To be fair, "Hello, let's go ice skating" in Mexican does sound an awful lot like, "We will burn your house down, old man!" with the right intonation.

"Good thing the home owner had a gun so that he could protect his family and his property!"

Don't fucking use shit like this to hop on the ignorant gun control bandwagon. The old man in the story is just a sad example of poor gun ownership. He is a murderer and should be charged as such. Period.

Stop being the media's lapdog and parading around on the deaths of innocent people to promote your political ideals.

My ideals include a society where this sort of thing is much less likely, if not impossible.
That is not politically motivated, that is motivated by compassion for the people and world around me.

If you want to talk bring up the 'gun control bandwagon', now that's political. That is the gun lobby's wet dream cum to sticky fruition. The only thing that sells guns better than picatinny rails and fear of crime/zombies, is fear that someone is going to tell us that we can't play with guns anymore.
Which one of us has been whipped-up into a a blind, frothy, swearing rage here?
Which one of us is a lap dog?

"Good thing the home owner had a gun so that he could protect his family and his property! "

^ this is when you politicized it. You are taking one event and then casting a blanket over everyone who wants to own a firearm.

Do you think it's funny that this kid got shot in the head? I certainly don't. Making light of it with humor is pretty disgusting. Also that you associate gun owners (myself) with this guy is horrible.

It's like saying everyone who rides a motorcycle is a democrat.

I've owned a gun for more than 10 years and I've never shot anyone with it.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'Phillip Sailors, Rodrigo Diaz, gun, defense, ice skating, murder, error' to 'Phillip Sailors, Rodrigo Diaz, gun, control, defense, ice skating, murder, error' - edited by messenger

So the answer here is what...?

Larger fences
Gated communities
More lights on properties
Regular psychological evaluations for everyone owning a gun
Panic Buttons
Panic Rooms
Limit the use of guns
Limit the storage of guns in a home

Fact: No gun and the kid would still be living.
Fact: If he was protecting himself with a sword, no one would have died.

How do you make the call on who is the good guy with the gun and who is the bad guy? This guy was the good guy, until he killed someone, now he's the bad guy. No gun = no bad guy.

Saying safe gun handles should get guns and everyone else gets them taken away doesn't work. Who makes that call?

This is more of a case where all the bad apples spoil it for the good apples while the good apples accidentally spoil it for the remaining good apples. In the end, you can't tell the good apples from the bad apples.

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.

This sounds like the No True Scotsman Fallacy to me.

*teens *wtf

Adding video to channels (Teens, Wtf) - requested by ant.

Shouldn't the real discussion here be about what the guy was so scared in the first place?

Why do so many people always assume the worst in others. I will never understand how people can be so frightened of others that they basically barricade themselves into a fantasy land of us vs. them.

Well that's basically everything.

Good people get drunk and hurt people but we don't ban alcohol etc etc

All I know is that if someone comes to me I'm glad I own a gun and not a sword.

Some people live where there really are a lot of home invasions, muggings, and other violent crimes.

Everyone else lives where the local news wants them to believe that there really are a lot of home invasions, muggings, and other violent crimes.

I disagree. He is the bad guy here. He is a paranoid, gun-wielding murder. Someone brown showed up near his house and his first instinct is the start shooting?

Bad guy.

I believe that Sagemind's point was that before the gun-wielding murderer shot someone, he would have been counted among the responsible, well-trained (possibly), never did anything wrong with their weapon, statistics.

With the bad apples so thoroughly mixed among the good, I'd hesitate to label the barrel "safe for human consumption" and ship it off to the school lunch program.
Better to put screens on the fruit market's windows, so that maggots never have a chance to infest the fruit in the first place. ....sure maggots have a tiny amount of protein.. but very little; we don't really need them.

Why do any cars go above 90mph? ever? when is it ever safe and necessary to drive in excess of this speed? Why is there no government control over the torque or horsepower in vehicles? Wouldn't it be easier to catch criminals and racers if only cops could drive over 90mph? Why aren't peoples licenses permanently revoked after 1 or 2 DUIs? Why are we obligated to keep giving DUI offenders 3rd and 4th and 5th chances just so their lives arent adversely affected?

The same response to these questions could be applied to gun ownership. Because one, those situations where people suffer because of this kind of behavior are the exception and not the rule, and two the government has decided that it is not justification enough to infringe on peoples rights to own a fast and powerful vehicle anymore than it is to prevent people from going hunting or shooting for hobby.

If peoples guns must be removed for the good of us all, despite there being reasons to want to own one ABOVE and beyond recreation, then why not stuff like fast cars and dangerous hobbies?

To be clear: my point is a nanny state can't and should not stop short of any one persons bias on what is good or bad. Either the state should do everything in its power to safeguard people against themselves OR we have to accept that the government will allow things that may be unsafe/harmful for people in certain situations. If you accept that 2nd part then give thought to the fact that just because guns are pointless to u, it does not mean they are pointless to everyone.

According to the video the victim was 22 or 23, so maybe change the title?

Of course "screens" are important here and there are several "screens" already in place and a few could use some repair and tightening. Obama put 23 executive orders in place to do just that. I fully support fixing the small holes in the "screens".

Now, back to this murder. He is clearly not well-trained (or at all) and is certainly not responsible. A well trained, responsible gun owner would have never even revealed he had a gun until it was absolutely necessary to defend themselves or their property. They certainly wouldn't have come out the door firing into the air and then unloaded into a fleeing car because brown people are in it.

This guy fucked up. He murdered a kid. He'll pay for it and he deserves to. I wish there were a way to weed out the crazies legally and sanely, but the crazies will always find a way to show how crazy they really are. Hell, if this guy had used a bow and arrow, we wouldn't even be having this discussion. Same deadly result, same murdering, paranoid act, but somehow when you toss in a gun and the current media fervor over guns, it is plastered all over every website and TV channel out there.

Of course, that ignores the fact that his odds of actually killing someone with a bow are substantially lower than with a gun...and with a gun, he gets one hell of a lot more shots before they're out of the driveway too.

Saying that crazies will always find a way around the laws is, frankly, bullshit. Some will, some won't. Blocking -some- is better than blocking none. Or are you also opposed to the drunk driving laws (and education) that have reduced alcohol-related car accidents by 60+% over the last few decades?

The fact that we can't prevent every crime doesn't provide an excuse for not attempting to improve things at all.

Beeping your horn. The international mating call of the home burglar.

The world needs more guns. All the rampage shooters are PATRIOTS! PATRIOTS! Gun owners are just practicing their rights! More children should die if it means keeping our guns! If every person in the world had a gun, heck, four guns, world peace would have been achieved years ago. GUNS = WORLD PEACE... IDIOTS!

Actually they are mostly liberals.

It's a fact that you don't know if he would be alive or dead if their was no gun involved. It is also a fact you don't know if he was protecting himself with a sword that nobody would have died. Be especially mindful that the sword was the army's choice of murder weapon for several thousand years and is incredibly effective at killing people. A short sword thrust into the chest can do considerably more vascular damage than a lot of firearms.

Before committing a crime everyone is part of the good guy pool - it is the default situation.

In Australia we stop firearms ownership by those with criminal convictions and those with a history of mental illness. It is effective in stopping the legal ownership of firearms by those groups of people. The real kicker of course is those with a criminal bent simply ignore the rules anyway and buy illegal firearms. Additionally we have a nationwide free mental health system. This has proven it's worth many times over and should be adopted by the USA.

I think the focus should be on changing the USA's standards in regards to who can own firearms, how they are bought, how they are tracked, and how they are stored.

It does "sound like" it, but it's not. He does not assert that no true gun owner would ever be irresponsible or a murderer. He states that it was "poor gun ownership" and that he is "a murderer".

If the old man is telling the truth then I think I'd include cognitive decline in the no go list for firearms ownership. Yes there are tests. Yes they work.

Welcome to Ameriguns!
Puns set aside..
You all seem to miss (If my short memory recalls correct) that the old man was a vietnam vet. So he's probably not dera.. oh wait no war can quite fuck you up, and make you paranoid. And he was old, oh.. probably not a suitable gun owner. And he used to shoot foreigners like them in his youth so perhaps it was a "flashback" moment he had and just pulled the trigger.
Blahblah, I would more like to reply to dirk.
1. Emergencies requires speed. (That inclued both ambulance & private)
2: I think the discussion to regulate torque/horsepower has come up somewhere before. But if you think long about it.. it ends up quite uneccesary (if you follow the next points) to limit this
2.1 Just see to the whole history and scale of motor vehicles. There's probably alot of engineering, problem of controlling, bad fuel consumtion (low gear vs high gears etc) that makes implementation of limits a bad idea. Cars are, much more than guns, an actual symbol of mans (modern) freedom. Freedom to travel, move, explore and work, transport and evolve. It's also a passion for so many people. Racing and amateur racing.
2.2 So no chance people would obey or accept somthing limiting their horsepowers.
2.3 Not really a big problem. Yes, some people speed and some die as a result. Atleast to be qualified for a license you HAVE to learn, pass an exam and have a license.
2.4 The US state does alot to "nanny" the traffic and highways already.
-----Reply to your second segment----
First I think comparing guns to any other item of possesion is just going down a route of stupid argumentation. I'd rather see 99% of all arguments and discussion stay on-topic instead oft taking the try-to-win-a--point-with-farfetched-comparisons turn.
But. Already said, vehicles and cars most often requires licenses, are monitored, regulated, taxed and enforced etc. Also, could I turn this steak over 180? As cars are taxed, registries are of them and police can force you to show license/revoke/stop you when drunk etc. Shouldn't all the same things they do here also apply to guns?
--Third segment--
A. Removing all guns would be great, but not possible as that just is not the world we live in (Or as for USA, the country they live in). So the question is rather: Who shall be allowed to buy them? B (to answer the actual and sole question I could read): They Kill people, alot easier than cars (and what dangerous hobbies are you thinking of?), so we are less inclined to ban fast cars. But sure, we could ban fast cars as well, which leads to
C: Invalid argument. Let's just say the actual sequence of events would be: "Yes, now we are banning guns, and you are right about fast cars as well. They are to be forbidden next month. Oh, I see some argue that if no fast cars, then why sharp knives - they kill as well. That's correct, next month they will be banned as well." And then it just rolls on.. down to forks and metal cutlery. See the fallacy?
--Final part--
I'm not going into what I believe a state should, or should not do. And how ignorant and missing the point of the point of having a state in the first place, there is to ... saying that it should either completely be THIS - or completely do THAT. It's not a do-or-don't; black-and-white way, that state, laws and regulations work (or is meant to work).
I will go on your "OR we have to accept" since that's more sensible way to have a society. Then I have
To be clear: My opinion is that I see no point in civilian ownership of HIGHLY lethal weaponry. Guns are not comparable to anything else (almost) that exists. Everything else that is as potentially lethal is already forbidden or reduced. A gun can so ridiculously easy destroy so much, so fast. I simply see no point in any-one and everyone able to own one. Yes, hunters (limited to rifles) and hobby marksmen (limited to X mm gun/rifle - controlled and licensed and trackable etc) I believe should be able to use or practice their livelyhood or passion. But as easily as it is now, no way.

---
I think alot of this problem is simply the fact that it's written clearn in your constitution - the right to bear arms. Was written very long ago, or more so: so much has gone so fast and evolved since then. It's not a necessity now; as it was then, they were sure not as effective then as now, and several other things that has evolved and made the reasons for bearing arms (lacking a huge law enforcement agencies as no#1) seem good then: just be stupid theese days.

Do people realize the whole "if a good guy owns a gun" goes both ways? I love this argument because it's so one sided and utterly blind. I'd like to call it the "dumbass argument".

Let's think for a moment: kids looking for friend suddenly have a man open fire on them, so they all pull out their firearms to protect themselves from the raving lunatic old man who opened fire on them first. Old man is dead, riddled with dozens of bullets. Good guys win. Oh . . . wait. That's not what happened. The good guys didn't have a gun. Or was the old man a good guy? I'm confused now. Who's the good guy?

We had something similar here in Florida where a man was going door to door to sell lobster. Homeowner shot him in the head as he walked away, kept shooting him, and went to reload while an officer was trying to arrest him.

The real issue is the fact this man, and the man in my example, simply thought owning a gun meant they could shoot and kill someone for almost a pathetic reason. Both were "defending my home" against the evils of lobsters and ice skating. I believe this is the movie line of "shoot first, ask questions later." This is what is referring to as the "gun culture."

Yeah, guns (unless it's a colt) don't kill people, people with guns kill people. But there's an old mentality (that's pretty much dead now) that using a gun was cheating. That using a gun wasn't personal, so they resorted to swords and fists. Now, it's so easy to kill a person that it's almost impersonal just to shoot at some brown kid who's "invading" your home by showing up in a car, knocking on the door politely, and asking "Dónde está Paul?"

So anyway, now that we're arguing on the internet . . . .

Personally, I love shooting guns. If I have to jump through a few extra hoops to be allowed to do that, I'm totally fine with it.

Examples and evidence please.

The mexican should also have had a gun. That would have solved it.

I don't think there is a single authority that would advocate someone speeding above 90mph in an emergency situation. In those situations it is my opinion that most experts would suggest waiting for the ambulance/police, not racing down the road like in the movies.

your 2.2. "point" is no different than people saying that gun owners would not give up their rights. It's not an argument its just a statement of something, it provides no support of anything other than "the world cant change that much" and I agree, in the case of gun ownership as well.

As for the difficulty in speed metering, look to many motorcycles and race cars for how to limit speed, it is already done today.

I use the example of cars because I'm not advocating stopping the use of cars, just the inability to travel above speeds that are reasonable. It's a change in safety that only affects enthusiasts or criminals in much the same way that gun laws would which is why I use it. Also because most of us know that although the majority of us own cars and operate them, we dont tend to exceed 90mph or drive under the influence ourselves and so it seems like a bit of an over-reaction.

My intention is not to compare driving and gun ownership directly. My intent was to compare the differing logic that people will apply to situations that have very analogous themes based on their personal bias or beliefs.

As much as many people see no reason for your average person to own a gun, I see no reason for the average person to be able to travel at high speeds. Just like affecting legal gun ownership will only lower violence some...so will limiting speeds only lower vehicle deaths some.

Just like removing all guns and the slow change in society resulting from it might one day minimize gun violence, so would removing all private ownership of cars require a painful period of mass transit expansion but eventually a world where rapid mass transit and only professional vehicle use would minimize vehicle deaths.

I would argue that the last two situations (all guns and all vehicles being gone with proper transit support) would be ideal for society. But they are also not going to happen any time soon. However how we can be so focused on guns and their use (particularly the use of legally obtained guns) in saving and protecting lives, while ignoring other places in society that cause more death is odd to me. Especially if those changes are just as obvious or palatable as extreme gun control measures when gauged across all demographics.

Your ideals, his politics, WTF? What you are saying is that you chose an extreme example (like this news organization did) as your offering, inserting through the filter of your experiences in your society as described, what? You obviously have no desire to see anyone with guns, or any society in which this could possibly happen, and you'd be interested in selling a wondrous adjustment or replacement based upon what? Your personal experiences and world view?? Your own country's model for how to get along?? It's sounds just as pontificous any passionate nut job, right left or center.

Now focus on some lobbies wanting to make money, describe their motivations using crude imagery to make what point ??(knowing fuck-all about the gun lobbies in the U.S. I'd hasten to guess you are pulling shit out of your own ass??)?

A point everyone seems to miss is lost in endless banter over this gun issue in a country whose real problems dwarf how many and what type of boomsticks people have.

The people who control policy, who have worked hard to bankrupt this country and rape her human resources, drug them, offer them more laws to create an illusion of safety and fairness? Fuck you.

Problem isn't guns, mine or yours, or the ones you poor fucks in countries who have decided for you that guns are bad for you. The problem is that the world is full of the most part, of ineffectual, programmable, inept automotons when it comes to exercising their rights under natural laws, AS evidenced for me, in the up-voting of grinter's little passionate episode here...

My country is full of broken people, desperate people, seasoned with an inordinate amount of total fuck-ups, and I have to watch the shit in slow-motion while it gets even more fun...with guns, with a political system totally fucking retarded holding her citizens an economic hostage to special interests dwarfing any gun lobby's.

Is YOUR country broken grinter, or have you decided that you are satisfied with elected officials. we don;t have elected officials anymore. We have criminals.

WORLDWIDE, we're headed for a radical democracy or some comfortable, tolerable, illusory freedoms under a Nuevo-Fascist Global Cuntfest at this point.
Fuuuuck! Get a clue!? all I have to do is watch how utterly retarded these hearings are(kangaroo-court-style) to gauge the breakdown of this motherfucker...

'Cept for this guy, who it looks like was a PTSD Vietnam oldster, I blame a combination of a collective societal developmental disability combined with poor diet/lack of good drugs, too much goddamn television, electronics and obsession with and necessity of the same , working to pay without play and not enough fucking. Plus everything to be heard in media/internet, is either a half-truth, meaningless, or a downright lie.
I blame the death of the spoken word for the sake of the word. I blame you.

Straining to look past they way you have tried to make your point, I think I pretty much agree with you. I've suggested several times on VS and elsewhere that gun control is, in itself, a minor issue, and that even the gun culture I take issue with is part of a larger sickness. Hell, even on this page, I have pointed to propaganda driving both the 'pro' and 'anti' sides of this "debate".
Still, I see no sense in shouting "the sky is falling". It is ineffectual.

Would the absence of guns have prevented this murder? Maybe, maybe not. The killer could have used a knife, a hammer, a lead pipe, a screw driver, a frying pan or any other potentially lethal object instead. Granted, it would have been harder, but considering that the majority of violent crimes are committed with melee weapons, it's not improbable.

The issue here is what lead to the killing and how such incidents can be avoided in the future. Banning guns isn't going to suddenly rid the world of paranoia, racism, PTSD, senility, irresponsibility, psychosis, poverty, desperation, ignorance or any of the multitude of human conditions. People who want to hurt other people will always do so unless you address the root of that desire.

As an aside, there is a practical reason for civilians to own guns. Although the gun was misused in this particular case, criminals do exist and there are many who like to rob/mug/rape/murder innocent people. If there weren't, we wouldn't need laws. All weapons, especially guns, are equalizers. They allow physically inferior people to defend themselves against physically superior people who want to abuse their superiority. They allow a single person to defend themselves against multiple assailants. Melee weapons can do the same but are far less effective due their dependence on physical prowess. To claim that guns serve no purpose is short-sighted and ignores these facts.

is it possible for something to do more harm than it does good?

Sure. Alcohol, for example, clearly does more harm than it does good if alcohol-related death statistics are accurate. The question is whether or not guns actually do more harm than good and that's a difficult question to answer. There are certainly other countries with strict gun laws but those are different countries with different populations, different economies and different cultures. In an ideal world, banning guns would solve all our problems. Crime rates would decrease and nobody would have anything to fear. Unfortunately, I don't think that would happen in reality. Criminals would still get guns (because they don't care about laws) and there would still be gun-related deaths (albeit fewer), in addition to all the unrelated violent crimes. I'd be surprised if overall crime didn't increase to compensate for the lack of guns and the inability for civilians to protect themselves.

It just seems to me that the recent uproar about gun laws is a reactionary response to the occasional shooting spree. The vast majority of gun-related crimes are committed using pistols (such as the one used in this story), yet everyone is focused on assault rifles which are almost never used. Then everyone is ignoring the fact that smoking and alcohol cause significantly more deaths than guns do. Why is no one trying to ban those? Oh, right, we've tried that already and it failed. Banning liquor during the prohibition only resulted in criminals getting the upper hand, just as banning guns would do today.

A good way to judge the effectiveness of gun laws is by comparing Florida to Washington D.C. Floria basically has no gun laws. You can buy assault rifles in garage sales. No licenses or registrations required. It's essentially the Wild West. Conversely, D.C. has strict gun laws. No assault rifles, no automatic weapons, no concealed carry, no open carry, an extensive registration and permit process, etc. However, despite all this, D.C. had more than double the violent crime rate of Florida in 2011 and more than triple the murder rate.

Source: http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-2011/tables/table-5

Seriously? You think that comparing DC to the State of Florida is a good way to make a point?
And speaking of poor comparisons, drugs are something we use on ourselves which carry a risk of death, guns are something we use on other people which carry a risk of survival. Same thing, right?

I don't see how it's a poor comparison at all. Anti-gun people seem to think that banning guns will significantly reduce violent crime. This isn't really the case, as the statistics show. If your logic was valid, then Florida would have a higher violent crime and murder rate than DC simply because it's much easier for criminals to get guns. However, the factors that lead to violent crime and murder extend far beyond the availability of guns, so trying to ban all guns is kind of missing the point. It's like putting a Band-Aid on a gaping wound.

As for your drug analogy, I'm not really sure what you were trying to say. I think your attempt at sarcasm overshadowed the clarity of your message. That said, it's a good thing you brought up narcotics because they also kill significantly more people than guns. They are also banned, yet drug-related deaths and crime continue unabated. It's amusing that the same people who decry the War on Drugs are so quick to demand a ban on guns when the former shows how ineffective bans actually are. If a junkie can get his hands on drugs, a homicidal sociopath can get his hands on guns, legally or otherwise.

So what is the determining factor between Florida and DC such that there is a sizable discrepancy between the two?

Drug use has a far more pervasive impact on society than guns ever will because of how it affects lives.

Drug users health and the health of the people around them are impacted (the harder the drug the further that reaches). Drug use is a primary motivator to commit crime. Drug trafficking is yet another of the primary motivators and it grows as drug use grows.

This is not even addressing injuries and deaths related to drug use and people causing accidents while under the influence. The impact of drug related incarceration and its social impact are also numerous.

One could argue that some drug users may cause more aggregate damage over the course of their life than a murderer might, but that requires putting a value on human life which I'm not sure is possible.

This is a great example of how people do not weigh out the full impact of things in complex comparisons, particularly when there is a heavy bias clouding their comparison (not saying you are but it happens often with this topic and others).

This is the fault of the murderer. It would be hard to kill someone while they are driving away if you don't have a gun. But to always assume the worst of others to the degree that you kill an innocent young man who was lost is unforgivable. If a group of young people with knives in their hands showed up on my doorstep I still wouldn't assume anything dangerous was happening. That old man must spend his whole life in Hell. So afraid inside a prison of his own making. How you get to be grown up and still be so ignorant of basic facts and reasoning is a mystery to me.

That's the big question. Population density, unemployment, culture... there are any number of things to consider here. The only thing that's clear from the statistics is that strict gun control laws do not seem to have any meaningful impact on violent crime, just as banning drugs and alcohol didn't have any meaningful impact on their existence.

Yeah exactly! Liberal patriots! Plenty of gun loving patriot liberals! I'm glad you agree! We're in the same boat here. This gun issues goes beyond the left and right. Only PATRIOTS apply here. These no gun sissy's want to take away our rights! If EVERYONE had a gun! NO ONE WOULD EVER DIE! EVER! What is wrong with all these American hating unpatriotic fools?

It probably wouldn't be as difficult to answer if the gun lobby hadn't shut down research into that very question, would it?

I think that alone is grounds to assume the answer is not one they'd like...-they- certainly think so. My belief is that the NRA should be allowed ZERO input on this issue...they should be considered to have forfeited their say, due to decades of acting with a lack of good faith.

You can do your own research if you really want to find the answer. From the research I've done, I've already established that the availability of guns does not guarantee a significant reduction in violent crime. If that were the case, DC's violent crime rate would be significantly lower than it is because they have very strict gun laws. I've also established that a ban on assault rifles would not have a significant impact on gun-related crime because the vast majority of gun-related crime is committed using pistols, not fully-automatic weapons. I've also established that the majority of guns used in gun-related crimes are obtained illegally, either stolen or obtained through unofficial means. The facts simply don't support the idea that banning assault rifles (or even all guns) would significantly reduce violent crime.

The current fixation on gun control is a purely reactionary response to recent shooting sprees (which comprise a negligible percentage of all gun violence). The only reason people care now is because these shooting sprees generally take place in middle and upper-class areas. Nobody cares when people get killed in poor areas, where the bulk of violent crime occurs.

I'm in no way a gun nut (I don't own nor plan to ever own any guns) but I'm not going to let my opinion of guns get in the way of facts. People who blindly believe that banning guns will solve all problems are just as bad as the NRA. Do your own research and don't ignore facts that contradict your own position. The FBI website is a great place to start, as they provide annual statistics on all crime in the U.S. and they don't have any reason to skew the numbers.

So...when is your research going to come out in a peer reviewed journal? Because the CDC's would have.

Perusing bits of articles online is not exactly what I was referring to, nor was it what the NRA spent so much money getting suppressed. Now, if you have a degree in statistical analysis or epidemiology, I'll apologize, but otherwise, you're an armchair quarterback making pronouncements with nothing to back them up.

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.

Nope, I'm not qualified to do real research into the causes and scope of gun of violence, and apparently neither are you, if you think all it takes is looking at FBI numbers. Just looking at FBI numbers wouldn't associate violent crime with leaded gasoline, but there is an extremely strong correlation there, and a path for possible causation as well.

I prefer to let those with the experience to do so meaningfully, adjust for factors like poverty-levels, drug bans, environmental isses and all of the myriad other inter-related factors. I know enough about it to know that to do it right takes years of study. When you have such training, or if you can point to a study by someone who does, then I'll look into credentials to see if it's worth looking at.

Again, -my- point was that we have no such research, because the NRA killed it. Try as you like to derail that point, I consider it pretty telling.

I assume your leaded gasoline theory was sarcasm? If not, I'm intrigued and would love to hear more.

That said, I'm glad that you acknowledge that there are other factors that contribute far more to violent crime than guns do. On the other hand, you seem adamant about ignoring any statistics that hurt your position. I'm not sure why you keep fixating on the NRA either. They'll obviously try to stop anything that could potentially support gun control. Emphasis on "potentially." Similarly, gun control proponents will automatically support anything that will potentially make guns disappear. Again, emphasis on "potentially." However, doing even a little independent research on your own would at least inform you on the statistical efficacy of gun control, rather than the theoretical results of banning all guns.

Here, let me google that for you...violence and lead poisoning

.23 seconds later, 6.5 million results.

Nothing in the FBI's numbers for those decades would suggest that banning leaded gasoline would reduce violent crime. But because research wasn't suppressed, we have an extremely clear case for that now.

I don't get why you're having problems comprehending this...you yourself said it was a difficult question to answer. I have agreed, and pointed out over and over that you learn NOTHING by looking at the raw FBI numbers. Those tell you diddly shit about other factors. But you continue to ignore the fact that those numbers take no other factors into account and claim they prove something you want to find.

The only research into those other factors was killed by the gun lobby. In spite of your false equivalence, it was not, and has rarely if ever, been the progressives that kill research into contentious issues...progressives generally prefer to have some facts to base their approach on. Lobbying organizations care only about money..facts have no bearing on their stance, and they are more likely to bury them than display them.

You are aware that the research behind the lead gasoline correlation was based on statistics, right? Statistics like the ones available on the FBI website? There has already been tons of research on the correlation between violent crime and guns. This site has some interesting statistics: http://www.justfacts.com/guncontrol.asp

The point I've been making (and that the statistics support) is that there is no clear correlation between violent crime and gun control. The states with the loosest gun control laws (Florida, Texas, Maine, Vermont, Alaska) do not have the highest violent crime rates (in fact, Maine and Vermont have some of the lowest) and the state (DC) with the highest crime rate (by far) has some of the strictest gun laws in the country. Therefore, enacting more restrictive gun control laws is unlikely to have any meaningful impact on violent crime, as there are clearly many other, more significant factors involved. The last part we can at least agree on, yes?

Out of curiosity, what exactly is your position on the topic? Do you believe guns should be banned? Do you think a ban would actually prevent criminals from getting guns? Do you think banning guns will significantly reduce violent crime? I'm pretty sure I already know your answers but confirmation would be nice.

BTW, liberals (or "progressives", as they like to refer to themselves) are no more interested in facts than conservatives are. Both are only interested in the facts that support their agendas. Such is the nature of politics. If a liberal wants to ban guns, he/she will ignore any evidence that undermines that. If a conservative wants to abolish all gun laws, he/she will ignore any evidence that undermines that desire. Willful ignorance is inevitable when people have strong beliefs.