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I knew some of this stuff, but not that. But that seems ... problematic.

Cobain's lyrics were pretty famously difficult to understand. I had no clue what most of the lyrics to Smells Like Teen Spirit were until like 20 years after I first heard it when I was 10. Weird Al's parody of the song directly jabs at this, which a whole verse being:

"It's so unintelligible
I just can't get it through my skull
It's hard to bargle nawdle zouss???
With all these marbles in my mouth"


Considering all of that, if you're listening to "Polly" or "Rape Me" but only hearing half of the words, is it any surprise that people might not fully grasp the message? Might even interpret the songs as being pro instead of anti?

I love Nirvana. I agree with the intended messages of their music (at least, to the extent that I understand them). But any time that a band thinks that they don't want fans who don't agree with their "message", I tend to think it is just pointless.

Lots of bands take very clear political / ethical stances in their music. I can like the music without being fully on board with those messages. Even if I'm utterly opposed to them. I can like Rage Against the Machine without fighting the system. I can like System of a Down without being ... psycho? You might be a registered Republican who likes NOFX, or a registered Democrat who likes Kid Rock or Brooks and Dunn.

Basically, if I like what you're doing musically I don't give two shits about what your message is. The extent to which it might make me like you more or less is very negligible.

So many red herrings, cries of "wolf!", that I'm hyper suspicious.

According to this report/video, it's about accident vs intentional, not white vs black, not man vs woman.
Both cases went to grand juries, so the seeming disparity is not so institutionalized either, maybe cultural, maybe fact based.
Also, the father's charges likely to be dropped to culpable negligence or nothing.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3606895/Mississippi-man-released-jail-daughters-death.html

Edit:apparently he pled to manslaughter for probation.
I think you are off the rails @C-note.

It's a logical fallacy called Tu Quoque... and yeah everyone does it. And yeah it's always a dodge.
Does accepting that W said some good things we agree with mean we are ignoring his faults? I don't think so. He's an idiot and negligent war criminal AND (not but) he happens to say correct things once in a while. Both can be true. All these people like Olbermann are saying is that Trump is worse than Bush.
I don't get Scahill's pearl-clutching.

Thanks for that link -- really good.

I do think that "the left" is perhaps a bit too focused on specific weapon or accessory types. AR-15's, bump stocks, magazine sizes, etc. It's not completely ridiculous to say that if we banned AR-15's with 20-30 shot magazines, most of these shooters would just move on to the next best thing; maybe a Ruger Mini 14 or something with a 15 shot magazine.

Would that mitigate some of the deadly potential? Sure. Slightly. But it wouldn't prevent things at all, just (slightly) mitigate them. That might be worth doing, but it isn't beneficial enough to be what we should be focusing on.


I think two things could help contribute to prevention. Registration, and Licensing.

Step 1) Anyone who owns or purchases a firearm would be legally required to get it/them registered. Serial numbers (if they exist), etc. Anyway, descriptions of the weapon(s) on file and linked to a registered owner. If a firearm is used in a crime, the registered owner could be partially liable for that crime. Crime resulting in death? Owner subject to charges of negligent manslaughter. Violent crime, but no deaths? Owner subject to charges of conspiracy to commit X. Registered owner finds one or more of their firearms stolen or missing? Report them as such, and your liability could be removed or mitigated. Failure to register a firearm would also carry criminal penalties.

Step 2) Anyone who wants to use a firearm would be legally required to get a license. Licensing requires taking a proficiency and safety test. The initial license would require practical examination (safety and proficiency) at a range. Initial licensing and renewals (every 4 years?) would require passing a written test of knowledge about ownership laws, safety, etc. Just like a driver's license. And just like a driver's license, there could be things that might reasonably preclude your ability to get a license. Felony record? No license for you. Mental health issues? No license for you.


The NRA loves to tout themselves as responsible gun owners. Well, responsible people take responsibility. Remember that one kid in your class back in third grade that talked back to the teacher, so she made you all stay in and read during recess? Yeah, he ruined it for the rest of you. Guess what -- that's happening again. These nutjobs that shoot up schools or into a crowd of civilians are ruining things for the rest of you. We've tried unfettered access and an extremely lax interpretation of the second amendment. It didn't work out well. For evidence, compare the US to any other developed country on Earth.

Guns are a part of American culture, to an extent that taking them away completely would be ... problematic. But there are many, many things between the nothing that we're doing now and that.

Charged with making false statements isn't the criminally-negligent-homicide it should be.

I totally agree with her that environmental concerns turn "conservatives" off on any argument (funny, since it's conservation of the environment that they can't abide).
I think she should also be using financial phrases, because done properly, renewable energy saves you money in the long run. My solar system, for instance, paid for itself in the first 8 years of an expected 20 year lifespan, so I get 12 years of 'free' electricity and ignoring rate hikes, but most right wingers would claim it will never pay for itself and is nothing more than pie in the sky hippy fantasy because that's what Alex Jones and his ilk told them.
Showing people that being responsible will actually save them large sums of money is the number one way to convince them to change their behaviors, it's far more effective than any philosophical arguments. It's the main reason I bought my system, and is also a main reason I want an electric car.

Side note: the 'sit in your car in your garage' argument is the same one I use against anti-smokers. I tell them, "you sit in the car you drove here in to complain about some smoke with a hose from the tail pipe going into the window, I'll sit in my car smoking, and we'll see who dies first.". This is to illustrate that their complaints about the dangers of smoke are ridiculous and negligible compared to their own polluting behaviors.

Only if their entire weight is suspended by the water. If they're walking in the bottom (like here) it will add weight.

Having said that, I'd be pretty confident that it could take the negligible extra, even if it went above the max recommended occupancy.

Having said that, maybe for 30 seconds just to freak myself out, then nope nope nope nope nope.

The most interesting graph happens at roughly 4:38. 3.7 trillion dollars, made up of roughly 1/7th discretionary spending, 1/7th defense, and 5/7ths SS/Medi*/Interest.

The one philosophical holdout that I still appreciate about the GOP platform is generally smaller government. But for all they harp on that, they usually do jack shit to actually cut down on that total from the graph.

That huge 5/7ths portion is close to untouchable; or at least it would be political suicide to mess with any of that stuff. The only exception is the interest payments, which *do* have to be paid, but we could work to reduce the debt which would in turn reduce interest. How to do that? Raise taxes. And suddenly all the Republicans think it's a terrible idea.

That leaves the 1/5th from Defense and 1/5th from other Discretionary spending. To me, Defense is the obvious target. If you really want to tighten the belt and be fiscally conservative, do we actually NEED to spend all that on defense? Couldn't it be cut in half or even more drastically and we'd still easily be able to actually, you know, defend the country? But again, pretty much zero Republican interest in cutting Defense budget, unless you're a kooky fringe element like Ron Paul with zero intra-party backing.

So that leaves the 1/5th of Discretionary spending. And yeah, sometimes Republicans do actually make cuts here. At best, they cut "drop in the bucket" type stuff like mentioned in the video, with negligible effect on the budget and a loss of programs that are valued by some/many. At worst, you end up like KansasBrownbackistan, with zero budget for schools, etc.

That rift between party platform and actual action is the biggest reason that I tend to have *zero* interest in voting Republican for any national office, in spite of still being registered as a Republican. State offices (governor, state legislature, etc.) are slightly more palatable places to consider voting in an R, but not by much. I do think they tend to be good options for Local government offices, especially for more rural areas. On the other hand, D's tend to be much better at promoting things like Bond Issues for improving schools, maintaining infrastructure, etc.

Incredibly sad, no arrest yet, 2 weeks after the video was posted. That's negligence by the Boston PD in my eyes, they know who she is and where she lives, go get her. That behavior usually eventually ends in homicide, it nearly did just then.

If this happened here in the U.S. they would sue the mall for negligence and pain and suffering. Then sue to get distribution rights for this video.

If that's right, then he also had his safety off when he wasn't ready to fire....to me, that's (in a small way) negligent.
I have a really hard time seeing any possibility that this wasn't the owner/operators fault.

That's just, like, your opinion, man. ;-) I wouldn't rely on that position to help in court.

If you're really studying firearm design, you surely know different safety devices are on different firearms. Not having a certain device is different from inexpertly removing one.

Xray inspection isn't the only method, there's dpi (dye penetrant inspection) , magnetic particle, ultrasonic, eddy current testing, etc. I would be surprised to find a competent gunsmith that had never done at least one of those...I've done it for car parts in my garage, cheaply and easily.

How many videos would I find of well maintained factory condition firearms malfunctioning and discharging? I would expect that to be quite rare.

Thanks to safety features and decent quality control, unintentionally discharging is almost always user error, not malfunction, with rare exceptions like you mentioned. In this case it seems to be malfunction, both of the aftermarket part unprofessionally installed and the safety feature he removed that may have stopped the discharge even with the original failure. Imo, that's negligence, whether it in fact caused the discharge or not, because it made it far more likely to unintentionally discharge.

That's not true either. Following their directions doesn't mean you won't be negligent. Not following their direction doesn't mean you are negligent. You're conflating things. Each situation needs to be judged on it's own merits.

Removing safety features is not negligence unless you make the firearm unsafe. None of my firearms have a firing pin block from the factory. They're all safe firearms. My triggers have been lightened - they're still safe firearms. I've seen triggers lightened so much that they are unsafe. As before, each instance is judged on it's own merits.

I'll soon finish my mechanical engineering degree (and don't you know it, I'm looking for a job in firearm designing), so I do know a little about this stuff. Whilst with the proper equipment you can detect crack propagation or premature wear, this is not done on consumer products like firearms. That's why I wrote "this sort of item". Unless you're going to spend more money than the firearm is worth trying to detect cracks, you won't know it has cracked until you visually identify it.

Sure proper cleaning and gun inspection is part of having a safe, well functioning firearm. But don't fool yourself into thinking it's an aeroplane or space shuttle in inspections. Go ask your local gunsmith - the best one you can find - how many times he's done x-ray diffraction on a firearm for preventative maintenance. Chances are he's going to say zero.

Spend 5 seconds on google and I know you will find multiple videos of factory condition firearms discharging unintentionally. You'll also find recall information affecting millions of firearms - firearms at risk of unintentional discharge.

I should have qualified "much". More or less than 2500 rounds a year?

You're only obliged to follow directions if you don't want to be negligent.
No injury does not mean no negligence. Not following safety instructions is negligent, as is removing safety features, why you do it or the fact that others are also negligent does not erase the negligence.
You can certainly identify wear patterns and or cracks before this type of discharge occurs in 99.9999999% of cases. Proper cleaning and inspections are part of gun safety.
Not lately, but in the past, yes. I've never seen an unmodified gun fire unintentionally, but I have seen poorly modified guns 'misfire' on many occasions.