jbscout2002

I'm glad they are finding refuge, but rather than millions of people being displaced and leaving their entire lives behind to live in refugee camps, I'd rather about 200,000 of us go back to Iraq and put a beating on ISIS.

And the rest of the Middle East, Northern Africa, and Southwest Asia?

Abbas related that a man asked the Prophet, Tell me what should I do to be admitted to Paradise and he (the Prophet) answered: Worship Allah associating nothing with Him, observe Salat, pay Zakat and strengthen the ties of kinship. (Bukhari, Muslim) Abu Huraira related that the Prophet said: When someone is made rich but he does not pay Zakat for his wealth, then on the Day of Judgment his money will be turned into a poisonous snake with two black spots on its head. It will coil around his neck and bite his cheeks and say: 'I am your wealth, I am your treasure'. Then the Prophet recited verse 3:180 of the Quran. (Bukhari) - Qur'an "Zakāt or alms-giving (one of the 5 pillars of Islam) is the practice of charitable giving based on accumulated wealth. The word zakāt can be defined as purification and growth because it allows an individual to achieve balance and encourages new growth. The principle of knowing that all things belong to God is essential to purification and growth. Zakāt is obligatory for all Muslims who are able to do so. It is the personal responsibility of each Muslim to ease the economic hardship of others and to strive towards eliminating inequality. Zakāt consists of spending a portion of one's wealth for the benefit of the poor or needy, like debtors or travelers. A Muslim may also donate more as an act of voluntary charity (sadaqah), rather than to achieve additional divine reward." But all the Muslim countries (the wealthiest countries in the world) are turning them away.

Yeah it sounds crazy, but when you eliminate the "what if" game and only state the final outcome..... That woman had some serious skillz to take out the tire on a fleeing vehicle without any collateral damage.

Ok, so which bit of it directly addressed the differences in the offences which are included under the 'violent crime' umbrella between the UK, the USA and SA? Because I've got to be honest, I didn't notice that bit at all. Please, do feel free to point it out to me and prove that I'm just being obtuse The only possible answer here is LOL.

And how does any of that relate to your previous source being complete bollocks? Yet again, your ability to skip from argument to argument while ignoring anything you've previously said that was shown to be nonsense is very impressive. And you took the easy one, deflection. Big surprise. Like the way you took the easy out of quoting my post yet ignoring it completely and starting a brand new topic? How is that not deflection? Why do you expect me to directly answer every aspect of your posts when your replies to mine aren't even on the same topic? In fact, I don't even know how you expected me to reply to your post at all. Since it was entirely composed of a non-sequitur cut and paste with none of your own words for context I honestly have no idea what your point even was. What part of that post, which relates to our ongoing discussion, did you want me to reply to anyway? BTW, I thought you said you were going to shut up for a whie and go and learn stats. What happened with that? Providing you with the info on how your country surveys crime, which you called into question on your countries newspaper article, was a direct answer to your question. The answer being that I have consistently proved that it is only you who is bollocks. While I use credible info and link sources, you simply disagree with your own misguided opinion. Researching stats took about a coupl hours,mad it is already out there, you just have to dig a little deeper because the anti gunners tried to burry it. - Oh, and my hypothetical questioning method was to point out that people of your belief set, claim that: 1. There is an escallating murder problem in this country 2. The crime in this country is a DIRECT result of the guns in this country 3. Some magical new laws will fix this problem All available data shows: 1. Murder rates have been decreasing for the last 20 years 2. Guns are used several times more often to stop or deter a crime than they are to commit a crime 3. None of the laws proposed in the last 10 years would have stopped any of the latest high profile incidents, and most gun crime is committed with guns that are already in violation of the law In light of this evidence you admittedly just flat out don't care. You can offer no proposal to affect crime or murder rates. You just cherry pick numbers and twist the facts.

And how does any of that relate to your previous source being complete bollocks? Yet again, your ability to skip from argument to argument while ignoring anything you've previously said that was shown to be nonsense is very impressive. And you took the easy one, deflection. Big surprise.

In America, there are an estimated 250-280 million firearms (latest estimates are 300 million). Out of these, it is of course impossible to tell how many are illegal weapons, as the very nature of a weapon being illegal would preclude its registration to the current owner or wielder. Another study showed that five out of six gun-possessing felons did not purchase a handgun or otherwise get one through legal means, but instead procured an illegal weapon through the secondary market, or by theft. The information of this study strongly supports the fact that handguns used by criminals are most often stolen or traded between each other, and therefore become nigh impossible to track in any meaningful fashion. All of these would be deemed illegal weapons. According to a study conducted in 1997, which admittedly could be out of date but is one of the most recently conducted studies of this comprehensive nature , only 15% of firearms possessed by Federal inmates were obtained through a retail store. The largest portion of illegal weapons were given to the inmates by a family member or a friend, with the next largest portion having been given to the inmates by a drug dealer. The bottom line of most of this information is quite clear: the firearms being used in crimes are overwhelmingly illegal weapons, and unfortunately, the government is unable to track illegal weapons because of their illegal, unregistered status. www.gun.laws.com With the info above, let me throw you a hypothetical. Let's say in 2 years from now, your crowd has gotten all the gun control you could ever ask for passed into law. -Mental health assessments on everyone in the country -Assault weapons banned -High capacity magazines banned -Number of firearms one per person limited -Ammount of ammo per person limited -All semi automatic rifles, pistols, and shotguns banned -All handgun ownership requires a license -All purchases require a top secret clearance investigation by the NSA -12 month waiting period on all firearms -Quarterly BATFE random inspections of your guns, ammo, and storage It is a liberal dream land, a peaceful and peace-loving haven of tranquility. Now please tell me, in this perfect world of yours, what you think the trends in crime would be, considering most crime is committed with illegal firearms, and that the 300 million guns already in the population could only be identified and tracked if the owners of those firearms volunteer hat info to the government. Or if you would rather just deflect the question or change the subject, I suppose you can tell us all about how the world is flat or whatever else you choose to run with in spite of all evidence pointing to the contrary.

Yeah, the problem is that's bollocks, and it always was. it comes down to classification of a 'violent' offence. In the UK that covers an enormous range of incredibly petty situations that the US and SA (and many others) do not classify in the same way. The U.K. measures crime using two different processes: British Crime Survey (BCS): The Home Office conducts surveys of the population to determine how often subjects have been affected by criminal activity. Data is projected to reflect the entire population. Police reporting: Crimes are reported to the police and nationwide, census-level statistics are summarized. The BCS has been reporting a declining crime rate in the UK while police reporting has shown an increase. The BCS has routinely been criticized because it under reports crime due to the following factors: -Murdered and imprisoned people do not answer surveys -Some crimes are not surveyed when victims are below age 16 -Crime against institutions (bank robbery, etc.) are not included -Crimes are recorded at final disposition (conviction/acquittal), leaving many crimes completely unreported 4 These deficiencies are so significant that even the British government does not believe the accuracy of the BCS. “[T]he BCS did not record ‘various categories of violent crime’, including murder and rape, retail crime, drug-taking, or offences in which the victims were aged below 16. The most reliable measure of crime is that which is reported to the police. We’re facing over a million violent crimes a year for the first time in history.” Gun control groups tend to cite the BCS reports because it supports their narrative that Britain’s gun control laws lower crime. Criminologists tend to use the reporting system because it more closely matches the FBI Uniform Crime Statistics used in the United States. One curious tidbit: Murder rates initially appear to decline after 2002/2003. This is chiefly due to the scores of killings attributed to serial killer, Dr. Harold Frederick Shipman, which were booked in 2002/03 and did not recur in 2003/04. http://www.gunfacts.info/gun-control-myths/miscellaneous-gun-control-information/

My point exactly. How many people's lives were SAVED in the cases I highlighted? If 100 lives are saved by an armed citizen, but 1 life is taken by an armed murderer, we quietly brush off the good and make a big spectacle out of the bad. Blood sells, then follow up stories over the shooters background, then stories on the victim, then televised debated over gun laws, stirred up emotions, anti gun propaganda, good TV ratings, good filler news when they have nothing else to talk about.

That's odd, the victim was selected "at random". If a white guy killed a black jogger it would be a "hate crime". There would be nation wide protesting and the president would condemn the incident and order an investigation on the local police department for not being there to stop it. Of course the chances of a white guy being able to catch up to a running black man would be pretty slim

It would probably be helpful if the citizens of the EU had the availability of privately owned firearms that Americans enjoy. This way they can be the humanitarian saints they want to be, while still protecting their families.

The federal Gun Control Act of 1968 imposed a series of regulations on ammunition manufacturers, dealers and purchasers. The Act required all ammunition manufacturers and dealers to be licensed and maintain ammunition sales logs, prohibited licensees from selling any ammunition to persons under age 18 and handgun ammunition to persons under age 21, and prohibited interstate sales to unlicensed purchasers. Federal prohibited purchaser categories for firearms also apply to ammunition. Additional information on restrictions on firearm sales and purchases is contained in Federal Law on Prohibited Purchasers Generally. Ammunition may not be sold or otherwise transferred to any person who: Is underage; Has been convicted of, or is under indictment for, a crime punishable by imprisonment for more than one year; Is a fugitive from justice; Is an unlawful user of or addicted to a controlled substance; Has been adjudicated as a mental defective or committed to a mental institution; Is an illegal alien; Has been dishonorably discharged from the military; Has renounced his or her U.S. citizenship; Is subject to a court order restraining him or her from harassing, stalking or threatening an intimate partner, his or her child or a child of a partner; or Has been convicted of a misdemeanor offense of domestic violence.

Don't feel bad, I can't recall much that was in the media 18 years ago either. Really? Because we damn sure seem to remember Columbine High School - April 20, 1999. And of course typical of your crowd, you casually gloss over the 4 incidents that happened LAST YEAR and use the one from 97 as your one stuck point. Also typical that you would take a long list of examples and cherry pick one from it to misconstrue what is being presented. How about quoting the full list to give it the correct context? We love the carnage, but don't even hear about these mass shootings that were thwarted by a hero in the right place at the right time with a CCW.

You need to read the thread more carefully. It was all about "context". rushmc tried to downplay the (32%) difference. I highlighted it. If you want a better, more thorough analysis maybe you should write to your congressman and senators and tell them to repeal their NRA inspired prohibition on the CDC analyzing gun violence. Except, of course, the NRA is afraid of what the analysis might find. Try again. Or you can go back a couple posts to where I provided you with a link to the full CDC report. The report that you claim the CDC isn't allowed to do, but by executive order of the president on January 16, 2013, and $10 million to fund the research, was completed by June or July of 2013. That report is there, and it says you are wrong, but you gloss over it like everything else and will just answer questions with questions, ignore them, change the subject, or start up another character assassination campaign. It was presumptuous of me to assume you would entertain any rational discussion on the topic. I will disengage myself from your postings. Sorry to have bothered you.

The person shot was the front seat passenger, not the gun owner. Well then, unfortunately it's the grandmother and the child who suffered from that gun owners stupidity. Still glad it wasn't he child. I've seen small children with bullet holes in them, and I don't think that kid would have held up very well against a .357 mag

I don't, I am just amused by the spin trend that gets applied to these incidents. I will admit though, I do have a lack of empathy for the woman who thought it was a good idea to keep her loaded firearm in the seat back pocket directly in front of the CAR SEAT that a 2 year old child sits in. People like this, and intervening people like this, is what will start showing positive impacts on these types of problems. (Thank god it was her that paid for her bad judgment, and not the child)

News sources confirm the pistol was legally purchased by the 2 year old boy himself, or a family member. The boy was said to have made threatening comments on social media sites, and could have possibly had mental health issues. The shooting rampage ended only after the crazed child was distracted with a set of car keys. This latest occurrence of murderous gun violence has launched renewed political pressure for increased background checks, and imprisonment of all gun owners immediately.

This wouldn't happen if we raise the minimum purchasing age to 3.

Just a thought, and this isn't meant to be disrespectful, but being the intellectual that you are, is it possible that you have grown acustomed to most of the people you interact with, simply taking your opinion at face value? I kind of get the impression that you rationalize the numbers, but are basically just firmly gun control oriented, so you chose to hold your ground recycling the latest rhetoric - If you can't daze the with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit. 10,000-12,000 people per year are murdered by guns, every year, however, it is estimated that guns are used to stop or deter "violent crime" (I don't know how many murders, but even conservative estimates say at least as often as they are used to kill) anywhere between 108,000 and 1.5 million times per year (depending on how pro or anti gun the survey is). Despite my posting history, I would fully support any new gun laws, if they could be shown to have a plausible impact on gun violence. I would even go so far as to say that in spite of history supporting my argument, if any new evidence proved otherwise, I would start surrendering firearms. I do not place the value of gun ownership above the value of human life. I suppose I could just be seeing the world through blurry lenses, but from what I've seen so far, I just don't get it. There is a violence problem, but new gun laws won't fix it. It is like plugging a hole in the Hoover Dam with chewed bubble gum. It might make you feel like you stopped the leak, but there is a lot bigger problem going on there that needs to be addressed. In Oregon there was a vet who was shot 7 times trying to stop the shooter. In the building next door, there was another vet, who was armed. Imagine the lives that could have been saved if one person in that room were armed, or if the shooter just happened to pick the other room that had the armed vet. If it is really about preservation of life, then how can one dispute this concept? At this point, I'm not even trying to prove a point, argue, start crap or anything. I honestly want to understand the logic. It seems there is a set of data, numbers, that we all agree on, but then one side says, only if there were less guns the numbers go down. The other side says, only the right people with guns make the numbers go down. On the anti gun side, is there a common belief that new laws on purchasing will reduce the 300 million guns already among the population? Is this even that kind of discussion, or is it more of a, "if only there was a world free of guns" type of discussion? *Edit* I guess I have my answer. I have obviously made an overestimation. I was expecting better.

I don't recall seeing these high profile incidents in the media. Pearl High School - Oct. 1, 1997 Luke Woodham fatally stabbed his mother at home before opening fire at his high school, killing two students and injuring seven others. The attack was stopped when Assistant Principal Joel Myrick retrieved his .45 caliber handgun from his truck and confronted Woodham, detaining him until authorities could arrive. Myrick’s action stopped Woodham from going across the street to the middle school as he had planned. Parker Middle School - April 24, 1998 A 14-year-old student showed up to his middle school dance carrying a .25-caliber pistol. He opened fire inside the dance, killing one teacher and wounding another as well as two students. The rampage ended when James Strand, owner of the banquet hall the dance was happening in, grabbed his personal shotgun and confronted the 14-year-old killer. Strand held the teen at gunpoint for 11 minutes before finally getting him to drop the weapon and lie on the ground and searching him for additional weapons. Appalachian School of Law - Jan. 16, 2002 A 43-year-old former student armed with a .380 handgun killed Dean Anthony Sutin and Professor Thomas Blackwell with point blank shots and went on to kill fellow student Angela Dales as well as wounding three others before being confronted at gunpoint by law students Tracy Bridges, a county sheriff’s deputy, and Mikael Gross, a police officer, after retrieving their personal handguns from their vehicles. The gunman was then apprehended by other students. Gross and Bridges lost valuable response time accessing their handguns because of the law school’s standing as a gun-free zone. New Life Church - Dec. 9, 2007 2 parishioners were killed and 3 wounded when a gunman toting a Bushmaster AR-15 opened fire at New Hope Church. Hearing the rifle fire, Jeanne Assam grabbed her personal concealed carry firearm and confronted the gunman from a distance of 20 yards. According to 5280 Magazine: She fires five quick shots. Murray falls backward. Assam moves to the middle of the corridor and rushes forward. She’s a few dozen feet from Murray now, exposed in the middle of the hallway. “Drop your weapon, or I will kill you!” she yells. Murray sits up to face her. He’s still holding the rifle. Boom-boom-boom. Bullets rip past her and pepper a wall. While Murray shoots, Assam fires three times. Through the haze of gun smoke, Assam sees the man struggling on the floor. He props his head against a wall. Her weapon is up, trained on the man. She sees his hands moving near his shoulder. He’s trying to pull the pin on a grenade. He’s going to kill everyone around here, Assam thinks. She instinctively steps back and fires two more shots. New York Mills AT&T Store - May 27, 2010 A 79-year-old man entered an AT&T store in New York Mills, New York carrying a .357 magnum revolver in his hand and a list of employees he planned to kill in his pocket. Hearing the hand cannon go off, Donald J. Moore drew his own personal weapon and killed the gunman before he could complete his plan. One employee was wounded in the shooting. Sullivan Central High School - August 30, 2010 When a 62-year-old man armed with two handguns forced his way into Sullivan Central High School in Tennessee, he was immediately engaged by School Resource Officer Carolyn Gudger. Gudger put her body between the gunman and a student and started what would turn out to be a more than 10 minute gun-to-gun encounter. Gudger used the time to slowly move the man to a less crowded part of the school. When other officers arrived on the scene, a brief gun battle erupted ending with the gunman mortally wounded. Freewill Baptist Church - March 25, 2012 Aaron Guyton was inside the recreation building of his grandfather’s church when he saw Jessie Gates, a member of the congregation, pulling a shotgun from his vehicle. Guyton leapt into action, locking the doors to the church where services were going on. Gates kicked in the door and pointed the shotgun at Rev. Henry Guyton and several parishioners. Drawing his concealed handgun, the younger Guyton held Gates at gunpoint while two members of the church took him to the ground. Rev. Guyton then took the shotgun from his hand. Clackamas Town Center Mall - Dec. 11, 2012 Two people were killed and a third was seriously wounded at Clackamas Town Center near Portland, Oregon when a rifle-toting gunman opened fire in in the busy food court. Nick Meli, a shopper in the mall, drew a personally owned firearm on the gunman, who immediately retreated to a service corridor and killed himself. Meli did not fire his weapon for fear of striking bystanders yet authorities say his actions caused the gunman to cease his attack and end his own life. Mystic Strip Club - January 11, 2014 After being refused entry to the strip club for belligerent behavior and racist comments earlir in the night, Thomas Elliott Hjelmeland returned carrying a handgun and wearing a Halloween mask. As soon as he entered the club, Hjelmeland opened fire, striking bouncer Brian Rizzo, a patron, and a waitress. Another bouncer, Jonathan Baer drew his concealed handgun and shot Hjelmeland, killing him. Following the attack Baer posted to Facebook: “I did what I felt was right to stop the shooter…I carry every day, and will continue to, and will so with the hope that I will NEVER have to pull it out again.” Austin, Texas Construction Site - April 30, 2014 An irate former employee came to a construction site and opened fire on his co-workers. The site’s foreman, a Concealed Handgun License holder, drew his firearm and opened fire. Both men were wounded in the exchange of gunfire but the foreman’s actions ended the attack and no one else was wounded. Cache Valley Hospital - May 16, 2014 Armed with two handguns, a man entered the Cache Valley Hospital emergency room and began making demands. After demanding to see a doctor, he racked the slide on one of his handguns and told hospital employees “someone is going to die today”. While a security guard tried to keep the gunman’s focus on him, two corrections officers who happened to be at the hospital on an unrelated matter engaged from another direction. The gunman was shot three times and no other people were harmed. Mercy Fitzgerald Hospital - July 25, 2014 A patient at a psychiatric clinic killed his case worker at point blank range and then turned his gun on his doctor, Lee Silverman, striking him several times. Before the gunman could leave the office and continue his rampage, Dr. Silverman drew his own concealed handgun and pumped three rounds into the gunman’s torso, mortally wounding him. Police and hospital staff hail Dr. Silverman as a hero and credit him with saving dozens of lives.

They'll learn not to zig when they should have zagged On a serious note, in 2011, there were 136,423 schools in the U.S. In 2011, there were 8 school shootings. 4 of those resulted in zero fatalities. The other 4 resulted in a total of 6 fatalities. This puts the chances of dodging bullets at school, whether in kindergarten or your senior year of college, at just less than a .006% chance. The media makes it look like going to school is more dangerous than than an American christian trying to convert muslems in Raqqa, Syria, because their audience has a morbid fascination with sick sh*t, which translates into rating$.

Like right-wing anti-terrorists? (And what is it that they're ignoring?) The gun-nuts are ignoring the thousands of their fellow citizens who are shot dead every year due to unnecessarily lax gun laws, and the anguish of the victims' families. So they throw dust in the air to try to conceal their indifference. Professor, as an individual who is among the top of their field in a scientific community, do you honestly hold conviction in this statement, citizens who are shot dead every year due to unnecessarily lax gun laws? An unshakeable assertion that lax gun laws are the proponent for the victims of gun violence? I ask this, pointing out, that no current laws or any laws that had been proposed in the last decade would have stopped any of the mass shootings that happened in the last 3 years, possibly more. Also that, some states with the most lax gun laws have the lowest murder rates in the nation while other states that have the strictest gun laws have more than one of the nations deadliest cities within their state lines. It seems we can all take the same data and highlight the portions of that data that make our side of the debate look better, but this simply isn't the scientific method. For the most part, IMHO, researchers are collecting data to show how gun violence is created or affected by either stance A, or stance B. This of course means that most studies are being conducted with preconceived biases, IOW: "pre-existing beliefs can alter the interpretation of results, as in confirmation bias; this is a heuristic that leads a person with a particular belief to see things as reinforcing their belief, even if another observer might disagree (in other words, people tend to observe what they expect to observe)." Just my little ole opinion here, but I firmly assert that if general violence was explored as a public health concern by the criminology, sociology, psychology, and medical fields, that all violence including gun violence could be reduced. I also expect that as a byproduct of this effort, gun control zealots would stop charging full steam for as much "ban" as possible, which in turn could result in less aggressive resistance from pro gun groups afraid of unnecessarily losing "control". (I believe that like dealing with children, many gun people perceive your gain in "control" as their loss in "control" and it scares them) My hypothesis would be that if the gun debate cools (a calming of ban threats, panicked gun buying, and mistrust by both sides), then what could actually be considered "common sense" laws could be passed, such as national background checks, or a system that makes it easier to get someone seen by the wizard and put on the "no buy" list, yet offers avenues for that person to clear there record if it was decided to be unfounded. Perhaps that last paragraph was a silly fantasy that would never happen, but even if it didn't, the result would still be a reduction in violence and in gun murder specifically, so what would we have lost other than the argument of weather guns should be allowed in the U.S.?

You think you have seen some sh*t, but you've led a sheltered life until you've seen this one. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iJ4T9CQA0UM

I'm not great at articulating my ideology, and I easily get sucked into simply defending guns, but irregardless of what restriction lay ahead, the loan wolf, antisocial, crazy, nut job will always be a threat. Nothing short of total ban and an effective total confiscation program could be expected to combat that. The majority of guns used in crimes are obtained illegally, which means that no amount of legislation will affect it. Even with a total ban and confiscation, there are still guns that will be smuggled in or manufactured here. In 1994, Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act went into effect until it expired in 2004. It banned assault weapons and high capacity magazines. Crime data analysis showed no measurable change in crime rates, but the program cost 30.2 billion dollars. It is estimated that to simply reinstate that same ban today would cost in excess of 45 billion dollars. This is a lot of money that produces no results and alienates a lot of Americans who disagree with it. 45 billion dollars could go an awful long way in after school programs, intervention programs, additional law enforcement resources, better access to mental health care and so on. These strategies would have a large impact on crime.