|
Post by Christine on Nov 5, 2017 21:13:09 GMT -5
A crazy idea would be to figure out how he got an AR15 then prosecute anyone and everyone involved in the sale. He was dishonorably discharged from the military and under federal law prohibited from owning firearms. Something useful? A good start would be enforcing current laws and actually prosecuting those who skirt them. Absolutely. Was he sold a firearm without a proper background check? Prosecute the seller as an accessory to murder. Was the firearm his grandpa's or one of his friends? Prosecute them, too. For either loaning it out or not keeping it locked up. Accessory to murder. Of course, none of these measures would have stopped the Vegas shooter, a law-abiding, licensed gun-owner....
|
|
|
Post by nighttimer on Nov 6, 2017 0:20:57 GMT -5
Low class Poet. The bodies are still warm If history is any indication, by the time they're cold no one will give a fuck, let alone thoughts and prayers. This tendency to say "it's too soon" has become a ploy to stifle discussion for the sake of some perceived respect for the dead. It's a silencing tactic and its absurd. We ain't respecting the dead by refusing to talk about these rampages. We're being COWARDS and I won't have anything to do with it. I don't care who doesn't like it and I don't care who's annoyed or upset by it. "Thoughts and prayers" have become a metaphor for cowardly, impotent, politicians to hide behind instead of saying, "We could do something about this carnage, but we owe our asses to the NRA, so we will do nothing. Real sorry about your loss." Fuck empty thoughts and fuck empty prayers. God didn't create this mess and God's not going to clean it up. WE did and WE have to clean it up. Now. Before the next massacre and the next airdrop of useless thoughts and prayers
|
|
|
Post by haggis on Nov 6, 2017 0:25:35 GMT -5
Low class Poet. The bodies are still warm Hey, mikey? That's what we call a personal attack. Your best bet if you have a problem with a post like that is to report it to the moderators. Personal attacks suck. Have a nice day.
|
|
|
Post by poetinahat on Nov 6, 2017 5:07:18 GMT -5
The more I think about it, the more I think:
No.
When a white supremacist runs down a peaceful demonstrator with his car, he dithers and declares there was wrong on both sides. A white man blows away 59 people and wounds hundreds from his hotel room hundreds of yards away. He sends thoughts and prayers. A man annihilates his hometown church congregation as they worship - and he monitors the situation.
Colin Kaepernick sits for the national anthem, to peacefully protest a grave injustice he sees. He’s told sitting is disrespectful - kneeling would be better. So he takes a knee.
Donald Trump demands that, when anyone who behaves like that, they should fire the son of a bitch.
Many have been saying it for a long time, and I’ve not been so outspoken. But that time is over.
Donald Trump is not just stupid (though streetwise in his way) and narcissistic. He is a racist, he’s evil, and he is an enemy of democracy and freedom. He is an enemy of America.
And he will burn her to the ground if there’s a buck in it for him, much less to save his hide.
|
|
|
Post by maxinquaye on Nov 6, 2017 5:37:18 GMT -5
I don't think this has anything to do with Donald Trump, to be honest. I think it has to do with Americans as such. You're never going to do anything about guns, and you will never impose controls on guns. It's probably too late anyway. Your country is now so flooded with firearms that even if you stopped selling a single gun now, there would still be fifty years of mass shootings to follow.
I was reminded that there are a lot of guns in Sweden too, a week or so ago. 690 thousand people have a weapons license, and hold 1.8 million firearms. That's a lot of guns for a small nation. Why don't we have mass shootings? It's not like we're better people or anything like that. We have our share of angry, violent, and deluded people - just like you do.
There are differences, of course. You can't store the bolt with the rest of the weapon. You have to remove the bolt when you put the gun away. The guns are, mostly, manual bolt-action hunting rifles and not pistols or semi-automatics. You can't store ammunition with the gun. You have to store it separately. And, you have to store the weapons securely. They shouldn't be easy to steal.
But the key difference is, of course, that there's no 2nd amendment. There's no natural right to own a gun here. It's easy enough to get one, but you have to go to the police, and they'll do a check-up on you, and they'll demand to see if you have a relevant gun safety education.
Still, the amount of guns then say nothing about the frequency of mass shootings, because there are a lot of guns here too and we just don't have those numbers. We've had mass shootings, but the frequency has been like once in every 25 years. Not once every week. Since we're not better than anyone else, there must be something that doesn't involve the amount of guns. I don't know what that is.
|
|
|
Post by nighttimer on Nov 6, 2017 9:37:50 GMT -5
|
|
|
Post by maxinquaye on Nov 6, 2017 9:59:56 GMT -5
Yeah, particularly when 12 year old black kids are shot for having toy guns, I suspect the 2nd amendment only apply to white people.
|
|
|
Post by Amadan on Nov 6, 2017 11:44:40 GMT -5
A crazy idea would be to figure out how he got an AR15 then prosecute anyone and everyone involved in the sale. He was dishonorably discharged from the military and under federal law prohibited from owning firearms. Something useful? A good start would be enforcing current laws and actually prosecuting those who skirt them. I had to double-check this, because it didn't sound correct, and it isn't. Devin Kelley apparently received a bad conduct discharge from the Air Force. That is not the same thing as a dishonorable discharge. The latter usually occurs only when the servicemember has been convicted of a felony. Bad conduct discharges are when they kick you out for being a fuck-up, but not a felon. So no, it wasn't illegal for him to own a firearm.
|
|
|
Post by Vince524 on Nov 6, 2017 12:43:54 GMT -5
Yeah, particularly when 12 year old black kids are shot for having toy guns, I suspect the 2nd amendment only apply to white people. If you're talking about a case like Tamir Rice, that's not a 2nd amendment issue at all. He was shot by a police officer. That had nothing to do with the average citizen being allowed to own a legal firearm, it had to do with a cop who probably shouldn't have had a gun or badge, and a dispatcher who fucked up.
|
|
|
Post by Vince524 on Nov 6, 2017 12:49:02 GMT -5
The more I think about it, the more I think: No. When a white supremacist runs down a peaceful demonstrator with his car, he dithers and declares there was wrong on both sides. A white man blows away 59 people and wounds hundreds from his hotel room hundreds of yards away. He sends thoughts and prayers. A man annihilates his hometown church congregation as they worship - and he monitors the situation. Colin Kaepernick sits for the national anthem, to peacefully protest a grave injustice he sees. He’s told sitting is disrespectful - kneeling would be better. So he takes a knee. Donald Trump demands that, when anyone who behaves like that, they should fire the son of a bitch. Many have been saying it for a long time, and I’ve not been so outspoken. But that time is over. Donald Trump is not just stupid (though streetwise in his way) and narcissistic. He is a racist, he’s evil, and he is an enemy of democracy and freedom. He is an enemy of America. And he will burn her to the ground if there’s a buck in it for him, much less to save his hide. Trump says whatever suits him at the time. That doesn't mean he's automatically wrong in what he says, just that there's reason to celebrate when he's right. The fact that he's saying this isn't a gun issue, but a mental health issue isn't, at least IMHO, an example of him being right even by accident. Until we know how he got the gun, if it passed through safe guards and if there was a practical way that a new safe guard could have prevented him from obtaining the gun, then he shouldn't declare anything.
Also, while this schmuck may have had mental illness issues, can we not conflate mental illness with mass shootings. The vast majority of people who suffer from a mental illness aren't a danger to anyone, except maybe themselves and even that isn't a given. Let's not stigmatize someone who may suffer depression or anxiety as one step away from blowing away a bunch of innocent people. (This isn't directed at anyone on this board.)
|
|
|
Post by Amadan on Nov 6, 2017 13:25:11 GMT -5
Trump says whatever suits him at the time. That doesn't mean he's automatically wrong in what he says, just that there's reason to celebrate when he's right. The fact that he's saying this isn't a gun issue, but a mental health issue isn't, at least IMHO, an example of him being right even by accident. Until we know how he got the gun, if it passed through safe guards and if there was a practical way that a new safe guard could have prevented him from obtaining the gun, then he shouldn't declare anything.
Also, while this schmuck may have had mental illness issues, can we not conflate mental illness with mass shootings. The vast majority of people who suffer from a mental illness aren't a danger to anyone, except maybe themselves and even that isn't a given. Let's not stigmatize someone who may suffer depression or anxiety as one step away from blowing away a bunch of innocent people. (This isn't directed at anyone on this board.)
... I mean, you can't have it both ways. You can't say "It's a mental health issue, not a guns issue" and then say "But please don't imply that mental illness is dangerous!"
|
|
|
Post by Vince524 on Nov 6, 2017 14:37:41 GMT -5
Trump says whatever suits him at the time. That doesn't mean he's automatically wrong in what he says, just that there's reason to celebrate when he's right. The fact that he's saying this isn't a gun issue, but a mental health issue isn't, at least IMHO, an example of him being right even by accident. Until we know how he got the gun, if it passed through safe guards and if there was a practical way that a new safe guard could have prevented him from obtaining the gun, then he shouldn't declare anything.
Also, while this schmuck may have had mental illness issues, can we not conflate mental illness with mass shootings. The vast majority of people who suffer from a mental illness aren't a danger to anyone, except maybe themselves and even that isn't a given. Let's not stigmatize someone who may suffer depression or anxiety as one step away from blowing away a bunch of innocent people. (This isn't directed at anyone on this board.)
... I mean, you can't have it both ways. You can't say "It's a mental health issue, not a guns issue" and then say "But please don't imply that mental illness is dangerous!" Why not? People do horrible things with guns all the time. Dylan Roof was a racist. And my point is more about the broad brush.
|
|
|
Post by Amadan on Nov 6, 2017 15:05:24 GMT -5
... I mean, you can't have it both ways. You can't say "It's a mental health issue, not a guns issue" and then say "But please don't imply that mental illness is dangerous!" Why not? People do horrible things with guns all the time. Dylan Roof was a racist. And my point is more about the broad brush. Okay? I see this after every shooting in which the shooter was mentally ill (which is most of them): "Please don't stigmatize the mentally ill." No shit. Everyone knows that most mentally ill people do not shoot anyone. So what exactly do you want us to do while talking about it? If you're seeing people saying "All mentally ill people are dangerous and should be locked up," well, those people are idiots and it's only slightly less unlikely that Congress will introduce the Lock Up All Crazy People Act than the Ban (Some) Guns Act. It's also possible for it to be a guns issue and a mental health issue.
|
|
|
Post by poetinahat on Nov 6, 2017 16:42:52 GMT -5
|
|
|
Post by prozyan on Nov 6, 2017 16:50:19 GMT -5
A crazy idea would be to figure out how he got an AR15 then prosecute anyone and everyone involved in the sale. He was dishonorably discharged from the military and under federal law prohibited from owning firearms. Something useful? A good start would be enforcing current laws and actually prosecuting those who skirt them. I had to double-check this, because it didn't sound correct, and it isn't. Devin Kelley apparently received a bad conduct discharge from the Air Force. That is not the same thing as a dishonorable discharge. The latter usually occurs only when the servicemember has been convicted of a felony. Bad conduct discharges are when they kick you out for being a fuck-up, but not a felon. So no, it wasn't illegal for him to own a firearm. It was initially reported as a dishonorable discharge, which was in error. As CNN reports: He should have been flagged on a background check under the Lautenburg Amendment. He was not. The point remains: The system and laws in place failed. Those who caused the failure should be punished harshly. Instead, they will receive at most a really stern finger wagging. Adding more laws would be like stopping speeders by lowering the speed limit further or punishing curfew violators with an earlier curfew.
|
|