Kerr

This is the single best post in Speakers Corner, ever! -- Kerr

So probably less dangerous than your average leather belt then? Are you allowed to carry drinks glasses on 'planes in the US? I was a little surprised on a trip to Belgium recently that there was no problem bringing back honkin' great big beer glasses in cabin luggage. Not allowed nail clippers, but a potentially really nasty chunk of glass, no problem. I think if they banned them though, the duty free shop would have nothing to sell. -- Kerr

Just thought I'd jump in here with a quick explination of how VAT works in the UK (& euroland?). Companies with a turnover greater than about £54k need to be registered for VAT. All goods and services when sold by a VAT registered company have VAT added to them (17.5% in the UK), regardless of whether this is a business to business transaction or to a private individual. When a VAT registered company pays the VAT it has collect to HMC&E it deducts all the VAT it has paid to it's suppliers. If you are not VAT registered then you don't charge VAT on your sales and can't claim VAT back on your purchases. There are some small businesses that will do a service job for cash, knocking 17.5% off, so there is a black market, however this is pretty small. VAT is administered by HM Customs & Excise. Top tip, don't mess with people that have the legal authority to put on rubber gloves and ask you to spread and bend over. Some goods are VAT exempt, e.g. childrens clothing, some kinds of food. -- Kerr

I absolutely agree with your description of the fighting that would be involved. By military class firearms, I was thinking of fully auto small arms and explosives. Not heavy battlefield tech. You would probably get some split in the military, with some factions remaining under government control and some taking up arms against it. Absolutely, And here's where we seem to disagree. My position is that an initially unarmed populace will get armed and trained very quickly if there was a need to do so. I would argue that the overwhelming issue in those cases was a lack of information and education rather than a lack of firearms in the general population. People didn't understand what is going on untill it was too late. by that point, gun ownership would have been moot. May I ask why you believe it would not be possible for them to do so Ultimately I believe that the government's power comes from the population at large. Any attempt to shift the basis for that power away from the people would be met with overwhelming civil unrest to the point that the country would grind to a halt. If the government continued to impose rule the stronger the backlash would be. Although I would agree that if civil war was inevitable, then having guns at hand would help in the initial stages, in the grand scale of things they would have little impact on the outcome. People would get armed quickly anyway. I don't think the government needs anything to fear in it's populace. What would it have to gain? What would it have to loose? How difficult would it be to achieve it's tyrannical powers? Do you really believe that the only thing stopping your government from enslaving the populace is privately held firearms? I think that that consideration would be very far down the list of things they'd be worrying about. Where did that one come from? "Chhhk! They're coming in too fast!", "Chhhk! Stay on Topic, Stay on Topic, Chhhk!" -- Kerr

OK, an interesting distinction. I'd agree with you that in broad terms that that is correct. I think that it is interesting that often the right that is expressed is the right to bare arms, not the right to defend yourself. In the case of a tyrannical government then you'll end up with civil war. Given the scenario where a large part of the population decides that it is going to try and overthrow the standing government you are going to have massive widespread civil disruption and violence. I think the number of legally held firearms before the emergence of the tyrannical government would be of little importance. Military class firearms would be flooding into the country in huge numbers, dwarfing anything that would have been available before. This scenario is, of course, a war, with all that entails. I also don't think that the having widespread gun ownership would make any difference to the establishment of the tyrannical government in the first place. Do you believe that private firearm ownership would prevent a tyrannical government coming to power? Do you believe that private firearm ownership would significantly help during the outbreak of a civil war? Of course I don't believe that any UK government would be able to get into the position where it was able to impose the kind of restrictions that would classify it as tyrannical, regardless of private firearm ownership. -- Kerr

"I know this is all hypothetical and probably will never happen. People will have to try and remember that not everybody, specially myself, understands this fixation with freedom of speech." I think this is the crux of the cultural difference between many americans and many non-americans with respect to guns. You clearly see gun ownership as a right, just like free speech. To you the analogy is very clear. To many non-americans gun ownership is not seen as a right, rather it is seen as privilege. In that case your analogy does not fit, given that most people do see free speech as a right. -- Kerr

Erm... hilarious. -- Kerr

Playing devil's advocate on this point, but I'd guess that the answer to that one would be that guns are designed to kill people, cars are designed to transport people. -- Kerr

I'm not sure you can use these figures to demonstrate that gun crime is rising since the ban. All the numbers are pretty low and the variance is all within reasonable variance. If you take out the Dunblane killings it all looks pretty flat over the whole period. Please also remember that previous to the handgun ban it would be very difficult for any person that had a licence to own a handgun to use it for any for of self defence. You would have to have someone break into your house and for you to be trapped, unable to escape the house and be able to show that you were in immediate danger of serious physical injury, e.g. the other party was armed and was preparing to fire upon the homeowner. Even then, the homeowner wound be in for a hell of a ride from the police with possible charges being brought and very probably loss of firearms licences. Any claim that the handgun ban has made anyone less able to defend themselves is incorrect and shows a misunderstanding of UK law in this area. Of course you are more than welcome to comment on how ridiculus you feel that situation is, but don't confuse it with the ban on handguns. -- Kerr

Might have helped if they'd, you know, writen it down. Sounds like she's claiming there was no such agreement. -- Kerr

I don't think that any political parties are calling for a change in the current regs. Personally I thought that the new restrictions of '97 were unnecessary and I'd like to see a return to the regulations we had before that. As I understand it, had the police done there job properly given those regulations, Thomas Hamilton would not have had a firearms licence. -- Kerr

Although there was tightening of the regulations after the Hungerford shootings, the handgun ban came after the Dunblane shootings. I'd agree that it was a cheap government ploy though. -- Kerr

And that was the second repost 1st repost Original Is there a repost record? -- Kerr

Did you bulldoze the neighbouring apartment complex and build the wall in its grounds? Isn't that the main grounds for complaint against the wall? Unfortunatly, as far as I can tell, the wall does increase the sucurity, but also increases the tension in the area, leading to an increase in those who feel they have no other way of fighting back. If the increased security is nullified by an increase in tension then all that will have happened is that peace is moved one more step farther away. -- Kerr

God damn it!! I did a search to try and see if anyone had posted it, but obviously I suck -- Kerr