Ban semi-automatic weapons?

How reasonable is it to legislate to control clip capacity? As in, is it practical, not is the law actually passable, because with the current POTUS I'd be surprised if any sort of gun control was possible.

Tbh I still feel that even without 900rpm the capacity for a single bad actor to snuff out lives with a semi-auto rifle and 30 round mag is enormous. Doubtless they'd be people alive today who aren't now if he didn't have a bump stock... but it'd still be another mass murder with far too many people having to bury their loves ones. Idk. Progress of a sort maybe...

Thoughts:

1) There has been a ban on sales of new, fully-automatic firearms ("machine guns") since 1986. That leaves some loopholes (can still buy them if they were manufactured before then, but that demand plus scarcity makes them expensive, etc.) but in general, there isn't a whole lot of uproar over that 20-year-old ban.

2) These bump-fire stocks don't technically convert a firearm into fully-automatic; the trigger is still being pulled 1 time for each bullet that comes out (semi-automatic).

3) However, they easily allow for rates of fire (bullets per minute/second) comparable to fully-automatic weapons. So, I think an unbiased and reasonable person would say that while a firearm equipped with one of these does not violate the letter of the ban on fully-automatic firearms, it does quite reasonably violate the spirit of that ban.

4) Doing anything to correct that discrepancy will require updated laws. Updating the law requires a legislature that generally supports the update and a president that agrees, or a legislature that overwhelmingly supports the update and can override a presidential veto.

5) None of that exists at the moment in the US. So, it is (perhaps coldly) logical to say that these bump-fire stocks will not be banned as an extension to the 1986 ban on full-auto firearms, at least not in the short term.

6) However, before quietly accepting that, it is worth noting that political fallout amongst those individuals in the legislature that refuse to consider updating the law is a very real possibility. Plenty of people, even on the right, even plenty of gun nuts, say that they are in favor of some degree of "common sense" gun control. Pointing out that bump-fire stocks essentially circumvent the already in-place ban on fully-automatic firearms seems like a good way to test that professed adherence to common sense.

7) Get that word out there, and pretty importantly, try to do it in a way that is as respectful towards the average "gun nut" as possible. Their minds can be swayed. Hunters, sportsmen, and even people that have guns for self defense can be persuaded with reason -- they can still do their thing even without bump-fire stocks, just like they can do their thing without fully-automatic firearms. Congresscritters probably can't be convinced, because they've already been bribed"persuaded" with campaign donations, NRA lobbyists, etc.


So, don't preach to the choir. Try to convince the people that do actually own guns. The good news? You've got "common sense" on your side.

He accelerated to make the light...that's his mistake.

According to this study, even without antilock brakes and accounting for reaction time, 30m is plenty of distance to stop at that speed. Sorry.
http://www.bikesafer.com/detail/braketime.html

Not 100% of the time. If the light had turned red while the car turning was in the intersection waiting to turn (almost what happened here), then they turned and a car runs the light and hits them, going straight, it's still the second cars fault.
BUT
That argument still ignores reality, which doesn't care who is legally at fault, it's the biker that will pay the price, so logically it's the biker that needs to be more careful. In this instance, he wasn't careful enough...or was, but just barely.

@enoch, I'm going to be blunt about this. I don't support the US swinging its dick around the world, and may Hillary would be worse than Trump, but at least she's less likely to go to war because a foreign leader said something mean in a tweet.

But honestly, (and it is fucking depressing that we've come to this) that is no longer my primary concern.

Yeah, wars suck and the apparent glee with which the US enters them is frankly, abhorrent.

Let's say we can perfectly predict the future. If elected, Hillary will start a few wars, probably cosy up to wall street, and do some other generally sketchy shit.

I'd still choose her over Trump who in his first 100 days, has almost started a war, cosied up to wall street and done some insanely sketchy shit.

But at least Hillary wouldn't actively roll back the few fucking paltry steps the US has taken towards lowering its climate footprint.

And @radx, yeah.... the whole election sucked. But Bernie lost.... even without all the DNC bullshit, he was never going to win the Democratic nomination.

Doesn't absolve each and every eligible voter in the US who either didn't vote or voted Trump.

It has nothing to do with purity and everything to do with pragmatism. Not that the US is anything resembling a democracy these days anyway....

That was pretty good even without the pizza.

I never get tired of this movie. Back in high school in the 70s my film class teacher let us watch this, it was unheard of. He said if he heard any sniggering during any of it he would shut it off right then so we kept quiet.

He pointed out some symbolism that I didn't get at first, about Callahan and Scorpio on the 50 yard line in the stadium. And the processing plant representing the justice system during the final chase, with Scorpio escaping. He also pointed out that even without a search warrant they would have charged Scorpio for shooting Chico and beating Callahan.

One thing I noticed, the violence in this 1971 movie was unheard of a year earlier. I can't think of any movie from 1969 or 1970 that had anything close to it.

The rest of the franchise got progressively worse for me, although Magnum Force made an effort. ("Me and Smith and Wesson", oh brother. He would have been shot 10 times over before getting to that line)

2 more comments have been lost in the ether at this killed duplicate.

Trump was painful to watch. Even without the audience booing him. He seems to think it's funny to just say something mean-spirited about Clinton. That may work for Billy Bush, but most people have higher standards.

SAD

Hmm. I agree that Trump is an incompetent egotistical blowhard, who drums up support by drastically overstating America's problems. America doesn't *need* drastic change.

...BUT, American government, particularly at the national level in Washington really is a complete trainwreck that *does* need drastic change. Both of our disgusting parties hold plenty of blame for that.

I think that the short-term damage that a Trump presidency would cause would be mitigated pretty well by the separation of powers, one of the few elements of our government that does function pretty well. And I feel like it is possible that a long-term benefit could be that Republican voters would get a hard-to-ignore lesson that the "ideals" that are spouted by their party leadership don't work. George W Bush was the best thing to happen for the Democrat party in a long time; Trump could finish the party off and let something better replace it.

Hillary is definitely more competent. In the short term, the country would definitely be better off with her at the helm than Trump. But, I don't see any long-term benefits to electing her.

Republicans would have a prime and familiar scapegoat. The legislative branch ground to a standstill with Obama in office, I think it will/would be worse with Hillary. That might actually be a good thing; it could limit the damage that they can do -- and the consequences of a shitty legislative branch are worse than a shitty president, I think.

And the Democrat party, which had a golden fucking opportunity to lead by example and actually do some exciting GOOD things with government to win voters over, instead did every dirty and questionable thing they could to guarantee that Hillary "I am the establishment" Clinton got their nomination.


Neither side deserves to win, and in fact both sides deserve to lose. I'll be voting 3rd party; not that it will accomplish anything.

Democrats, you could have had my vote if you had selected literally anybody other than Hillary. Hell, I'd probably even have voted for Hillary over Trump if she had beat Bernie fair and square without resorting to all the shady stuff (she probably would have won even without that shit).

Republicans, almost the same goes for you -- I'd pretty happily have voted for anybody other than Trump running against Hillary. Well, maybe not creepy-as-fuck Ted Cruz or some other batshit crazy option like Sarah Palin; but pretty much any of the others.

Too late now though.

That's the scariest bit. On the surface it looks like a peaceful farm, because when you're going past it, all you see is lovely green grass and sheep grazing, it looks lovely and peaceful.

You don't get to see the castration, horn removal, tail docking and mulesing without any sort of anesthetic - this happens to every single lamb.

You also don't get to see the workers having a bad day and abusing (after the product is removed from them). This might not happen to every sheep, but with around 30 sheep getting sheared an hour by each person, you can bet at that speed it's not a pleasant experience even without malicious intent.

Outsiders just see a lovely country side, with sheep grazing before and after the abuse.

I'm glad he made the point that internal causes can't be separated from external causes. If you believe in determinism then you have to realize that before your birth everything that you will do was determined, but none of it was internal. And once you are born, how then do you become culpable for the initial state of the universe?

I agree with compatibilists on the broad point that determinism is largely compatible with holding people responsible for their actions. But I think they're too hung up on the idea of moral responsibility. Even without thinking anyone is the author of their own actions, it's still wise to lock people up who are an immediate threat to others, or use measured punishment as a deterrent, or hope to change future behavior with treatment programs. The only thing you don't get to do is be vindictive and cruel, thinking the perpetrator deserves to suffer. But I've never believed in punishment for the sake revenge anyway.

The bit with the kids was edited in, but the effect is similar even without it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtpuPixEGSk&t=24m55s

What does the President actually do? A few main things:

Chief Diplomat for foreign relations.
Commander in Chief of the military. (although legislature has some checks on that)
Appointing Supreme Court justices.
Presidential Pardons.
Veto power over Legislative bills.

Anything on any Presidential candidate's agenda that doesn't fall under one of those headings is hot air. Considering that, which of the candidates would actually be a better president?

Chief Diplomat role: Hillary wins here, pretty handily. Trump is generally hated by anyone outside of the US. Bernie isn't as smooth and well connected as Hillary. Interestingly enough, this is one area where I think Obama really shines. He's a good talker, and he increased the level of respect that other countries viewed the US with. Some of that was having a very easy act to follow -- Bush and the wars sent us pretty close to rock bottom in terms of how the rest of the world saw us, but Obama is legit as a diplomat even without the bonus of simply being an extremely welcome reprieve from Bush.

Commander in Chief: This one is more open to interpretation, but I think Bernie wins here. He had the right view on Iraq wars when most didn't, and a totally solid track record for a long time. Clinton acts like she was always on the correct side of that also, but she voted for Bush's war when she was in the Senate. Bernie didn't. Whatever she says to try to justify that doesn't change the simple facts of it. Trump could be pretty apocalyptically bad as Commander in Chief, but on the other hand he'd have the legislature and Joint Chiefs to keep him in check if he was doing anything truly insane. I think he's definitely the worst of the three, but I think saying a vote for him is a vote to "let the world burn" is a bit overly dramatic.

Supreme Court appointments: Sanders wins here by a LANDSLIDE. He's got the right idea on all of the judicial topics of the time, and knows exactly how important this is. Hillary is a massive corporate tool. She knows who pays her, and she'd definitely be looking out for their interests when it comes to stuff like Citizens United challenges, etc. I even think that Trump would be massively better than Clinton in this area.

Pardons: I'm specifically thinking of Ed Snowden here. Trump and Clinton both say he is a "traitor". Sanders at least acknowledges that Snowden's revelations did a lot of good, but still says that he should come home and face a trial. So that makes me think he's the best of the three -- but Jill Stein of the Green party says she would pardon Snowden, which makes her my favorite on this particular hot-button issue for me.

Veto powers: Opinions are going to vary on this one. I think Sanders wins considering that he simply stands by his record in the Legislature, which I think he deserves to be proud of. Clinton is a flip-flopping weasel of a politician, and she could easily swing things in favor of her corporate overlords with her veto power. Trump is a wildcard, but the inherent nature of veto power means that he can't do anything truly crazy with it unilaterally -- the worst he could do is get veto-happy and grind the legislature to a standstill (which they tend to do all on their own anyway) or pass something terrible (which would be more the fault of the legislature).


Depending on how any individual voter evaluates those topics, and how the prioritize them, I think it is perfectly reasonable for someone to think that any of the candidates would make a better president than any of the others. Personally, I think Sanders is the best of the three, but honestly I'd prefer incompetent President Trump to very dodgy President Clinton.

That Short Circuit character made me cringe when I first saw it, if for no other reason than the actor was complete shit even without the accent.

I also firmly believe some of these HAD to be played by whites as no one with a shred of self respect would play the character the way the director obviously wanted if they were that race...

There's actually a kind of pineapple, often called Kona White, that has incredibly low acid content and is super sweet even without the miracle fruit to help. They're pretty hard to find, though, if you aren't on Hawaii.