He's animated - But - He's correct! ...So to Recap: *quality

>> ^westy:

" everthing is ready for fighting " lol

Nice video , good advert. it does however raise the issue of parental responsibly of letting a kid watch such a violent film at a young age ( for people that care about that sort of thing )

Eh, I don't think it's a big deal. I think I was about that age when I watched Commando for the first time. The violence is so over the top in that film, it's essentially a cartoon.

@GeeSussFreeK

I didn't say GDP, I said GDP per capita. Both Finland and the US have roughly the same GDP per capita.

My assertion is that crimes are more likely to be committed by criminals who are empowered by guns. Suicide has nothing to do with this and that's why I didn't address it.

Murder rates are the only universally comparable measure when you consider various violent offenses are classified differently and with varying degrees of tolerance in difference countries.

I think it would hardly be a stretch to assert that guns allow criminals and delinquents to dish out far more death per violent incident - being a reason why crime is average/above average, but murder (especially by firearms) is astronomical.

Either way, I want to address murder singlehandedly as I think it's certainly still an important (and far less finnicky) topic to argue in and of itself, not crime generally.

Crimes again are classified and reported to varying degrees in different countries.

Again, I want to point out that my argument isn't about gun legislation but about gun ownership rates. I have no doubt that if you were to ban guns immediately in one state, there'll not be a chasm of a decline in gun murder rates. Arguments that look at gun laws ignore the blatant fact that US borders are very porous as far as I understand, and that even then, gun laws take years, decades perhaps to have meaningful effects on ownership rates and as a result, general availability at above minimal cost to criminals. Looking at the wikipedia page for California's gun laws, the only meaningful law I see is a 2005 ban in San Fransisco on all firearms and ammunition. Something like this would take at least a decade to have any meaningful effect though, I'm sure I would agree with you here when I say that smuggling guns into simply a city of all places (not a country with customs, or even a state) and selling them on the black market would hardly be difficult - where surrounding areas have no such ban.

I agree that no legislation will prevent a determined terrorist or capable individual from inflicting massive damage if nuclear weapons were readily available and manufactured in large amounts in one area of the world. A concerted and enforced gun ban on the other hand (with restrictions for hunting in some areas, target shooting, and potentially eased laws for protection in remote areas with low police presence) would do a great deal to reduce availability and reduce the incidence of gun murder by petty criminals which makes up the majority of gun deaths in the US.

Take for example our legislation in Australia. There's nothing exceptional about it, I'm just most familiar with it:

"State laws govern the possession and use of firearms in Australia. These laws were largely aligned under the 1996 National Agreement on Firearms. Anyone wishing to possess or use a firearm must have a Firearms Licence and, with some exceptions, be over the age of 18. Owners must have secure storage for their firearms.

Before someone can buy a firearm, he or she must obtain a Permit To Acquire. The first permit has a mandatory 28-day delay before it is first issued. In some states (e.g. Queensland, Victoria, and New South Wales), this is waived for second and subsequent firearms of the same class. For each firearm a "Genuine Reason" must be given, relating to pest control, hunting, target shooting, or collecting. Self-defense is not accepted as a reason for issuing a licence, even though it may be legal under certain circumstances to use a legally held firearm for self-defense.[2]

Each firearm in Australia must be registered to the owner by serial number. Some states allow an owner to store or borrow another person's registered firearm of the same category."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Australia

There is a very good reason why this has led to a 5.2% ownership rate among citizens and a murder rate by guns of between 29% and 19% that of the US per capita depending on which numbers you use from here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate

If you want to come back to saying that people simply murder in different ways, then look at purely the murder rate - the number goes up just slightly to 35% (the rate of murder per capita in Australia of that in the US).

Gun laws aren't punishment. Just like nuclear weapon bans aren't punishment. Or Sarin Gas bans. They're good policy.

Just like making everyone buy basic health insurance to reduce risk among consumers and lower prices, where the poorest are subsidised. If you insist on using analogies, I think this compares incredibly well to a gun ban which makes allowance for recreation and hunting (and at least in my view, allowances of 'for protection' licenses in remote areas with limited quantity and strict restriction to avoid smuggling).

Just like the compulsory third party car insurance we have here, that ensures that if you are at fault and damage another car, the innocent party is guaranteed to have their car repaired.

What I hope you understand coming from a libertarian position (and this is repeating the first thing I said in this whole discussion to blankfist) is that libertarianism is not a flat and universal position on individual rights. You, just like anyone I would imagine, have limits to how far you go with individual rights. You recognize the validity of a system of laws to limit the impact of one's individual's actions on another, and the retribution they should receive for violating it. You simply draw the metaphorical line on rights further right on the ideological spectrum than I do.

Therefore you can't simply justify gun ownership by claiming individual rights and the notion that everyone's entitled to them as they are not presumed guilty. You have to consider whether it does harm in society or not, just like the rest of us.

I hope I've laid out a pretty convincing arguments based on the statistics (speculative of course, I have neither the time nor resources to do a rigorous analysis controlling for a multitude of variables) that gun ownership does lead to more (gun) murders. If we were taking about a 10-20% difference, sure it would be debatable, but we're talking about a 2 to 3 fold increase. Let's not kid around about what causes this.

If you think that individual rights are so incredibly important that they trump this palpably gargantuan increase in death (and suffering) then that is certainly a position you can take, but let's be honest about this if that's the position you want to take.

As far as I'm concerned, I don't think they are. I think the opportunities for self defense, the willingness to use a gun of most people, the willingness of normal and ration people to risk death for losing their property are small. The sheer empowerment and impetus a gun (easily available from a nearby store at a price anyone can pay) can give a criminal on the other hand is huge.

---

Just a quick recap on things I didn't cover.

If you want to demonstrate guns are less devastating than drugs then kindly provide data to support this. If you are referencing the drug war or even if you are not, this is totally irrelevant to the question I posed to you.

Comparing guns to drugs and referencing the opium war is just not a good analogy. Colonialism. Colonialism. Colonialism.

Yes cars kill people, so do airplanes. So do pretzels. In fact, just about everything kills people (although yes car accidents are far more significant than pretzels). We do have a plethora of legislation that increases car safety. Guns are of course unique in that supposedly (if you would believe people in the US), more guns and LESS gun legislation protects you from the more guns you now have and so on. Let's look at this objectionably just as I compared the benefits to defenders versus aggressors for gun ownership. Cars provide an obvious benefit and are fundamental to commerce and modern life (unlike guns 99.9% of the time for private defenders of civil liberty). More legislation and safety requirements can obviously reduce death rates. To me it seems pretty obvious how to proceed here.

Upvote, upvote, upvote... a million times upvote!

This could be my favorite piece of exposing how horrible FOX is. To recap:

FOX: We never do that.
JS: Here are many examples of you doing that.

If there were any justice in the world, or even a hint of journalistic standards at FOX, Megyn Kelly should be looking for a job tomorrow morning.

>> ^BoneRemake:

in those shows, the same as Full house of family matters of whatnot, they have to recap what the episode was about, and I do not like that. They are all the same.


Mork and Mindy (and FullHouse) were made for kids (and family's) to watch. They provided some moral lessons and while not appealing to many adults were loved by the kids. (At least some kids)

in those shows, the same as Full house of family matters of whatnot, they have to recap what the episode was about, and I do not like that. They are all the same.

>> ^vaporlock:

It says video expired?


Wow, it was fine yesterday morning for me. It's broken right now even on http://abc.go.com/watch/clip/v/SH011580430000/PL55/VD55101665 ... So weird. I wonder why expire it after the season 2 premiere? Sheesh.

Done!

Great ideas. Thanks. I hope it helps.

DADT may be repealed! Yippee!

In reply to this comment by kronosposeidon:
The name Seth Walsh may not ring many bells, but people in the US are generally aware of the recent spate of gay teen suicides. Therefore I might re-title it:

Gay teen suicide: Seth Walsh speaks from the grave

In the description I would write: 13-yr old Seth Walsh committed suicide because of unrelenting gay-bashing by his peers. With this video, the ACLU begins begins its campaign for substantive and not BS anti-harrassment measures.

With 2 power points you can *promote your own video, so maybe you ought to give that a whirl. Maybe I'll throw another promote at it later.

In reply to this comment by bareboards2:
I'm disappointed that this video isn't getting more views. I can handle it not getting voted for -- getting people to watch is more important in the long run.

Can I empower you to make changes to the title or the description to grab more eyes? Write something snappy for the verbal recap? I don't feel proprietorial about it and you know the community better than I do.

It may be too late, of course.

I do have two power points that I haven't a clue how to use. Can you advise me on how to use them to gain my objective?

Taiko boy is stuck in low votes, too, which doesn't bother me. Except for how cool would it be to hit the top 15 with my first post? Not meant to be....

In reply to this comment by kronosposeidon:
*doublepromote *dark

I'm disappointed that this video isn't getting more views. I can handle it not getting voted for -- getting people to watch is more important in the long run.

Can I empower you to make changes to the title or the description to grab more eyes? Write something snappy for the verbal recap? I don't feel proprietorial about it and you know the community better than I do.

It may be too late, of course.

I do have two power points that I haven't a clue how to use. Can you advise me on how to use them to gain my objective?

Taiko boy is stuck in low votes, too, which doesn't bother me. Except for how cool would it be to hit the top 15 with my first post? Not meant to be....

In reply to this comment by kronosposeidon:
*doublepromote *dark

This clip parodies a scene in the movie The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. It may also be a reference to the Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law episode “Death by Chocolate.”


>> ^osama1234:

In case someone else was having deja vu, its based on the ending from a movie. Won't spoil it, but hint: Its a Brad Pit movie.

>> ^blankfist:
SPIT! SPIT! I hate the taste of words in my mouth.
I think you should read DFT's comment above. He got it.


Okay, so here's what DFT said:

Racism still thrives in this country, but the time of being able to say jaw-droppingly racist things in public is coming to a close. I think that's what blankfist meant.

DFT's description of your viewpoint matches mine. You think the problem of people saying jaw-droppingly racist things in public is essentially a solved issue.

Let's recap what's been happening in the public sphere in just the last few months:

Rick Sanchez just got fired for anti-semitic comments on the radio.

Laura Ingraham just got fired for saying nigger 11 times in the space of a few minutes, in the name of trying to prove that the real issues with race are that black people are "oversensitive" about white people saying racist things.

Carl Paladino just gave a speech proclaiming that schools should teach children that homosexuality is immoral.

Jan Brewer in Arizona is constantly telling people that all Mexican immigrants are violent criminals, and has occasionally called it an "invasion" (even though illegal immigration in Arizona has been trending downward for years).

We've had a pretty long, drawn out debate about whether Muslims should be allowed to build a community center within a few miles of Ground Zero, apparently because being Muslim in Manhattan is now offensive or something.

As part of that debate, we've had a bunch of people talking about burning Korans, and calling Islam a "cult" rather than a religion, etc.

Oh, and some lady called into C-SPAN and complained about how black people should be more thankful that white people gave them welfare and medicaid -- which you also find expressed in many of those interviews with people at Tea party rallies.

And that's just sticking to things you're likely to have heard about on TV and in the papers.

In short, if DFT "gets it", then you're saying something that's patently untrue, and highly dismissive of the issue.

>> ^quantumushroom:

"The CBO is required to score a bill based on the assumptions provided by the bill's authors. It's worth about as much as a report card filled out by the student himself."


Both parties have an incentive to do this. Yet even with the Republicans with providing the figures, this is what the CBO had to say about the 2001 Bush tax cuts:

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) estimate that H.R. 1836 would decrease governmental receipts by $70 billion in 2001, by $512 billion over the 2001-2006 period, and by $1.26 trillion over the 2001-2011 period.

Source: http://www.cbo.gov/doc.cfm?index=2867&type=0

Let's recap. CBO estimate for bush tax cuts under Republicans. Massive increase in deficit. History says, massive deficit. CBO estimate for health care reform under Democrats. Reasonable decrease in deficit. How is that not crystal clear, and not entirely indisputable?

Oh you think growth was great? It was consistently less than under Clinton. See how it averages about 4% under Clinton and averages roughly 2.5% on the graph at the bottom of the page?

Source: http://www.indexmundi.com/united_states/gdp_real_growth_rate.html

And you know what, you'd probably be thinking right now that uncertainty over the debt is hampering investment. You bet it is. You know what is going make much more difference than taxing wealthy consumers several percentages more? Increasing the likelihood that US public bond interest rates skyrocket once people realise the US cannot pay back its debt.

History has shown that the original Bush tax cuts did this. Estimates under Democratic AND Republican administrations have shown this.

Which begs the question of why you are pushing an ideology that we know will do damage and is clearly going to damage to the economy?

If not, dispute my facts directly, and prove me wrong. All your claims about government efficiency, ideology and morality do nothing to address these simple numbers.

By the way, everything beyond that initial paragraph has nothing to do with what we were talking about. I can rant about Republicans wanting to reduce working class income to slave labour and how some of them think that Obama is a secret muslim. The fact is though, nobody rational seriously belives that or your assertions that progressives want to destroy the economy through ramming through equality.

The only people who believe this nonsense are those who get suckered into believing the ranting of demagogues before elections.

If anyone listened to Opie & Anthony today, they had this guy on their show.

Recap: Video was filmed over a year ago, just now got popular.

Guy's name is Ken and is a rapper. He was doing his "dance" for his new song, gipper (pronounced jip er, not like Reagan). He was dancing where he was could, wasn't any traffic in "his" lane. Then the truck came out of no where and hit him.

He said the truck driver wasn't paying attention. He broke some ribs and had a bruised lung. Driver nor he had insurance.

Guy never admitted any guilt, said it was all the drivers fault for not watching out for him. He never played the race card at least.

He goes by Optimo 55 Souf on youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/user/Mr55souf

I was gonna say this wasn't explicit until the recap at the end in which I think I'm seeing a guy plunging a very large knife or a small sword into the other dude....

no mandatory slomo recap?!