The Official Gun Control Debate thread

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Originally Posted by PNWbrit

Can illegal aliens currently obtain firearms legally?

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I got on a two subject tangent and made comments quickly without thinking. My point is that there is no reason to allow people who are not naturalized citizens or Americans by birth to get handguns. I think this is a pretty reasonable. I don't believe that illegal immigrants can get a gun permit. My reasoning is that many times they (legal non-us citizens or illegal) don't have as much invested in being an American and have an easy escape to say Mexico which is what I had in mind when I mentioned it.

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Originally Posted by PNWbrit

I thought gun control didn't work because people who want to break the law with a gun will just obtain one illegally - :confused: and if gun control is effective for immigrants why wouldn't it work for everyone?

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People can and do easily get guns illegally. I never said gun-control was effective for immigrants (non-citizens, non-naturalized, illegal etc). I just said that we have to draw a line somewhere. As I mentioned above, it is a problem with criminals from Mexico heading across the border.

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Originally Posted by PNWbrit

How would becoming a naturalized citizen prevent anyone from being able to run to hide in another country? Again are you sure this is this a major issue? I can recall the recent case of a British man who'd fled the U.S. after the deaths of his wife and kids. Think he's now being/been extradited to stand trial in the U.S. after an undertaking that he'd not face death penalty.

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One small reason is that some people have to give up citizenship in their home country when they become a US citizen according to their government. An recent example is a Canadian that just married an American girl I know -- he had to give up his citizenship in Canada -- which I thought was weird. This makes it harder to run back home but again taking away citizenship is not very common.

Another point is that the extradition of murderers as you mentioned is often times with the legal agreement that they won't face the death penalty. But, of course, I don't think Brits are a major importer of crime to the US. However this is an issue with Canada and many other countries.

There is a very big problem in the US with people coming from latin countries such as Mexico and committing murder, etc. They can run across the border pretty easy. I'm not going to bother getting the numbers due to time constraints (wife wants house cleaned and is sick of TGR addiction) but I can assure you they are likely not very hard to find.

Officers spoke to Cho "at length" then asked him to see a counselor. He agreed to be evaluated by Access Services, an independent mental health facility in Blacksburg, the chief said.
"A temporary detention order was obtained and Cho was taken to a mental health facility"

So HOW did he pass "background checks" when buying Glocks..? :mad:

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Originally Posted by flowtron

Am I a "gun control freak" for thinking its a good idea to make it harder to buy a handgun? Maybe, say, a backround check that would be thorough enough to find out that a guy has been on the police radar screeen and sent into therapy for suicidal tendencies, stalking 2 women and constantly writing violent poems and plays?
Such a thorough backround check may take a little longer, I know that might frustrate you clean-record-having, potential gun buyers when you NEED to shoot those cans and washing machines out in the woods TODAY.

The more information we find about this guy and his legal purchase of the guns used, his psychiatric and police history and the fact that Virginia permits conceal and carry

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I'm with you 100% on this. If I try to use me credit card to buy gas and I'm over my limit, guess what, I can't buy gas. The gas pump knows that instantly. We need something similar for gun purchases.

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but nobody stepped up vigilante style to take this guy out (like the 'armed society is a polite society' folks would have you believe).....it boggles my mind that gun devotees will not give an inch.

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The school was a "gun free zone". This worthless pandering to please the anti gun nuts prevented even the possibility of someone stopping this guy with their legally carried firearm.

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and maybe its a good idea not to sell semi-automatic assault rifles while we're at it.

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No such thing. If it's semi-auto, it's not, by definition, an assault rifle. You really need to get your education from someplace other than the media. They are doing you a disservice with their selective inaccuracies.

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Originally Posted by DaveTV

Officers spoke to Cho "at length" then asked him to see a counselor. He agreed to be evaluated by Access Services, an independent mental health facility in Blacksburg, the chief said.
"A temporary detention order was obtained and Cho was taken to a mental health facility"

So HOW did he pass "background checks" when buying Glocks..? :mad:

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This is kinda ridiculous. A history of mental problems (even if not acted out violently) should be reflected on someone's record. I'm not saying every mother who's had post-partum depression should be denied a handgun, but a guy with a history of stalking people?

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Originally Posted by tommyvee

My point was that every sane person believes in restricting access to chem/bio weapons, missiles, and other "super-effective killing technologies". I have never argued to "outlaw firearms".

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Sorry, I misread your post. My mistake.

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Originally Posted by TruckeeLocal

Is your position that the US does not have a firearm mortality problem and that 12,000 firearm related deaths are an acceptable 'run-rate' in our culture ?

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Deaths are never acceptable, but the alternative is even more deaths.

My position is dictated by these facts:

"According to the 1997 Survey of State Prison Inmates in the US, among those possessing a gun, the source of the gun was a flea market or gun show for fewer than 2%, a retail store or pawnshop for about 12%; family, friends, a street buy, or an illegal source for 80%."
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/guns.htm
US Dept. of Justice, National Crime Victimization Survey, 2000

This means that for 80% of criminals, anti-gun laws have no effect at all. Obviously, though, they disarm 100% of law-abiding citizens.

"Fewer than 5 percent of all calls dispatched to police are made soon enough for officers to stop a crime or arrest a suspect."
"This is 911, Please Hold", U.S. News & World Report, June 17, 1996, p. 30

This means that if you are the victim of an attempted crime, you have less than a 1 in 20 chance of being protected by the police.

The point has been made abundantly clear by the horrible tragedy at Virginia Tech...the university had a "no guns" policy and there were no police to stop the gunman, so he killed at least 33 people over several hours before committing suicide. Contrast that with the rampage at Appalachian School of Law, where the gunman was stopped by armed students after killing six people:
http://www.uwire.com/content/topops012402002.html

There are approximately 1.5 million defensive gun uses per year in the USA.
http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles/165476.pdf

Let's be absurdly optimistic and say that none of the 20% of criminals who obtain guns legally are resourceful enough to get them illegally, so banning all guns stops 20% of gun crime. 20% of 12,000 is 2400 -- versus 100% of the 1.5 million crimes that are committed because law-abiding citizens no longer have guns to stop them.

This is why I support gun rights. It makes me, and you, and all of us, less likely to be injured or killed by a criminal.

This holds true whether you own guns yourself or not, so even if you dislike guns yourself and would never own one, you should support gun rights.

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Originally Posted by Spats

There are approximately 1.5 million defensive gun uses per year in the USA.
http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles/165476.pdf

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That article suggests that the 1.5 million figure seems pretty dubious and I have to agree.

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Originally Posted by The AD

That article suggests that the 1.5 million figure seems pretty dubious and I have to agree.

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I already addressed that issue, but I'll repost the reply since you missed it and I have a couple things to add (no blame to you, it's a long-ass thread):

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They are very surprised by the number and express disbelief that it's so high, but they can't refute it because it's their own survey using their own methodology. Remember, their initial survey put the number at 23 million, and the Kleck and Gertz survey put the number at 2.5 million. 1.5 million is the conservative number, eliminating both multiple uses by the same person and any situation that didn't meet the 30-question test.

http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles/165476.pdf

"Each of the respondents in the NSPOF was asked the question, "Within the past 12 months, have you yourself used a gun, even if it was not fired, to protect yourself or someone else, or for the protection of property at home, work, or elsewhere?" Answers in the affirmative were followed with "How many different times did you use a gun, even if it was not fired, to protect yourself or property in the past 12 months?" Negative answers to the first DGU question were followed by "Have you ever used a gun to defend yourself or someone else?" (emphasis in original).

Each respondent who answered yes to either of these DGU questions was asked a sequence of 30 additional questions concerning the most recent defensive gun use in which the respondent was involved, including the respondent's actions with the gun, the location and other circumstances of the incident, and the respondent's relationship to the perpetrator.

Respondents were excluded on the basis of the most recent DGU description for any of the following reasons: the respondent did not see a perpetrator; the respondent could not state a specific crime that was involved in the incident; or the respondent did not actually display the gun or mention it to the perpetrator."

This is pretty airtight.

The reason the authors have trouble believing the results isn't the total number of defensive uses, but the breakdown by crime (too many DGUs against rape). This is because they used too small a survey to break down by crime and still get useful numbers (2,568 adults, of which 19, or 0.8 percent, met the most conservative criteria for DGU). No one who knows the first thing about statistics will extrapolate fractions of a 19 person sample out to the entire US population!

Add that to the fact that the authors spend half a page talking about potential reasons for false positives, but not a single sentence talking about the very real possibility of false negatives. Keep in mind that a lot of people who own guns will not be willing to disclose their existence to random strangers on the telephone, nor disclose details of their defensive use which could lead to being charged with a crime -- especially during the early years of the Clinton administration, when this survey was conducted. So it's entirely possible that this survey strongly underestimates defensive gun use.

Despite the obvious anti-gun bias of the authors, they can't explain away the statistics, so they just say "Well, we don't really believe them." This isn't a matter of belief, it's a matter of facts.

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Originally Posted by DaveTV

[I]Officers spoke to Cho "at length" then asked him to see a counselor. He agreed to be evaluated by Access Services, an independent mental health facility in Blacksburg, the chief said.

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I believe it is .gov laws... medical records are not open for such checks. Thus if you voluntarily go to a psi hospital, it is not on the record. If you are involuntarily committed, it is court orders and court orders are matters of public record and thus go into the NCIS database and would show on a background check.

Similarly the CAMPUS police never persued the stalking claims at length and not official police record was created so it didn't show on the background...

Just like there is not officially searchable record his teachers concerns...

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Originally Posted by TruckeeLocal

The intellectally honest corrollary to this 'complacency' argument is that 12,000 firearm related deaths (let's pull out suicides) is an acceptable run rate to support our current interpretation of the 2nd amendment.

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It's all about delta or principles... its not whether 12,000 deaths are acceptable losses...

To the lives... it is about whether 12,000 vs what the number might otherwise be is worth the losses

To the principle it is about whether restrictions should be placed on the law abiding based on the actions of criminals.

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Originally Posted by DaveTV

Officers spoke to Cho "at length" then asked him to see a counselor. He agreed to be evaluated by Access Services, an independent mental health facility in Blacksburg, the chief said.
"A temporary detention order was obtained and Cho was taken to a mental health facility"

So HOW did he pass "background checks" when buying Glocks..? :mad:

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Great point. This brings up a bunch of other points too.

The whole idea of bannign certain kinds of guns is rediculous. This shooting showed that someone doesn't need an assault rifle to be deadly. This shooting also showed that we have a problem with the way background checks are run, and what kind of info comes up.

I really believe that if I am willing to jump through the proper hoops, I should be able as many fully automatic weapons as I want, complete with silencers, but I think that it is clear that we need to at least revamp the background check system. Unfortunantly, any attempt to do that would be ruined by the democrats trying to turn it into a gun control fiasco, and the republicans would probably try just as hard to fuck it up somehow as well.

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Originally Posted by Summit

... the NCIS database ...

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NCIS = Naval Criminal Investigative Service???

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Originally Posted by hemas

NCIS = Naval Criminal Investigative Service???

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Oops

NICS = National Instant Crimnal Background Check System

http://www.fbi.gov/hq/cjisd/nics.htm

Pardon my lysdexia

woohoo. nice thread :)
nazis, weapons, all in one thread. (sorry i stopped reading ~ at page 5)

and as an ultra left euro commie without liberty i won't comment on anything in the states, but i wanted to state that i like to read spook's comments.
cherioh

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Originally Posted by subtle plague

and as an ultra left euro commie without liberty i won't comment on anything in the states
cherioh

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Don't let it stop ya...

Oh, and a similar thread can be found at Padded Room:the_finge

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Originally Posted by Spats

Despite the obvious anti-gun bias of the authors, they can't explain away the statistics, so they just say "Well, we don't really believe them."

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I'm the same way. My feeling is that people who owns guns--especially handguns--are going to try to justify why they own them. Claiming a DGU is certainly a way to justify it. The only data I have to support the fact that the DGU data is erroneous is that I don't personally know of anyone who has used a gun in self defense. It's certainly possible many have and I just don't know about it. I know in my lifetime there's never been an occasion where I would have drawn a gun. I will admit my skepticism in the 1.5 million number is based on these observations and gut feel alone.

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Originally Posted by The AD

I'm the same way. My feeling is that people who owns guns--especially handguns--are going to try to justify why they own them. Claiming a DGU is certainly a way to justify it. The only data I have to support the fact that the DGU data is erroneous is that I don't personally know of anyone who has used a gun in self defense. It's certainly possible many have and I just don't know about it. I know in my lifetime there's never been an occasion where I would have drawn a gun. I will admit my skepticism in the 1.5 million number is based on these observations and gut feel alone.

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Is gut feeling really what you want our government to base legislative decisions on though?

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Originally Posted by Joey Joe Joe Junior Shabadoo

Is gut feeling really what you want our government to base legislative decisions on though?

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Well of course! All legislative decisions (hell - all decisions, period) should be based on feelings and emotions.

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Originally Posted by Jer

Well of course! All legislative decisions (hell - all decisions, period) should be based on feelings and emotions.

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You mean they AREN'T at the moment:FIREdevil

Reading this whole thread it is actually hard to figure out who is arguing what point.

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Originally Posted by Spats

"According to the 1997 Survey of State Prison Inmates in the US, among those possessing a gun, the source of the gun was a flea market or gun show for fewer than 2%, a retail store or pawnshop for about 12%; family, friends, a street buy, or an illegal source for 80%."
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/guns.htm
US Dept. of Justice, National Crime Victimization Survey, 2000

This means that for 80% of criminals, anti-gun laws have no effect at all. Obviously, though, they disarm 100% of law-abiding citizens.


Let's be absurdly optimistic and say that none of the 20% of criminals who obtain guns legally are resourceful enough to get them illegally, so banning all guns stops 20% of gun crime. 20% of 12,000 is 2400 -- versus 100% of the 1.5 million crimes that are committed because law-abiding citizens no longer have guns to stop them.

This is why I support gun rights. It makes me, and you, and all of us, less likely to be injured or killed by a criminal.

This holds true whether you own guns yourself or not, so even if you dislike guns yourself and would never own one, you should support gun rights.

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Two huge logical errors above.
1) To claim that because criminals have obtained guns illegally means that gun laws have no effect makes no sense at all. Gun laws as enforced can make illegal gun purchases more difficult, more expensive, and more risky. 100% of the people convicted of theft broke the laws against theft, does that mean that laws against theft have no impact and should be removed???
Of course not. Clearly requiring background checks for all gun transfers would have some effect and some criminals would find access to guns either more difficult or impossible. Of course, all illegal guns cannot be removed from circulation, but they can be reduced, as is evidenced by every other civilized country.

2) You never address the issue of if the following statement is true, why do all the countries with less "gun rights" also have much lower rates of murder and violent crime? If the following statement were true, the US would not have murder rates 2 or 3 times higher than countries with less
"gun rights".

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Originally Posted by Spats

"gun rights.It makes me, and you, and all of us, less likely to be injured or killed by a criminal.".

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ted rall
http://www.gocomics.com/rallcom/

All of this aside - I can say this. Because of my right to bear firearms...
I'm pretty much the wrong guy to fuck with.

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Originally Posted by Owens Never Sleeps

All of this aside - I can say this. Because of my right to bear firearms...
I'm pretty much the wrong guy to fuck with.

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interesting. that's pretty much the same idea cho had.

I don't have time to read all this.

Who's winning?

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Originally Posted by mrw

I don't have time to read all this.

Who's winning?

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The criminals. They've got all the guns they need and we, the unprotected law abiding citizenry, need to defend ourselves.

Who's losing ? I don't want to go there.