BTW Guns are not a huge issue here - this talking head trying to create it as an issue boggles my mind - SERIOUSLY- guns, it's a subject that does not factor into my existence, because I am not american. I never even think twice about guns, guns guns guns, leave it to these guys to dredge up a non issue to try an americanize us. guess what? i walk around all over the place in canada without ANY fear of guns. don't think about them, don't fear them. noone fucking has handguns, not afraid of rifles on dark streets, noone shooting up the place. i find the level of violence in canada VERY ACCEPTABLE where we are a human civilization, humans enter into conflict, shit happens. most people here die in hospital of old age so don't think that your gun debate has anything to do with canada, it's a non issue, and you thinking that we're talking about it ILLUSTRATES YOUR UTTER DETACHMENT FROM REALITY.

Pools are well-regulated. There are guidelines on access control and insurance liability. It would be good if guns had more regulation than swimming pools. Guns aren't just a risk to your family (and statistically, they are a MASSIVE risk to you family), they are a risk to everyone. It's hard to take a concealed swimming pool into a movie theater and drown everyone.

Anyway, nobody is trying to take away your guns. Although I wouldn't really be opposed to it (e.g. I'd be happy living in one of the many peaceful nations with strict gun control laws). I've been hunting and skeet shooting a handful of times and I think it's fair to say that long rifles and shotguns are a part of American culture for a hundred plus years. But I wouldn't care if all semi-automatic handguns and rifles were banned.

This is scarier than just some crazy vendetta cop-This guy has had all manner of special training in tactics, scenario, etc. as a Lt. M.P. in the Navy-He's a marksman, both handgun and rifle with handgun expert classification. He's had a few years to plan this, and he's got the cops in a few states, scared shit less. Almost as scary as a Glock-knock-off made in Beijing!

Care to provide any specific counter-arguments to any of the points I made or the evidence I cited to support them? Again, do the research yourself because politicians and lobby groups have no interest in anything that undermines their agendas. If you're waiting for them to provide objective and thorough research, you'll be waiting a long time. Of course, if you're only interested in research that supports your own opinion, that will probably be easier to find.

Check out the crime statistics on the FBI website. Compare Florida's violent crime rate to DC's violent crime rate. Compare the percentage of violent crimes committed using assault rifles, handguns and melee weapons. Look at the percentage of crimes committed using legally-obtained guns. Look at the results of the ban on drugs today and the ban on alcohol during the prohibition. If you can look at all that and still believe that banning guns will significantly reduce violent crime, you clearly don't need any amount of research to support your opinions.

The event has 'cast a blanket, or shadow, over everyone who wants to own a firearm' -- just as thousands of other tragedies have. Pointing out facts, even with a satirical tone, is not in itself political. I did not suggest that this event should motivate any political action.
Perhaps it's just that that the rational political action is just so glaringly obvious, that it seems to be inherently implied?
I also do not associate you, or any other individual gun owner who hasn't used a gun to express his paranoid fear, with the man in this video. I do realize, however, that with guns as prevalent as they are, events like this are inevitable.
You personal story is utterly insignificant considering the number of other gun owners out there, and the resulting number of gun accidents and acts of gun violence.
My personal story, equally insignificant, is told differently. I have been personally affected by two accidental gun deaths, have been threatened twice with handguns, and have been constantly bombarded with stories like the one in this video since I was old enough to comprehend them. I am surrounded by compatriots who are obsessed with tools of death. Despite this, I have never used a gun against a human towards a positive end, and (in civil society) I don't personally know anyone who has.

It could have just as easily as read, "Welcome to Luby's"-One is able to carry a concealed handgun into a Luby's Cafeteria(and most restaurants) here in Texas y'know.....The answer to another incident like Killeen is "killING" the bad guy before the 3 minutes or more it takes the Po-Po to respond.

Now read Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin and count how many times the word the word "nigger" is used and think about the context of what you are reading before you recoil from seeing letters arranged on pages that make you feel....uncomfortable.

Other suggested reading:
http://www.tommyduggan.com/teacher.html

Oh, and Joseph Conrad "NIgger of the Narcissus" ??...Here's a moronic move by the publisher re-issuing the book in 2009(about the time when all this N-Word nonsense started??) written in 1897, the new printing calls it, "The N-Word of the Narcissus"
in a dull and vapid move to not hurt anyone's wittle feeewings when gazing at it on the shelf??! WTF?! Censorship of an issue someone has with semantics and etymology, etc....ludicrous.

Racist books should be read to kids to school them on HISTORY as well as guide them in a path to understanding the species and the social cauldron we live in now. You can't help the old fuckers, they're gonna have to work it out on their own...But please, teaching your children to reference a word by it's first letter?? Someone hand me that airplane bag, still got a few hours left on the flight.

I lapse into this diatribe for your benefit and edification EDB, not trying to be mean-I believe the recent fervor over Django Unchained got me back on the subject, as well as the inappropriate title of this offering.

I also believe that it is part of the natural order of the species to survive, and to avail oneself of all the tools necessary to do so during one's tenure here should be a no-brainer to modern man with an I.Q. of 90 or above, hence my stance on being able to bear arms with as many bullets as needed to accomplish the task by birthright-Why should only cunts have guns, eh? Makes no sense.

Hope you understand my stance on guns now...I ain't no ya-hoo and I know my way around all the guns I own and the ones I've had a chance to get my hands on after about 50 rounds with an unfamiliar handgun?? Holes in holes at 10 yards, all day long!

Oh and BTW, I called that phone number on this advert. "No Longer in Service"

Is this freal??

Note that it was Shapiro who talked about taking handguns away.

No negotiation, make it all or nothing, whispers versus consensus.

You know that recently in China a man walked into a school and stabbed 22 kids? Guess what, they all survived. (See this UK Guardian article for more info). You're right, taking away the guns won't stop people from being violent but it will drastically reduce their capabilities for committing mass fatalities on the scale of Sandy Hook.

About banning assault rifles--since nearly all gun deaths in the U.S. occur because of handguns, not rifles, making handguns illegal would actually make far more logical sense--not that it would ever happen in the U.S., mind you.

About the "mentally disturbed" comment: less than 4% of violent crimes in the U.S. are committed by those with a mental illness. Identifying those "mentally disturbed" as you called them that will actually commit a violent act is not nearly as easy as it sounds; you might want to read this NY Times piece on the subject. Alcohol and drug use is actually a much better predictor of violent acts than mental illness is.

Back on topic to this clip--I'm saddened that Jon Stewart has fallen into the trap of thinking of this as a "gun control" issue. It isn't. There are already millions of guns in circulation, many of which are unregistered and would be impossible to confiscate in the case of a ban. The horse is out of the barn already, and it's far too late to start talking about shutting the doors. We need instead to be addressing the issue of why people are using the guns to commit crimes in the first place: economic disparity, the war on drugs, a culture that glorifies violence and "getting back" at the other guy, a mental health system that has difficulty both identifying and treating those with violent tendencies, etc.

People want the quick fix, the easy solution--there isn't one. The sooner Stewart, Obama, the NRA, and the rest of the U.S. figures that out, the sooner we can start having a real discussion about how to make our society a better and safer place.

I think we deffo need to step up stopping people who are mentally disturbed from getting firearms

Also stop the gunshow loophole as well

But banning assault rifles or large capacity magazines won't do anything to stem the violence at all. People will just bring improvised weapons to their place of slaughter.

Next thing you know it'll be people upset about modifying certain glocks to be fully auto with extended clips. Then they'll start banning handguns.

See that? No guns drawn because we have no fear that anyone and everyone could be carry a handgun. Who has more liberty?

(Sorry to highjack the vid thread PS)

You need to fix your goalposts son. To start off, the burden of proof is on those that seek to prohibit something. You could never show, for instance, that anything "won't help" anything else. That's asking for proof of a negative. It belies your profound misunderstanding of statistics. We had a nationwide assault weapons ban. It's efficacy was unimpressive. It certainly did not provide any conclusive evidence that the ban was effective which is where the burden should lie for restrictions on liberty.

There are also these things called "priors." For example: "An extremely small proportion of homicides are conducted using assault weapons. Thus, the maximal impact of their ban would similarly be small." If you want to ban anything it should be handguns, but I don't view that as consistent with the second amendment at all. You would (or at least should) need a constitutional amendment to pull that off.

Finally, I view homicide in general as a relatively small problem in comparison to other matters of public health and safety. That is if I look at numbers, as opposed to guessing at probabilities while I'm crying a river over news broadcasts designed to make me feel unsafe.

Sometimes being educated means considering other points of view. I'm a liberal and I don't own (or wish to own, or even really enjoy) guns. You have a fucking gun in your avatar.

She wasn't arguing for that. She was saying that with private ownership (hopefully not advertised in keeping with these maps) there would be fewer home invasions in the UK.

Full autos are pretty heavily regulated. Lots and lots of red tape. I'm not sure I've heard of any crime being committed with fully automatic weapons. If there is any, it's minuscule compared to the homicides committed with handguns. Generally speaking though homicide isn't a major concern to me. I'm more concerned about general health, accidental deaths, etc. Gun control is placebo policy at best, and autocracy at worst.

Not very good tactics - at least from what I saw.. Good for feeling more than helpless but really ineffective and a bit dishonest.

The trainers know the real deal, but are obviously providing training under restricted parameters.

Nobody is going to come through the door like that and most walls will not protect you.

The worst part is trying to put down an attacker like that. If he has a rifle you might stand a chance, if he has a handgun - its not going to work out most times. If he has a knife, it's even worse.

You need way more people by the door and they should all be in contact in a human chain.

If you are armed only with your hands against someone with a gun/knife - you have put yourself in the worse position possible with the least probability of survival.

related story :
http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2012-10/fyi-it-legal-3-d-print-handgun
(lots of comments there)

Also - plastic gun only lasts 6 shots before breaking.
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/12/weaponeers/