A Mass Shooting? Wake Me Up when Something Unusual Happens

[Long Run]

[Econoline]

President Obama asked for this graph.

"Have news organizations tally up the number of Americans who've been killed through terrorist attacks in the last decade and the number of Americans who've been killed by gun violence, and post those side by side on your news reports,"

Here it is:

"We spent over a trillion dollars, and passed countless laws, and devote entire agencies to preventing terrorist attacks on our soil, and rightfully so," Obama said. "And yet we have a Congress that explicitly blocks us from even collecting data on how we could potentially reduce gun deaths. How can that be?"

[MajGenl.Meade]

There's a non sequitur-ish quality to that. Stopping terrorism has no connection whatever to gun deaths. Might as well compare terrorism to banana shipments or automobile deaths for that matter. Or why not say, we spend billions on education but Congress..... or we sell arms to foreign countries for billions but Congress..... or we have public lavatories but Congress......

It looks as if the president has aspirations to become a meme-generator

Who does Congress block from collecting data? That is, who is this "us" he speaks of? (Not Econo's source, evidently)

What data is out there on the subject of potentially reducing gun deaths?

Perhaps it is something like, if all the guns in the world vanished and everyone forgot how to make them again, then there'd be no more gun deaths. In the USA of America. Like, the South Africa and maps.

[MajGenl.Meade]

There's a non sequitur-ish quality to that. Stopping terrorism has no connection whatever to gun deaths. Might as well compare terrorism to banana shipments or automobile deaths for that matter. Or why not say, we spend billions on education but Congress..... or we sell arms to foreign countries for billions but Congress..... or we have public lavatories but Congress......

It looks as if the president has aspirations to become a meme-generator

Who does Congress block from collecting data? That is, who is this "us" he speaks of? (Not Econo's source, evidently)

What data is out there on the subject of potentially reducing gun deaths?

Perhaps it is something like, if all the guns in the world vanished and everyone forgot how to make them again, then there'd be no more gun deaths. In the USA of America. Like, the South Africa and maps.

[oldr_n_wsr]

from page 2 of this thread, I'm late coming to it

Every time there is a mass shooting the gun laws are relaxed

Got any examples of this?
Seems NY and Conn were in a race to enact new gun laws after Sandy Hook. NY won and in the process had to backtrack as they banned 10 shot clips but forgot to exempt law inforcement from the ban. Ca is responding with yet another CC law after this latest attack.

Never heard of any relaxement of gun laws after a mass shooting (but I could be uninformed).

ETA
fixed Conn shooting locale

[Econoline]

There's a non sequitur-ish quality to that. Stopping terrorism has no connection whatever to gun deaths. Might as well compare terrorism to banana shipments or automobile deaths for that matter. Or why not say, we spend billions on education but Congress..... or we sell arms to foreign countries for billions but Congress..... or we have public lavatories but Congress......

It's absolutely appropriate to talk about how we (i.e., the federal government) prioritize the use of federal funds to solve national problems. Part of the reason automobile deaths (to pick one of your examples) continue to decline is the use of federal funds to study and regulate automotive safety. If the government spends a lot of money to combat one problem and no money at all to combat a demonstrably more serious problem, that's worth pointing out, and worth discussing, and worth doing something about.

It looks as if the president has aspirations to become a meme-generator.

Isn't that part of the job?


etc., etc.....

Who does Congress block from collecting data? That is, who is this "us" he speaks of? (Not Econo's source, evidently)

The CDC for one. The FBI for another. (And the availability of just the raw numbers doesn't seem very helpful without more extensive breakdown and analysis of the sort prohibited to federal agencies.) It is, after all, a national problem that demonstrably does not lend itself to a state-by-state solution.

[MajGenl.Meade]

If the government spends a lot of money to combat one problem and no money at all to combat a demonstrably more serious problem, that's worth pointing out, and worth discussing, and worth doing something about.

It's only more serious for the dead people. I'd rather be safe from terrorism - it's government at work and it works! See the results!

But seriously, the FBI is not allowed to collect data? That is just silly - of course they can and they do. "Ways to potentially reduce gun deaths" - what kind of "data" does anyone collect on that? Emphasis on the word "data". Quantifiable statistics... numbers... facts...

Conduct street interviews, is that it? "Sir, how do you think we could reduce gun deaths?"
Have scientists ask each other the same questions?

How many ways are there to potentially reduce gun deaths? Suggest some ways .... I'd like to know what it is that the executive is not allowed to do by the legislative. Then we can tell Obama, well it's (a) do away with guns or (b) encourage suicide by hanging - what's the data say?

[Econoline]

The story of what worked in Michigan -- one of six states that require registration of at least some types of firearms -- is also the story of what isn’t happening elsewhere. Gun-rights advocates, led by the National Rifle Association, have successfully campaigned against firearm registries across the U.S. They narrowly lost a bid last year to eliminate Michigan’s.

“The NRA has been extremely effective at guarding their patrons, the firearms industry, from having to provide data by consistently ginning up a fear that the federal government is going to come for your guns,” said Mark D. Jones, a former U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives special agent who is a senior law-enforcement adviser at the University of Chicago Crime Lab. “It slows down investigations in a profound way.”

Gun registries are just one area in which the NRA, the nation’s largest pro-gun lobby, has persuaded federal and state lawmakers to block information that might help prevent crimes, solve them or inform policy making. The Fairfax, Virginia-based NRA helped persuade Congress to make it tougher to study illegal firearm trafficking, stymie scientific research on shooting deaths and create restrictions that force U.S. law enforcement to record gun sales on microfiche.

Todd Tiahrt, a former Republican congressman from Kansas [...] successfully pushed NRA-backed measures to block access to data tracing the sale and possession of guns used in crimes, and ban the information from being used as evidence in civil court. His amendments stopped the ATF from requiring that gun dealers check their inventory for missing weapons and mandated the Federal Bureau of Investigation destroy background check results within 24 hours.

Since 1979, Congress has prevented ATF from keeping centralized gun-ownership records, according to the agency. Sales data instead are maintained by the country’s 58,900 federally licensed firearms dealers. When they go out of business, they’re required to send the paperwork to ATF, which stores it on microfilm and microfiche. Without a computer database, ATF traces a gun by contacting the manufacturer to identify the distributor, who will know the dealer. One of those three sources typically will be out of business, which forces ATF to sift through 445 million snapshot images of sales records, said Ginger Colbrun, a spokeswoman.

In 1999, the agency released the results of such traces, showing that Badger Guns & Ammo in West Milwaukee, Wisconsin, sold more firearms used in crimes than any other U.S. dealer. The store promised to change its sales practices. After the announcement, the number of its guns linked to crimes decreased, according to Daniel Webster, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research in Baltimore. Once the Tiahrt measures took effect in 2003 and the data couldn’t be released publicly, Badger guns linked to crimes increased, according to Webster’s study, published last year in the Journal of Urban Health. “What the Tiahrt amendments do is provide cover for irresponsible -- if not outlaw -- dealers,” Webster said.

[Econoline]

"Ways to potentially reduce gun deaths" - what kind of "data" does anyone collect on that? Emphasis on the word "data". Quantifiable statistics... numbers... facts...

Conduct street interviews, is that it? "Sir, how do you think we could reduce gun deaths?"
Have scientists ask each other the same questions?

What percent of houses have guns? Is the presence of a gun in the home more likely to have a protective effect, or a hazardous effect? Where are youths most likely to obtain the weapons they use in acts of violence? When a firearm is used in a homicide or suicide, what is the typical length of time between the purchase of that firearm and the occurrence of the violent act? What characteristics differentiate mass shootings that were prevented from those that were carried out? What are key differences between urban and rural youth with regard to risk and protective factors for gun-related violence? For gun owners, what is the probability of thwarting a crime versus committing suicide or sustaining an injury from their guns? What is the projected impact of passive technologies on reduction of firearm violence, and which of the technologies will have the greatest impact? Which types of mental illness increase the risk of gun violence to others, and which increase the risk of suicide, and by how much? Is mental-illness-focused gun control more harmful than helpful? Are persons with a history of involuntary psychiatric hospitalization at higher risk of firearm violence than the general population or than other persons with mental illness?

[Guinevere]

Why I'm for the Brady Bill
By Ronald Reagan; Ronald Reagan, in announcing support for the Brady bill yesterday, reminded his audience he is a member of the National Rifle Association.
Published: March 29, 1991

LOS ANGELES— "Anniversary" is a word we usually associate with happy events that we like to remember: birthdays, weddings, the first job. March 30, however, marks an anniversary I would just as soon forget, but cannot.

It was on that day 10 years ago that a deranged young man standing among reporters and photographers shot a policeman, a Secret Service agent, my press secretary and me on a Washington sidewalk.

I was lucky. The bullet that hit me bounced off a rib and lodged in my lung, an inch from my heart. It was a very close call. Twice they could not find my pulse. But the bullet's missing my heart, the skill of the doctors and nurses at George Washington University Hospital and the steadfast support of my wife, Nancy, saved my life.

Jim Brady, my press secretary, who was standing next to me, wasn't as lucky. A bullet entered the left side of his forehead, near his eye, and passed through the right side of his brain before it exited. The skills of the George Washington University medical team, plus his amazing determination and the grit and spirit of his wife, Sarah, pulled Jim through. His recovery has been remarkable, but he still lives with physical pain every day and must spend much of his time in a wheelchair.

Thomas Delahanty, a Washington police officer, took a bullet in his neck. It ricocheted off his spinal cord. Nerve damage to his left arm forced his retirement in November 1981.

Tim McCarthy, a Secret Service agent, was shot in the chest and suffered a lacerated liver. He recovered and returned to duty.

Still, four lives were changed forever, and all by a Saturday-night special -- a cheaply made .22 caliber pistol -- purchased in a Dallas pawnshop by a young man with a history of mental disturbance.

This nightmare might never have happened if legislation that is before Congress now -- the Brady bill -- had been law back in 1981.

Named for Jim Brady, this legislation would establish a national seven-day waiting period before a handgun purchaser could take delivery. It would allow local law enforcement officials to do background checks for criminal records or known histories of mental disturbances. Those with such records would be prohibited from buying the handguns.

While there has been a Federal law on the books for more than 20 years that prohibits the sale of firearms to felons, fugitives, drug addicts and the mentally ill, it has no enforcement mechanism and basically works on the honor system, with the purchaser filling out a statement that the gun dealer sticks in a drawer.

The Brady bill would require the handgun dealer to provide a copy of the prospective purchaser's sworn statement to local law enforcement authorities so that background checks could be made. Based upon the evidence in states that already have handgun purchase waiting periods, this bill -- on a nationwide scale -- can't help but stop thousands of illegal handgun purchases.

And, since many handguns are acquired in the heat of passion (to settle a quarrel, for example) or at times of depression brought on by potential suicide, the Brady bill would provide a cooling-off period that would certainly have the effect of reducing the number of handgun deaths.

Critics claim that "waiting period" legislation in the states that have it doesn't work, that criminals just go to nearby states that lack such laws to buy their weapons. True enough, and all the more reason to have a Federal law that fills the gaps. While the Brady bill would not apply to states that already have waiting periods of at least seven days or that already require background checks, it would automatically cover the states that don't. The effect would be a uniform standard across the country.

Even with the current gaps among states, those that have waiting periods report some success. California, which has a 15-day waiting period that I supported and signed into law while Governor, stopped nearly 1,800 prohibited handgun sales in 1989. New Jersey has had a permit-to-purchase system for more than two decades. During that time, according to the state police, more than 10,000 convicted felons have been caught trying to buy handguns.

Every year, an average of 9,200 Americans are murdered by handguns, according to Department of Justice statistics. This does not include suicides or the tens of thousands of robberies, rapes and assaults committed with handguns.

This level of violence must be stopped. Sarah and Jim Brady are working hard to do that, and I say more power to them. If the passage of the Brady bill were to result in a reduction of only 10 or 15 percent of those numbers (and it could be a good deal greater), it would be well worth making it the law of the land.

And there would be a lot fewer families facing anniversaries such as the Bradys, Delahantys, McCarthys and Reagans face every March 30.

http://www.nytimes.com/1991/03/29/opini ... -bill.html

Of course, the version of the Brady Bill that passed substituted an "instant" check for the 7-day waiting period, completely undoing the whole "cooling off" concept, and creating "checks" based on incomplete information. And the funding for even that checking process has been sparse at best, and so some slip by who could and should have been stopped, including the Charleston and Louisiana movie theatre killers.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015 ... .html?_r=0

[MajGenl.Meade]

That's interesting. Your first post there Econo, answers my question; thanks

The second one doesn't. All or most of that is stuff that profs can study (and have studied no doubt) and how does e.g When a firearm is used in a homicide or suicide, what is the typical length of time between the purchase of that firearm and the occurrence of the violent act? have any effect upon potential reduction? Is it that if we find out it's 27.5 days, there should be a 28 day period between purchase and delivery?

Guin - guess I've been asleep. I thought there was a waiting period for a background check for handguns. That's why I used to buy long arms at gun shows - no check/no wait. You mean all this time I coulda been stocking up on Glocks?

[Econoline]

The second one doesn't. All or most of that is stuff that profs can study (and have studied no doubt) and how does e.g When a firearm is used in a homicide or suicide, what is the typical length of time between the purchase of that firearm and the occurrence of the violent act? have any effect upon potential reduction? Is it that if we find out it's 27.5 days, there should be a 28 day period between purchase and delivery?

(a) If there's no grant money available--if in fact federal grant money is legally prohibited--it makes research much more difficult. (b) If the figure is 27.5 days, maybe there's no practical application for the finding; if it's 1 or 2 days, perhaps there's a real chance that a short waiting period might help? ("FIVE DAYS!?!? But I'm mad NOW!!!") In either case, it seems like it might be useful information to know.

[Econoline]

[dales]

No guns here!

[Econoline]

Did someone mention Godwin's Law?

Why Godwin's Law is Destroying Us.

For decades now we have seen a decline in education, in information checking, and in understanding history. One of the most important eras is that of World War II, or more specifically the rise of Nazi Germany, and most people have no idea how it really came to pass.

Unfortunately the Internet, that bastion of both knowledge and ignorance, upon its early adoption found people arguing and throwing out references to Hitler and the Nazis in various arguments, most of the time in completely the wrong context. This led to Godwin's Law. Basically the Law says that if an argument goes on long enough someone will bring up the Nazis or Hitler. This usually then ends up discrediting the person and killing reasonable conversation.

And then of course you see people with no understanding of that period of time at various rallies comparing politicians to Hitler or the Nazis (the most absurd being President Obama as a Black Hitler).

So how has this all, including Godwin's Law, caused our nation to be where it is?

Because nobody is seeing the exact same thing that happened from 1933 to 1939 in Germany playing out in our own country. And those that do are called names or they say "oh no, it's the other Party that's like that," when it definitely isn't. Nobody is actually calling out the factual comparisons, because everyone is afraid it'll be too extreme, it'll be too harsh, it'll be over the top...when in fact it's completely accurate.

People must remember that the Holocaust, which is usually the key element associated with the Nazi Party, did not really start until many years after the Nazis took control of Germany. As with World War II, there was a time prior that was neither war nor mass murder, but politics, maneuvering, lies, propaganda, bullying, guns, and flag waving.

In 1930 the Nazi Party took 19% of the Reichstag (German Congress). They proceeded to disrupt the operations of the Weimar Republic. They used propaganda to put fear into the population about Jews and Marxists, they bullied political rivals, they disrupted votes. In 1932 they took 30% of the Reichstag and in 1933 Hitler was made Chancellor. They legally were voted into office, and Hitler was legally appointed to office. It was not a coup, it was not a revolution, it was enough radical, fearful people voting.

This is exactly what the Republican Party has done for the past fifteen years. They have disrupted the operations of our Republic. They have used propaganda, especially via Fox News network, to put fear into the population about Muslims, Hispanics, and Blacks, they have bullied rivals, and they have disrupted votes.

Read the full essay:
http://useyourbrains.blogspot.com/2015/ ... ng-us.html

[Scooter]

No guns here!

Of course, the fact that Hitler actually relaxed pre-existing gun control laws makes absolutely no difference to those who unfailingly make this comparison.

Because why would facts matter to those who believe that children must have the unfettered right to blow each other's heads off?

[dales]

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/3 ... p-halbrook

[Econoline]

The Hitler gun control lie

The NRA, Fox News, Fox News (again), Alex Jones, email chains, "Joe" “the Plumber” Wurzelbacher, Gun Owners of America, etc., all agree that gun control was critical to Hitler’s rise to power. Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (“America’s most aggressive defender of firearms ownership”) is built almost exclusively around this notion, popularizing posters of Hitler giving the Nazi salute next to the text: “All in favor of ‘gun control’ raise your right hand.”

In his 1994 book, NRA head Wayne LaPierre dwelled on the Hitler meme at length, writing: “In Germany, Jewish extermination began with the Nazi Weapon Law of 1938, signed by Adolf Hitler.”

And it makes a certain amount of intuitive sense: If you’re going to impose a brutal authoritarian regime on your populace, better to disarm them first so they can’t fight back.

Unfortunately for LaPierre et al., the notion that Hitler confiscated everyone’s guns is mostly bogus. And the ancillary claim that Jews could have stopped the Holocaust with more guns doesn’t make any sense at all if you think about it for more than a minute.

University of Chicago law professor Bernard Harcourt explored this myth in depth in a 2004 article published in the Fordham Law Review. As it turns out, the Weimar Republic, the German government that immediately preceded Hitler’s, actually had tougher gun laws than the Nazi regime. After its defeat in World War I, and agreeing to the harsh surrender terms laid out in the Treaty of Versailles, the German legislature in 1919 passed a law that effectively banned all private firearm possession, leading the government to confiscate guns already in circulation. In 1928, the Reichstag relaxed the regulation a bit, but put in place a strict registration regime that required citizens to acquire separate permits to own guns, sell them or carry them.

The 1938 law signed by Hitler that LaPierre mentions in his book basically does the opposite of what he says it did. “The 1938 revisions completely deregulated the acquisition and transfer of rifles and shotguns, as well as ammunition,” Harcourt wrote. Meanwhile, many more categories of people, including Nazi party members, were exempted from gun ownership regulations altogether, while the legal age of purchase was lowered from 20 to 18, and permit lengths were extended from one year to three years.

The law did prohibit Jews and other persecuted classes from owning guns, but this should not be an indictment of gun control in general. Does the fact that Nazis forced Jews into horrendous ghettos indict urban planning? Should we eliminate all police officers because the Nazis used police officers to oppress and kill the Jews? What about public works — Hitler loved public works projects? Of course not. These are merely implements that can be used for good or ill, much as gun advocates like to argue about guns themselves. If guns don’t kill people, then neither does gun control cause genocide (genocidal regimes cause genocide).

Besides, Omer Bartov, a historian at Brown University who studies the Third Reich, notes that the Jews probably wouldn’t have had much success fighting back. “Just imagine the Jews of Germany exercising the right to bear arms and fighting the SA, SS and the Wehrmacht. The [Russian] Red Army lost 7 million men fighting the Wehrmacht, despite its tanks and planes and artillery. The Jews with pistols and shotguns would have done better?” he told Salon.

Proponents of the theory sometimes point to the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising as evidence that, as Fox News’ Judge Andrew Napolitano put it, “those able to hold onto their arms and their basic right to self-defense were much more successful in resisting the Nazi genocide.” But as the Tablet’s Michael Moynihan points out, Napolitano’s history (curiously based on a citation of work by French Holocaust denier Robert Faurisson) is a bit off. In reality, only about 20 Germans were killed, while some 13,000 Jews were massacred. The remaining 50,000 who survived were promptly sent off to concentration camps.

Robert Spitzer, a political scientist who studies gun politics and chairs the political science department at SUNY Cortland, told Mother Jones’ Gavin Aronsen that the prohibition on Jewish gun ownership was merely a symptom, not the problem itself. “[It] wasn’t the defining moment that marked the beginning of the end for Jewish people in Germany. It was because they were persecuted, were deprived of all of their rights, and they were a minority group,” he explained.

Meanwhile, much of the Hitler myth is based on an infamous quote falsely attributed to the Fuhrer, which extols the virtue of gun control:

This year will go down in history! For the first time, a civilized nation has full gun registration! Our streets will be safer, our police more efficient, and the world will follow our lead into the future!

The quote has been widely reproduced in blog posts and opinion columns about gun control, but it’s “probably a fraud and was likely never uttered,” according to Harcourt. “This quotation, often seen without any date or citation at all, suffers from several credibility problems, the most significant of which is that the date often given [1935] has no correlation with any legislative effort by the Nazis for gun registration, nor would there have been any need for the Nazis to pass such a law, since gun registration laws passed by the Weimar government were already in effect,” researchers at the useful website GunCite note.

(My emphasis.)(The article's a bit longer than this; go here for the whole thing.)



ETA: here's the URL for the Fordham Law Review article (PDF) mentioned and linked to in the above text:

http://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4029&context=flr

[dales]

Perhaps that's why the NAZIS were so afraid of Jews owning firearms?

[Scooter]

I'm sorry, it's rather difficult to make sense of what you are saying with your foot jammed so firmly in your mouth.