Just wanted to mention that...
I support my second amendment right just as I support my first amendment right. IMO allowing one to be changed because of politics would be just as bad as allowing the other.
Furthermore,
I believe it is prejudicial and inflammatory to imply the owners of legally obtained firearms are the sole reason for the negative sides of this issue.
Finally,
I want to mention that comparisons with other countries are unfair. America has many "issues" that do not exist in European nations. Certain phenomena have taken tolls on the statistics availible as well as the perceptions people form.
I read that a lot of New Orleans residents are now purchasing firearms like crazy. Why does it take a big tragedy to teach people it's considered being prepared and the right thing to do to purchase a firearm? For the Katrina victims who didn't own a firearm who were victimized twice by violent criminals, most of whom who didn't have a gun either, are now purchasing two main items. Generators and handguns. Any politician who utters a single gun law proposal as been attacked, and rightfully so, threatened to be outcast by voters at the next election for saying such retarded ideas. And a bunch of foreigners want to tell me guns are bad?
Don't believe me? Read this report about it.
NEW ORLEANS (AP) - Sixty-four-year-old Vivian Westerman rode out Hurricane Katrina in her 19th-century house. So terrible was the experience that she wanted two things before the 2006 season arrived: a backup power source and a gun.
"I got a 6,000-watt generator and the cutest little Smith & Wesson, snub-nose .38 you ever saw," she boasted. "I've never been more confident."
People across New Orleans are arming themselves - not only against the possibility of another storm bringing anarchy, but against the violence that has engulfed the metropolitan area in the 19 months since Katrina, making New Orleans the nation's murder capital.
The number of permits issued to carry concealed weapons is running twice as high as it was before Katrina - this, in a city with only about half its pre-storm population of around 450,000. Attendance at firearms classes and hours logged at shooting ranges also are up, according to the gun industry.
Gun dealers who saw sales shoot up during the chaotic few months after Katrina say that sales are still brisk, and that the customers are a cross-section of the population - doctors, lawyers, bankers, artists, laborers, stay-at-home moms.
"People are in fear of their lives. They're looking for ways to feel safe again," said Mike Roniger, manager of Gretna Gunworks in Jefferson Parish.
Citizens, the tourism industry, police and politicians officials have been alarmed by the wave of killings in New Orleans, with 162 in 2006 and 37 so far this year. A Tulane University study put the city's 2006 homicide rate at 96 slayings per 100,000 people, the highest in the nation.
National Guardsmen and state police are patrolling the streets of New Orleans. In neighboring Jefferson Parish, which posted a record 66 homicides in 2006, the sheriff sent armored vehicles to protect high-crime neighborhoods.
In New Orleans, police have accused the district attorney of failing to prosecute many suspects. Prosecutors have accused the police of not bringing them solid cases.
Some people are losing faith in the system to protect them.
Earnest Johnson, a 37-year-old chef who lives in Kenner, bought his first gun recently and visits a shooting range regularly. "Things are way worse than they used to be," he said. "You have to do something to protect yourself."
Kevin Cato, a 41-year-old contractor, bought a .45-caliber handgun for protection when he is working in some of the city's still-deserted areas. "But it's not much safer at home," Cato said. "The police chased a guy through my yard one time with their guns out."
In New Orleans, the number of concealed-carry permits issued jumped from 432 in 2003-04 to 832 in 2005-06. In Jefferson Parish, 522 permits were issued in 2003-04, and 1,362 in 2005-06.
Mike Mayer, owner of Jefferson Indoor Range and Gun Outlet in suburban Metairie, said that despite the drop off in population, sales are up about 38 percent overall since Katrina.
Just how many guns are out there is anybody's guess. Gun buyers in Louisiana are not required to register their weapon or obtain a concealed-carry permit if they keep the gun in their house or car.
In a measure of how dangerous New Orleans is becoming, guns are finding their way into criminal hands at an alarming rate. The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives'"time-to-crime" analysis of the interval between the legal sale of a gun and the time it is seized in a crime investigation is five years on average around the nation, said ATF spokesman Austin Banks. In New Orleans, time-to-crime is six months, he said.
This sometimes happens because of "straw purchases," in which a buyer obtains a gun for someone not legally eligible to purchase one. Many guns also are stolen from homes and cars.
While many are buying guns for protection, only two defensive killings of criminals by civilians took place in New Orleans in 2006, according to police. No charges were filed against the shooters.
Westerman, an artist who lives in the city's Algiers neighborhood, is prepared to use deadly force.
"I'm a marksman now. I know what I'm doing," she said. "There are a lot of us. The girl next door is a crack shot."
Here's a good reason to own a gun that I think many in other countries don't realize. Guns make people civil. Carrying a gun is a civilized act. In the 1930's, our country went through some tough times. Crime was high because people didn't have a lot of money. But, nearly everybody carried a pocket pistol. They were very popular. People wouldn't mess with you back then because they figured you had one.
Human beings only have two ways to deal with one another: reason and force. If you want me to do something for you, you have a choice of either convincing me via argument, or force me to do your bidding under threat of force. Every human interaction falls into one of those two categories, without exception. Reason or force, that's it.
In a truly moral and civilized society, people exclusively interact through persuasion. Force has no place as a valid method of social interaction, and the only thing that removes force from the menu is the personal firearm, as paradoxical as it may sound to some.
When I carry a gun, you cannot deal with me by force. You have to use reason and try to persuade me, because I have a way to negate your threat or employment of force. The gun is the only personal weapon that puts a 100-pound woman on equal footing with a 220-pound mugger, a 75-year old retiree on equal footing with a 19-year old gangbanger, and a single gay guy on equal footing with a carload of drunk guys with baseball bats. The gun removes the disparity in physical strength, size, or numbers between a potential attacker and a defender.
There are plenty of people who consider the gun as the source of bad force equations. These are the people who think that we'd be more civilized if all guns were removed from society, because a firearm makes it easier for a mugger to do his job. That, of course, is only true if the mugger's potential victims are mostly disarmed either by choice or by legislative fiat--it has no validity when most of a mugger's potential marks are armed. People who argue for the banning of arms ask for automatic rule by the young, the strong, and the many, and that's the exact opposite of a civilized society. A mugger, even an armed one, can only make a successful living in a society where the state has granted him a force monopoly.
Then there's the argument that the gun makes confrontations lethal that otherwise would only result in injury. This argument is fallacious in several ways. Without guns involved, confrontations are won by the physically superior party inflicting overwhelming injury on the loser. People who think that fists, bats, sticks, or stones don't constitute lethal force watch too much TV, where people take beatings and come out of it with a bloody lip at worst. The fact that the gun makes lethal force easier works solely in favor of the weaker defender, not the stronger attacker. If both are armed, the field is level. The gun is the only weapon that's as lethal in the hands of an octogenarian as it is in the hands of a weightlifter. It simply wouldn't work as well as a force equalizer if it wasn't both lethal and easily employable.
When I carry a gun, I don't do so because I am looking for a fight, but because I'm looking to be left alone. The gun at my side means that I cannot be forced, only persuaded. I don't carry it because I'm afraid, but because it enables me to be unafraid. It doesn't limit the actions of those who would interact with me through reason, only the actions of those who would do so by force. It removes force from the equation and that's why carrying a gun is a civilized act.
I'm more than confident I can deal with an attacker with my hands or knife. That, however, doesn't mean I should be left with only that as an option. Why would anybody limit themselves from safety? It makes NO SENSE.
Currently, UK is going through a big problem with knife attacks, stabbings and murders committed with knives. Guess what? More knife laws have been passed. Idiots. When will they 'get it.' Banning guns is not working, banning knives wont work either. Next, sticks and stones? Stale scones?
For those who are amazing ignorant about guns and 'assault weapons' watch this YouTube video to learn something. Notice, in CA, several semi-automatic hunting rifles were banned here during yet another useless 'assault weapons ban.'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjM9fcEzSJ0
A story about two concealed carry weapon holders stopping a mad gunman before anybody got killed. Just think if anybody with a CCW near the Virgina Tech college could have done the same thing.
http://www.wave3.com/Global/story.asp?S=6198907
Here are 40 reasons to ban guns for those of you who just don't seem to get it. Enjoy.
1. Banning guns works, which is why New York, DC, Detroit & Chicago cops need guns.
2. Washington DC's low murder rate of 69 per 100,000 is due to strict gun control, and Indianapolis' high murder rate of 9 per 100,000 is due to the lack of gun control.
3. Statistics showing high murder rates justify gun control but statistics showing increasing murder rates after gun control are "just statistics."
4. The Brady Bill and the Assault Weapons Ban, both of which went into effect in 1994 are responsible for the decrease in violent crime rates,which have been declining since 1991.
5. We must get rid of guns because a deranged lunatic may go on a shooting spree at any time and anyone who would own a gun out of fear of such a lunatic is paranoid.
6. The more helpless you are the safer you are from criminals.
7. An intruder will be incapacitated by tear gas or oven spray, but if shot with a .357 Magnum will get angry and kill you.
8. A woman raped and strangled is morally superior to a woman with a smoking gun and a dead rapist at her feet.
9. When confronted by violent criminals, you should "put up no defense - give them what they want, or run" (Handgun Control Inc. Chairman Pete Shields, Guns Don't Die - People Do, 1981, p. 125).
10. The New England Journal of Medicine is filled with expert advice about guns; just like Guns & Ammo has some excellent treatises on heart surgery.
11. One should consult an automotive engineer for safer seat belts, a civil engineer for a better bridge, a surgeon for internal medicine, a computer programmer for hard drive problems, and Sarah Brady for firearms expertise.
12. The 2nd Amendment, ratified in 1787, refers to the National Guard, which was created 130 years later, in 1917.
13. The National Guard, federally funded, with bases on federal land, using federally-owned weapons, vehicles, buildings and uniforms, punishing trespassers under federal law, is a "state" militia.
14. These phrases: "right of the people peaceably to assemble," "right of the people to be secure in their homes," "enumerations herein of certain rights shall not be construed to disparage others retained by the people," and "The powers not delegated herein are reserved to the states respectively, and to the people" all refer to individuals, but "the right of the people to keep and bear arms" refers to the state.
15. "The Constitution is strong and will never change." But we should ban and seize all guns thereby violating the 2nd, 4th, and 5th Amendments to that Constitution.
16. Rifles and handguns aren't necessary to national defense! Of course, the army has hundreds of thousands of them.
17. Private citizens shouldn't have handguns, because they aren't "military weapons'', but private citizens shouldn't have "assault rifles'', because they are military weapons.
18. In spite of waiting periods, background checks, fingerprinting,government forms, etc., guns today are too readily available, which is responsible for recent school shootings. In the 1940's, 1950's and 1960's,anyone could buy guns at hardware stores, army surplus stores, gas stations,variety stores, Sears mail order, no waiting, no background check, no fingerprints, no government forms and there were no school shootings.
19. The NRA's attempt to run a "don't touch" campaign about kids handling guns is propaganda, but the anti-gun lobby's attempt to run a "don't touch" campaign is responsible social activity.
20. Guns are so complex that special training is necessary to use them properly, and so simple to use that they make murder easy.
21. A handgun, with up to 4 controls, is far too complex for the typical adult to learn to use, as opposed to an automobile that only has 20.
22. Women are just as intelligent and capable as men but a woman with a gun is "an accident waiting to happen" and gun makers' advertisements aimed at women are "preying on their fears."
23. Ordinary people in the presence of guns turn into slaughtering butchers but revert to normal when the weapon is removed.
24. Guns cause violence, which is why there are so many mass killings at gun shows.
25. A majority of the population supports gun control, just like a majority of the population supported owning slaves.
26. Any self-loading small arm can legitimately be considered to be a "weapon of mass destruction" or an "assault weapon."
27. Most people can't be trusted, so we should have laws against guns, which most people will abide by because they can be trusted.
28. The right of Internet pornographers to exist cannot be questioned because it is constitutionally protected by the Bill of Rights, but the use of handguns for self defense is not really protected by the Bill of Rights.
29. Free speech entitles one to own newspapers, transmitters, computers, and typewriters, but self- defense only justifies bare hands.
30. The ACLU is good because it uncompromisingly defends certain parts of the Constitution, and the NRA is bad, because it defends other parts of the Constitution.
31. Charlton Heston, a movie actor as president of the NRA is a cheap lunatic who should be ignored, but Michael Douglas, a movie actor as a representative of Handgun Control, Inc. is an ambassador for peace who is entitled to an audience at the UN arms control summit.
32. Police operate with backup within groups, which is why they need larger capacity pistol magazines than do "civilians" who must face criminals alone and therefore need less ammunition.
33. We should ban "Saturday Night Specials" and other inexpensive guns because it's not fair that poor people have access to guns too.
34. Police officers have some special Jedi-like mastery over handguns that private citizens can never hope to obtain.
35. Private citizens don't need a gun for self- protection because the police are there to protect them even though the Supreme Court says the police are not responsible for their protection.
36. Citizens don't need to carry a gun for personal protection but police chiefs, who are desk-bound administrators who work in a building filled with cops, need a gun.
37. "Assault weapons" have no purpose other than to kill large numbers of people. The police need assault weapons. You do not.
38. When Microsoft pressures its distributors to give Microsoft preferential promotion, that's bad; but when the Federal government pressures cities to buy guns only from Smith & Wesson, that's good.
39. Trigger locks do not interfere with the ability to use a gun for defensive purposes, which is why you see police officers with one on their duty weapon.
40. Handgun Control, Inc., says they want to "keep guns out of the wrong hands." Guess what? You have the wrong hands.
) You're right on those last two parts too. No one trusts this government (or any politicians) enough to put something like say legal ownership of guns without cocking something up. I personally don't think it's a good idea, and the people wouldn't want it (if you did a referendum it'd be quite the minority that would want guns to protect themselves, I'd bet) I've only ever heard a gunshot once in real life. (didn't actually see the gun) but for the rest of the day I was very uncomfortable, I don't like guns, moreso the power the people that have them have over people that don't. I also think it'd be silly to have legal gun ownership if our Police Officers don't have guns on them.
