I will argue that "as cocoa
plants don't grow in the U.S. obviously cocaine is unobtainable here."

No, I wouldn't argue that. Only your strawman would argue that.

We hear a lot of stupid distractions and irrational comments about
guns on this NG, John, but yours are right up there with the dimwits.

Is it something that happens when you decide that you're okay with gun
crime, as long as it doesn't affect your guns? Does it short out
something upstairs?

No Ed, I don't own any guns and haven't for 40 years now that I've
lived in countries where personally owned firearms are illegal. But
I'm still rational enough to understand, as you apparently are not,
that simply banning something doesn't preclude its being availability.
As I've continually stated, drugs have been outlawed in the U.S. for a
considerable period and are still available, gambling was outlawed in
much of the U.S,. and was still available and innumerable other sins
have been banned and are still available. The Volstead (spelling?) act
outlawed alcoholic beverages in the U.S. and if anything it became
more available.

But in spite of the overwhelming failure of simply banning something
with the thought that it will go away, somehow if guns are banned a
miracle will occur and gun crime will cease.

--
cheers,

John B.

On 7/21/2015 3:53 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 13:07:45 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 11:32 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:01:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:36 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

See above.

I did. You don't think people should be able to defend themselves? My
reluctance to kill is less than my reluctance to be killed.

No, you have a perfect right to defend yourself. And if you have to,
it's time to move.

Easy to say assuming unlimited funds and options.

No, you don't need unlimited funds and options. What you need is the
good sense not to plant yourself and your family in a shooting
gallery.

It was what I could afford.

Nonsense. There are plenty of safe places that aren't expensive. That
was your choice.

I chose what I could afford. That didn't include safety as the highest
or only priority.



In the real world, not
so much. For that matter, the number of safe places to move to is
dropping rapidly.

I can suggest a few if you're interested. Crime rates for nearly every
town in America are published online.

Oh, good, and you're willing to help subsidize this move of course, or
should I just use money I don't have?

You shouldn't have planted yourself in a dangerous place to begin
with. You're on your own.

I didn't plant myself in a dangerous place. I bought what I could afford
and security was only one of the factors involved. If security hadn't
been a factor, I could have spent far less.


The rest of the world can do what it wants with DDT.

Not if the program gets US funding, which many do.

WTF? So we're responsible for malaria in Africa? We're supposed to
fund their mosquito repellants because of our domestic decisions? Let
them get their DDT from India -- they still make it -- and have China
pay for it.

We already give millions for malaria abatement. Bill Gates gives
millions more.

But not using DDT, which had almost eradicated malaria until Rachel Carson.

Horse****:

"The program was successful in eliminating malaria only in areas with
"high socio-economic status, well-organized healthcare systems, and
relatively less intensive or seasonal malaria transmission".[33]

So it was used successfully in areas where the need was less critical,
but it could be used.

"DDT was less effective in tropical regions due to the continuous life
cycle of mosquitoes and poor infrastructure. It was not applied at all
in sub-Saharan Africa due to these perceived difficulties. Mortality
rates in that area never declined to the same dramatic extent, and now
constitute the bulk of malarial deaths worldwide, especially following
the disease's resurgence as a result of resistance to drug treatments
and the spread of the deadly malarial variant caused by Plasmodium
falciparum."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDT

More right-wing mythology. This has been known for close to 50 years,
David. And it wasn't even USED in sub-Saharan Africa! You're still
regurgitation bull**** that was demolished a half-century ago.

So we don't really know how successful it would have been if it had been
used where it was most needed.




Of course, this ignores that the
vast majority of legal purchases are never used in crime.

Gee, ya' think? How did this ridiculous idea become part of the
discussion?

"The point is that you aren't paying attention to the stats. According
to the FBI, the average time between a legal gun purchase and its use
in a crime is 2-1/2 years."

The way you state this, it implies that any legal purchase is used in a
crime on the average 2-1/2 years later. I know that's not what you meant
to say, but that's the first inference I made.

If that was what I was saying, that would mean every gun in the US was
used in a crime. What kind of nut would think that?

And if you knew that's not what I meant, then what is all of this
gum-flapping you're doing?

Because I could see the point your awkwardly worded sentence was trying
to get at.


I would have said "According to the FBI, the average time between the
legal purchase of a gun used in a crime and that use is 2-1/2 years."

How can you make a legal purchase of a gun used in a crime?

Maybe you want to try re-wording that sentence.

OK. "According to the FBI, the average time between the legal purchase
of a gun subsequently used in a crime and that use is 2-1/2 years."

Added one word, even less ambiguous than your original awkward sentence.

This depends on what you mean by easy. No security system will stop a
determined thief, the best it can do is slow him down or make it too
much trouble.

Check out the security requirements and the gun-theft rates in
Switzerland. Doing there, what most people do in the US, would land
you in jail. And their gun-crime rates are much lower than ours.

Nah, comparing different societies to the US just demonstrates that
they're different societies. Far more variables than just gun thief
rates and gun crime rates. If I compare crime in Milwaukee to most
European cities, the numbers are similar if you ignore the areas where
most of the blacks and Hispanics live. That's an endemic social problem
that doesn't translate in comparisons.

David

On Wed, 22 Jul 2015 06:20:53 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 3:53 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 13:07:45 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 11:32 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:01:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:36 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

See above.

I did. You don't think people should be able to defend themselves? My
reluctance to kill is less than my reluctance to be killed.

No, you have a perfect right to defend yourself. And if you have to,
it's time to move.

Easy to say assuming unlimited funds and options.

No, you don't need unlimited funds and options. What you need is the
good sense not to plant yourself and your family in a shooting
gallery.

It was what I could afford.

Nonsense. There are plenty of safe places that aren't expensive. That
was your choice.

I chose what I could afford. That didn't include safety as the highest
or only priority.



In the real world, not
so much. For that matter, the number of safe places to move to is
dropping rapidly.

I can suggest a few if you're interested. Crime rates for nearly every
town in America are published online.

Oh, good, and you're willing to help subsidize this move of course, or
should I just use money I don't have?

You shouldn't have planted yourself in a dangerous place to begin
with. You're on your own.

I didn't plant myself in a dangerous place. I bought what I could afford
and security was only one of the factors involved. If security hadn't
been a factor, I could have spent far less.


The rest of the world can do what it wants with DDT.

Not if the program gets US funding, which many do.

WTF? So we're responsible for malaria in Africa? We're supposed to
fund their mosquito repellants because of our domestic decisions? Let
them get their DDT from India -- they still make it -- and have China
pay for it.

We already give millions for malaria abatement. Bill Gates gives
millions more.

But not using DDT, which had almost eradicated malaria until Rachel Carson.

Horse****:

"The program was successful in eliminating malaria only in areas with
"high socio-economic status, well-organized healthcare systems, and
relatively less intensive or seasonal malaria transmission".[33]

So it was used successfully in areas where the need was less critical,
but it could be used.

"DDT was less effective in tropical regions due to the continuous life
cycle of mosquitoes and poor infrastructure. It was not applied at all
in sub-Saharan Africa due to these perceived difficulties. Mortality
rates in that area never declined to the same dramatic extent, and now
constitute the bulk of malarial deaths worldwide, especially following
the disease's resurgence as a result of resistance to drug treatments
and the spread of the deadly malarial variant caused by Plasmodium
falciparum."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDT

More right-wing mythology. This has been known for close to 50 years,
David. And it wasn't even USED in sub-Saharan Africa! You're still
regurgitation bull**** that was demolished a half-century ago.

So we don't really know how successful it would have been if it had been
used where it was most needed.




Of course, this ignores that the
vast majority of legal purchases are never used in crime.

Gee, ya' think? How did this ridiculous idea become part of the
discussion?

"The point is that you aren't paying attention to the stats. According
to the FBI, the average time between a legal gun purchase and its use
in a crime is 2-1/2 years."

The way you state this, it implies that any legal purchase is used in a
crime on the average 2-1/2 years later. I know that's not what you meant
to say, but that's the first inference I made.

If that was what I was saying, that would mean every gun in the US was
used in a crime. What kind of nut would think that?

And if you knew that's not what I meant, then what is all of this
gum-flapping you're doing?

Because I could see the point your awkwardly worded sentence was trying
to get at.


I would have said "According to the FBI, the average time between the
legal purchase of a gun used in a crime and that use is 2-1/2 years."

How can you make a legal purchase of a gun used in a crime?

Maybe you want to try re-wording that sentence.

OK. "According to the FBI, the average time between the legal purchase
of a gun subsequently used in a crime and that use is 2-1/2 years."

Added one word, even less ambiguous than your original awkward sentence.

This depends on what you mean by easy. No security system will stop a
determined thief, the best it can do is slow him down or make it too
much trouble.

Check out the security requirements and the gun-theft rates in
Switzerland. Doing there, what most people do in the US, would land
you in jail. And their gun-crime rates are much lower than ours.

Nah, comparing different societies to the US just demonstrates that
they're different societies. Far more variables than just gun thief
rates and gun crime rates. If I compare crime in Milwaukee to most
European cities, the numbers are similar if you ignore the areas where
most of the blacks and Hispanics live. That's an endemic social problem
that doesn't translate in comparisons.

David

If gun crime in Democrat run blue states where guns are virtually
banned..are removed from the stats..the US has gun crime rates at or
below that of Switzerland and England.

Doesnt say much for gun control now does it? And in fact..25 states
now allow their citizens to carry firearms openly.. and of those...10
allow them to carry concealed WITHOUT A PERMIT....

Funny..gun crime in those states is at a low..while gun crime in the
US as a whole..is at the levels of the early 1960s...the lowest gun
crime rates in 50 yrs..and its still falling, though a bit slower than
it has over the past 15 yrs..simply because black gun crime has not
been stopped..in those very same gun banned blue states.

Funny how that works...isnt it?

20 yrs ago..only 8 states issued concealed weapons permits. Today...48
of them do..with the remaining 2 in violation of SCOTUS rulings and in
and out of court...

And the gun crime rate continues to fall

Gunner

On Wed, 22 Jul 2015 13:00:50 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:54:10 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 14:30:25 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 22:35:34 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:05:38 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:21:45 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 08:40:08 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Sun, 19 Jul 2015 09:05:10 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Sun, 19 Jul 2015 14:09:57 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

On Sat, 18 Jul 2015 11:21:07 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

snip


While statistically you may be correct, I'm not that sure about the
relationship between gun availability and crime. For example, I read
that while criminals in England rarely used firearms in, say the '50's
- the Great Train Robbers were armed with clubs - while today, even
with more stringent firearm laws in the country, armed criminals are
more common. to the extent that arming the police seems to becoming a
more popular idea.

Yeah, they're having a hell of a wave of murders with guns in the UK.
Their rate is all the way up to 0.26/100,000. The rate for the US is
40 times higher.

They're just going to hell in a handbasket...

The point, or course, was that even with stringent gun laws the number
of armed criminals in the British Isles is increasing. What was it in
England, Scotland and Wales, say 20 - 30 years ago compared to the
present?

It's meaningless. When the numbers are so vanishingly small, even a
slight perturbation in the numbers causes a disproportionate change in
the percentages.


And, of course, in Northern Ireland where possession of a firearm
likely ensured a very unpleasant visit to the police station, at a
minimum, gun crimes were sky high for a while :-)

But as I previously mentioned, they banned alcoholic beverages in the
U.S. and that automatically stopped drinking in the entire country.
Right?

There's no connection.


I see...

Banning alcohol was thought to decrease the evils of that "Demon Rum"
and banning firearms is expected to decrease the evils of those
terribly dangerous guns.



The first didn't work and in fact is often claimed to be a major
reason that the "Mafia" grew from a little neighborhood protection
racket to a major factor in crime, but the second will be just so
effective, just like banning narcotic drugs has eliminated "dope
fiends" and outlawing cocaine had eliminated the use there of.

It's a fairly foolish comparison. People wanted to drink. It's not
true that many people want to shoot and kill each other.

Note what's happened in the UK and Australia when some or most types
of guns were banned.


Prostitution and gambling has been banned for years and years, so
obviously there are no hookers walking the streets and "the numbers"
were a figment of someone's imagination.

People like to ****. Far fewer want to kill.


Wake up and smell the flowers Ed. Banning something doesn't stop the
use of that thing. It just increases the cost.

It's a mixed bag, John. Some work, some don't. The DDT ban was very
effective. It's pretty hard to buy asbestos insulation these days.
And you don't see many stoles and jackets made of endangered species
any more.

You have to be a little more thoughtful and careful about these
absolute pronouncements. There are LOTS of bans that have succeeded.


Or did you think that all the evil doers running about and shooting
each other are using legally purchased guns and that all, each and
every one of them, has a State issued concealed carry permit?

Virtually ALL GUNS WERE PURCHASED LEGALLY. That's a key issue that gun
nutz refuse to address.

Exactly what I have been saying. Individuals who commit the majority
of the gun crimes do it with what might be termed "banned guns".

What guns are banned? They aren't banned. Any criminal can buy one.
Our gun laws are a joke.

Goodness, you mean there are no background checks and some bloke just
out of jail can walk right down to the gun shop and buy one?

No, I mean what I said -- guns aren't banned, and any criminal can buy
one, because our gun laws are a joke. And in private sales, in most
places, there are no background checks.

And than
apply to the state for his concealed carry permit?

He doesn't need one. Once he has your gun, he's all set.


But I agree about the gun laws. Perhaps the U.S. could get serious and
emulate Singapore where possession of an illegal firearm is a
mandatory death sentence.

And your argument apparently is that banning guns will reduce firearm
crimes

No, that's not my argument. I haven't made any arguments about what
should be done, or what the consequences would be. You're just making
it up in your own head.


Well, Ed, it doesn't seem to have.

Next, I assume, you will argue that "after all, if guns are banned
there won't be any here to buy", to which I will argue that "as cocoa
plants don't grow in the U.S. obviously cocaine is unobtainable here."

No, I wouldn't argue that. Only your strawman would argue that.

We hear a lot of stupid distractions and irrational comments about
guns on this NG, John, but yours are right up there with the dimwits.

Is it something that happens when you decide that you're okay with gun
crime, as long as it doesn't affect your guns? Does it short out
something upstairs?

No Ed, I don't own any guns and haven't for 40 years now that I've
lived in countries where personally owned firearms are illegal. But
I'm still rational enough to understand, as you apparently are not,
that simply banning something doesn't preclude its being availability.

I don't know where you get the idea that I "don't understand" that
banning something doesn't preclude its availability. I've repeatedly
pointed out that 1) some bans work, and others do not; 2) that banning
guns in some countries has worked quite well; and 3) that there is no
possibility that banning guns in the US would have any effect. We're
awash with guns, and many are in the illegal market already. The way
our laws work, we'll continue to flood the illegal market for many
years to come.

I find it bizarre that you would use the UK as a comparative example,
claiming that its gun bans are not effective. John, the UK has 1/40
the firearms homicide rate of the US. What would the ratio have to be
for you to decide it was effective?

That's the kind of nuttiness that defeats rational discussions about
guns and the law.

As I've continually stated, drugs have been outlawed in the U.S. for a
considerable period and are still available, gambling was outlawed in
much of the U.S,. and was still available and innumerable other sins
have been banned and are still available. The Volstead (spelling?) act
outlawed alcoholic beverages in the U.S. and if anything it became
more available.

Uh, no, but that's an argument with which I won't get involved. You'd
better equip youself with some facts before taking on anyone regarding
Prohibition. That's another subject about which there are a lot of
myths.


But in spite of the overwhelming failure of simply banning something
with the thought that it will go away, somehow if guns are banned a
miracle will occur and gun crime will cease.

That's a pretty sophomoric argument. I don't know anyone who would
make it, and if one did, they aren't worth the argument.

--
Ed Huntress

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 21:34:17 -0700, Gunner Asch
wrote:

On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 22:26:41 -0400, Tom Gardner
wrote:

On 7/18/2015 1:07 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:



The best solution is ALWAYS to punish the law abiding gun owners.

So what punishment did they give to you, Tom?



When they came to take away the Jews, I said nothing.....


Absolutely!!

So, did they round up all of the Jews in Taft? What did they do with
them?

--
Ed Huntress

On 7/21/2015 8:39 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 17:16:16 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 5:03 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 16:44:18 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 3:22 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 12:18:26 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 9:16 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 07:38:19 -0700, Rudy Canoza
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 1:32 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 14:56:33 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 10:43 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 10:24:16 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 8:52 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 18:47:16 +0700, John B. Slocomb
wrote:

Disregarding that something like half the deaths attributed to guns
seem to be people committing suicide.

Who's disregarding it?

Although I suspect that if they
can't get a gun they will take to jumping from high buildings and
bridges, or even suicide by automobile. Just drive down the highway
and straight into the bridge abutment.

Ya' never know. But maybe you'd like to try researching that one
before "suspecting."

Best to ask those who committed suicide by gun if they would have killed
themselves by another means if a gun had not been available.

Another way is to see how many times they failed at other methods. For
example, my former college roommate, who became schizophrenic at age
22. He tried running his car into a ditch on I-96. That didn't work.
So he stole a semi and tried driving it into a bridge on I-80 in
Pennsylvania. No luck.

So, one day in 1979, living in Daytona Beach, he bought a .38 Spl. S&W
revolver, put it to his head, and finally had success. One wonders how
it would have gone if we had a background-check system in place then.

Dan was basically kicked out of the mental-health system, with no one
to keep track of his meds. He quit taking them. Whether he would have
been rescued if he had another failure is problematic. Not only do we
have a mental health system that leaks like a sieve, but nobody seems
to care, either.

You're dismissing the question out of ignorance, David.

Not really, two good friends of mine, both bi-polar, killed themselves
when at the bottom of their mood swings, one by sitting in a car in a
closed garage with the engine running, the other w/ a .38 Spl S&W. I had
refused to sell her a gun some time before.

So I know something of this. In both cases, this was the first attempt
that I know of. Neither had had any history that would have precluded
buying a gun. The use of a gun was irrelevant to the result.

So why did you ask the nonsense question about querying them after
they're dead? That was the idiot remark.


About 50% of US suicides are by gun in the US, with about 24% by hanging.

So how many would we have if there weren't any guns?


Japan has a suicide rate about 2-1/2 as high as the US, with hanging at
about 50%. Somehow they manage to do it w/o guns.

And the Philiippines have a rate that's 1/4 of ours. What conclusion
do you draw from this?

The obvious one: guns don't cause the suicide rate to be what it is.

There is no connection that you could make.

It's an obvious connection, nsf eddy, but it's apparently too subtle for
you.

So where's the subtlety? Tell us about the "connection" you've made.
Then I'll show you the stats that shoot it to hell.

By the way, that claim about "stats" is stinkier than your usual
bull****. There are no such stats.

No, I gave you plenty of info to see that it's been the subject of
clinical studies, and

There are no "clinical studies" chortle that show guns as a causative
factor for the impulse to commit suicide in the first place. Access to
guns doesn't cause a non-suicidal person to become suicidal.



Deal?

There is no connection. Between countries, suicide rates vary hugely.
Within the US, there is no doubt that a large part of our suicide rate
is the result of the easy availability of guns. No doubt at all.

Of course there's doubt, nsf eddy.

Nope.

Yep.

You don't have any way of knowing
what those who use guns would do if guns weren't available.

Yeah, we know quite accurately what the failure rates are by method,

Irrelevant, nsf eddy. Boy, you're slower than usual today; arthritis
acting up? You have *no* way of knowing that if someone fails by one
method, that he won't try it again, or try another method, until he
succeeds.

That Japanese rate just screws you, nsf eddy.

No, dimwit, it leads to a quite clear conclusion.

It leads you to a wrong and logically invalid conclusion, nsf eddy.

Guns don't cause suicide. There's just no getting around that fact.

On 7/21/2015 1:53 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 13:07:45 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/21/2015 11:32 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 21 Jul 2015 08:01:06 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

On 7/20/2015 3:36 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:07:21 -0500, "David R. Birch"
wrote:

More likely we want to be able to defend ourselves.

See above.

I did. You don't think people should be able to defend themselves? My
reluctance to kill is less than my reluctance to be killed.

No, you have a perfect right to defend yourself. And if you have to,
it's time to move.

Easy to say assuming unlimited funds and options.

No, you don't need unlimited funds and options. What you need is the
good sense not to plant yourself and your family in a shooting
gallery.

It was what I could afford.

Nonsense. There are plenty of safe places that aren't expensive. That
was your choice.

Neighborhoods change over time, you arrogant jerk.