I had it pointed out to me

[Stella_Omega]

You know where he got those guns, right? His mother owned them all.

She believed that she need them in case someone invaded her little home in the middle of bucolic white middle class adorabaville.

So he killed her while she was in her bed and helped herself to those guns which were going to protect her from outsiders.

Good thing she kept them in a gun safe!

 

[njlauren]

I'm reluctant to judge her on that - or indeed her husband - without knowing more of the story. There are reasons why some people don't seek treatment for mental illness even when money isn't an issue.

For one, it's heavily stigmatised, both in the USA and .au. This thread is a prime example: everybody's talking about how we need to protect ourselves from the crazies, but in fact mentally-ill people are far more likely to be victims of violence - about 10x. Once you get tagged as a crazy, good luck trying to find a normal job.

(And if you treat "crazies" as a subject of derision, congratulations, you've just made yourself part of the problem. For all you know, somebody with mental issues is listening to you and deciding, yep, safer to keep it hidden and try to work it out in quiet, instead of seeking help.)

It's also possible that she tried and he just wasn't interested in cooperating. If a twenty-year-old guy doesn't want to do something, about the only leverage his parents have is threatening to kick him out of home - and that's unlikely to help a mental-health situation, and could easily exacerbate it. For all we know, that could be what happened.

I was responding to the link someone else gave, about the parent of a troubled child, about how hard it is to get help and my response was that lack of resources wasn't a problem. I know how hard it is to deal when there is someone mentally ill in your family, my mother in law was probably a certifiable paranois/schizophrenic, and she lived with us, we were her only resources. Part of the problem also is it is hard to admit, you don't want to admit that someone you love has issues, and on that I can't totally blame them, but the reality is this kid seems to have shown that he had trouble for a long time and it doesn't sound (from like what I have read) that nothing was done. Add to that that the parents were divorced and it was a mess. My biggest criticism is that the mother apparently didn't understand that when you have someone who is troubled, it is playing russian roulette with 4 bullets in the chamber to allow them access to guns, the whole line about 'but they never appeared violent' is one of the biggest jokes, I can't count how many times that was used when someone who was 'different' explodes.

To be honest, the mother's attitude towards guns in general sounded like someone missing several cards in the deck, leaving them where an emotionally disturbed kid can get them, and also the reported bragging publicly about her gun collection (which, among other things, is inviting someone to break in and steal them), it sounds like someone not all there either.

 

[njlauren]

Yes and no. There's not a huge design difference between semi- and full-auto weapons: once you have the self-loading part implemented, the self-firing bit is relatively trivial, and many semi-autos are simple modifications of full-auto weapons.

And in scenarios like this, a semi-auto is just as deadly - if anything, maybe more so, since the shooter is less likely to run out of ammo in a hurry. But it's always good to get the terminology right.

(Just to confuse people, an "automatic pistol" is usually a semi-auto.)

Yeah, a semi automatic can be made into full automatic mode by a gunsmith in about 15 minutes by filing a certain component. On military weapons there is a switch to go between full auto and semi automatic mode. The terms are important because the law already makes fully automatic weapons illegal,because they are felt to be too dangerous, and I think that is a key argument in banning semi automatic military weapons like the AR-15 and the AK47, because the difference between them and a full automatic is not all that much. I think the first step is to ban the large magazines, though to be honest, not so sure what good that would do, that one is so easily violated, those magazines are small enough you could order them over the net from overseas too easily.

The only reason people own those weapons is vanity or they are over the top paranoid freakouts who think the zombie apocalypse is coming or the black helicopters, and all the talk of sportsmen and such is a crock of bullshit, since those weapons as sporting weapons is a joke, you don't hunt with them, and you sure as heck don't use them for target shooting, they suck in terms of accuracy.

 

[njlauren]

You are quoting inaccurate information. There is no evidence that he was trying to buy a gun. ATF reviewed many hours of surveillance tape and found nothing. There are too many rumors and misinformation being reported with this story. Even after the investigation is finished and reported, most people will not be able to understand WHY this happened. It will be difficult to develop a prototype of these shooters since they are outliers—thank goodness.

By the way, taking way everyone's guns is not going to solve this problem. As a law abidding gun owner, you will find your gun ownership will be unaffected.

Nobody is talking about taking away everyone's guns, that is a chimera that the NRA loves to put up there. What most are talking about is reasonable restrictions on gun ownership, owning an AK47 or an AR15 is not an inalienable right, and given the destruction these guns represents, especially with mega magazines, there is little justification for civilians to own them, basically none. Despite what the gun nut lobby is trying to say, if Lanza had had the handguns, the death toll would have been a lot less, one of the teachers may have been able to disable him by charging (they teach when someone has a gun to go into it, for a reason), or when he went to reload.According to law enforcement, Lanza only had a couple of minutes, he killed himself when law enforcement showed up and they came minutes after it started. You can't kill 26 people in a couple of minutes with two handguns, semi automatic or not, he was able to kill those people and pump multiple bullets into them if he didn't have the AR15, and he would have it if his asshole mother didn't have it. Speaking as a parent and as a fellow citizen, she was a piece of shit and quite frankly it is poetic justice that she was killed with her own guns by her own stupidity.

 

[Weird Harold]

I think we can be angry about these nuts bringing up the Second Amendment too, because, as you note, anyone who can actually read and understand what the Second Amendment actually says, knows it's about the standing militia--the early form of what is now the National Guard--not individual citizens who aren't in the National Guard.

The Supreme Court of the Unites States disagrees with you.

 

[Weird Harold]

Nobody is talking about taking away everyone's guns, ...

Except these people:

Here is an example of what some congressional representatives consider to be reasonable gun control:

Mr. Speaker, I rise to introduce the Public Health and Safety Act of 1993 on behalf of myself and nine of my colleagues: Mel Reynolds, Bill Clay, Jerry Nadler, Eleanor Holmes Norton, John Lewis, Nydia Velazquez, Ron Dellums, Carrie Meek, and Alcee Hastings. This legislation, first introduced in the Senate by Senator John Chafee, would prohibit the transfer or possession of handguns and handgun ammunition, except in limited circumstances. It would go a long way toward protecting our citizens from violent crime.

The need for a ban on handguns cannot be overstated. Unlike rifles and shotguns, handguns are easily concealable. Consequently, they are the weapons of choice in most murders, accounting for the deaths of 25,000 Americans in 1991.

A 6-month grace period would be established during which time handguns could be turned in to any law enforcement agency with impunity and for reimbursement at the greater of $25 or the fair market value of the handgun . After the grace period's expiration, handguns could be turned in voluntarily with impunity from criminal prosecution, but a civil fine of $500 would be imposed.

Exemptions from the handgun ban would be permitted for Federal, State, or local government agencies, including military and law enforcement; collectors of antique firearms; federally licensed handgun sporting clubs; federally licensed professional security guard services; and federally licensed dealers, importers, or manufacturers.

The Public Health and Safety Act of 1993 represents a moderate, middle-of-the-road approach to handgun control which deserves the support of all members of Congress who want to stop gun murders now.
--- Hon. Major R. Owens (Rep. NY, Introduction of the Public Health and Safety Act of 1993, Extension of Remarks - September 23, 1993. Congressional Record, 103rd Congress, 1993-1994)

More Quotes from Politicians, Periodicals, and Prominent Persons

Mr. President, what is going on in this country? Does going to school mean exposure to handguns and to death? As you know, my position is we should ban all handguns, get rid of them, no manufacture, no sale, no importation, no transportation, no possession of a handgun . There are 66 million handguns in the United States of America today, with 2 million being added every year.
--- Senator John H. Chafee, Rhode Island (June 11, 1992, Congressional Record, 102nd Congress, 1991-1992)

Mr. speaker, we must take swift and strong action if we are to rescue the next generation from the rising of tide armed violence. That is why today I am introducing the Handgun Control Act of 1992. This legislation would outlaw the possession, importation, transfer or manufacture of a handgun except for use by public agencies, individuals who can demonstrate to their local police chief that they need a gun because of threat to their life or the life of a family member, licensed guard services, licensed pistol clubs which keep the weapons securely on premises, licensed manufacturers and licensed gun dealers.
--- Rep. Stephen J. Solarz, New York (August 12, 1992, Congressional Record, 102nd Congress, 1991-1992, Daily Edition E2492-2493.)

Links to the congressional record and other citations can be found at http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcnobody.html (The quotes above are only a few of the many listed with links to the original instance where possible.)

 

[PennLady]

A friend posted these on Facebook:

"if the logic is, its useless to regulate guns because criminals will still break the law, then why have traffic laws? Why have any laws?" -- tweet from Aasif Mandvi

"One failed attempt at a shoe-bomb and we all take our shoes off at the airport. Thirty-one school shootings since Columbine and no change in our regulation of guns." -- John Oliver

Comedians, perhaps, but they have points.

 

[mikey2much]

It seems like there is movement toward gun control

From what I could see this morning on TV, a lot of the gun lovers are agreeing that they don't really need the thirty rounds clips. They will most likely pass some kind of controls on assault rifles.

I hope that they will also pass some sort of law to help the people who are living with these mental cases that are still out there, ticking, waiting for the thing that sets them off.

 

[NekoParks]

Misconstrued my comments...

Nobody is talking about taking away everyone's guns, that is a chimera that the NRA loves to put up there. What most are talking about is reasonable restrictions on gun ownership, owning an AK47 or an AR15 is not an inalienable right, and given the destruction these guns represents, especially with mega magazines, there is little justification for civilians to own them, basically none. Despite what the gun nut lobby is trying to say, if Lanza had had the handguns, the death toll would have been a lot less, one of the teachers may have been able to disable him by charging (they teach when someone has a gun to go into it, for a reason), or when he went to reload.According to law enforcement, Lanza only had a couple of minutes, he killed himself when law enforcement showed up and they came minutes after it started. You can't kill 26 people in a couple of minutes with two handguns, semi automatic or not, he was able to kill those people and pump multiple bullets into them if he didn't have the AR15, and he would have it if his asshole mother didn't have it. Speaking as a parent and as a fellow citizen, she was a piece of shit and quite frankly it is poetic justice that she was killed with her own guns by her own stupidity.

If you had read my other posts, you would have realized that I am not a gun owner, and I support gun restrictions. I was commenting on previous post from another contributor. I am hesitant to call anyone a POS when she was shot by her own child. Less anger and more compassion is called for here. Too much judgmentalism has already alienated people from getting the mental health care that they desperately needed. It's very hard to see the people in your own family as dangerously ill. I was raised in a household with guns, but I have never had any desire to own or fire a gun myself. Over 20 years ago, I was a teacher in high school that had a school shooting. So I know first hand what those teachers and students were feeling on Friday. During my first year of teaching, I attended five funerals for students that were killed due to gang related/gun activity. Nothing is more wrenching than burying a child. I left teaching, but I have so much respect for teachers.

Here are some comments from my previous post:

Long Island Train Shooting in 1993

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

One of the points made by the witnesses of the Long Island train shootings in 1993 was the fact that less ammo would have given people time to jump the shooter when he had to reload. Unless a person is trained in the use of deadly force, the use of a gun in time of high stress with adrenaline pumping through your system would be dicey at best. Most people would hesitate to fire into a crowd for fear of hitting a bystander. Unfortunately, the psychological advantage of having a huge magazine clip is what gives some nutcases the confidence to attack a group of people. Most law enforced professionals will tell you that a cell phone and a plan to save yourself are better defense than having a gun. The other things that are always stressed to women are to not let yourself be taken a secondary crime scene.

 

[sr71plt]

The Supreme Court of the Unites States disagrees with you.

A bare majority of them. Perhaps when these events are happening daily, one more of them may wake up.

I'll stick with my ability to read the Constitution over your selfish myopia.

 

[NekoParks]

Here is a link to an article written by a mother with a child suffering from a mental illness. It illuminates the problems that family members have in dealing with a chronic mental illness.

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/i-am-adam-lanzas-mother

 

[Weird Harold]

A bare majority of them. Perhaps when these events are happening daily, one more of them may wake up.

I'll stick with my ability to read the Constitution over your selfish myopia.

In other words, the law is what you say it is rather than what those charged with interpreting the law say it is.

Until such time as you can convince one member of the Supreme Court to change their mind, the Supreme Court still disagrees with you.

 

[sr71plt]

In other words, the law is what you say it is rather than what those charged with interpreting the law say it is.

Until such time as you can convince one member of the Supreme Court to change their mind, the Supreme Court still disagrees with you.

Ummm, no. What it means is that there's more work to be done to wake people up, I think. But then I already knew that. We don't know what the current court would rule today--there's no case before it to rule on today. (Perhaps you need to brush up a bit on your understanding of how the U.S. government works.)

Of course the Supreme Court at that time disagreed with my interpretation (although I wasn't aware of the Supreme Court ruling that Brambleton point to)--and of course their ruling holds until it gets changed. But Supreme Court rulings do get changed. That's why the United States system has held as long as it has--because it is elastic in interpretation and can change with the times. It's such reactionaries as you indicate you are who aren't elastic. We no longer live in anything like the atmosphere of when the Constitution was written. And it began to be reinterpreted even while the States were ratifying it--and will continue to do so. And the Supreme Court can change its rulings as new cases come before it.

With a few more wakeup calls, maybe cases will come before it that will change that one vote on the Court. The Supreme Court can't weigh on anything without a case before it. There's no telling what the vote would be if they had something to rule on today.

 

[mikey2much]

I think this is the problem

I feel that our values as a nation are in need of re-evaluation.

Lets start with the hellfire missile, When you take these fifty thousand dollar toys from old stock they have a failure rate of almost 25 percent. The newer missles rate of failure is much lower somewhere in the 2 percent range. We have just voted to spend another three billion on these missiles that we will have to use quickly before they go bad.

On the other hand we have this sort of thing.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/19/state-mental-health-cuts_n_1897769.html

Where we are cutting the money out of the projects that might help avoid these terrible deaths of the helpless and innocent

We as Americans have a choice to make. Are we killers of others or are we healers of our own people.

 

[sr71plt]

I feel that our values as a nation are in need of re-evaluation.

Lets start with the hellfire missile, When you take these fifty thousand dollar toys from old stock they have a failure rate of almost 25 percent. The newer missles rate of failure is much lower somewhere in the 2 percent range. We have just voted to spend another three billion on these missiles that we will have to use quickly before they go bad.

On the other hand we have this sort of thing.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/19/state-mental-health-cuts_n_1897769.html

Where we are cutting the money out of the projects that might help avoid these terrible deaths of the helpless and innocent

We as Americans have a choice to make. Are we killers of others or are we healers of our own people.

I agree with you on the need to reevaluate.

Not so much on the effectiveness of the missiles. Most of the effectiveness of a missile system is in its deterent value. Star Wars, for instance, had a great deal of effectiveness as a deterent system--the opposition was busy designing its offensive systems against a theoretical construct that never worked worth spit or got very far from theoretic and early pretenses of development. And so no long-range missile war actually happened at the time. So, with zero success rate, Star Wars had 100 percent deterent value. That factor has to be read into your missile discussion as well.

But on the need to reevaluate, I do agree. On this private gun possession issue, we are out of step with the world--and it's killing us.

 

[Weird Harold]

Of course the Supreme Court at that time disagreed with my interpretation (although I wasn't aware of the Supreme Court ruling that Brambleton point to)--and of course their ruling holds until it gets changed. But Supreme Court rulings do get changed.

Until it does get changed, any effort at gun control has to take the existing precedent (and the Second Amendment itself) into account. Your desire to disarm the general populace has to take these minor details into account if you want to have any hope of succeeding.

 

[trysail]

A bare majority of them. Perhaps when these events are happening daily, one more of them may wake up.

I'll stick with my ability to read the Constitution over your selfish myopia.

I must admit I kept reading through this to see where the erotica started--and didn't find it. Glad the feedback was excellent though.

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/hypocrisy-meter.gif​

Why on earth do you see the need to post this here? What does this have to do with erotica?

Here we have the 5,683rd demonstration of why this buffoon is generally considered Lit's biggest hypocrite and phony.

 

[sr71plt]

Until it does get changed, any effort at gun control has to take the existing precedent (and the Second Amendment itself) into account. Your desire to disarm the general populace has to take these minor details into account if you want to have any hope of succeeding.

Well, sure. So the effort should be to change the laws, not to sit and do nothing and let the killing go on. Obviously, the current situation isn't working in terms of preventing an astronomically higher rate of people killing each other than in any other society in the world.

You obviously want to do nothing--until, perhaps, one of your loved ones gets senselessly murdered this way--and maybe with their own gun. Going to a school, theater, grocery store, church, or mall anytime soon? You might see that your will is in order before you do.

 

[sr71plt]

This message is hidden because trysail is on your ignore list.

It doesn't take much imagination to figure out what quote from Fox News this dummy has stolen and posted here.

 

[mikey2much]

I know, he on my iggy too

I peeked and it is a bitch post about us talking about something that isn't porn related.

I wouldn't mind if he was saying what he thought or felt about something but to have him point at different things he has read as if he were a mute, I ain't into it at all.
back on iggy.

 

[Weird Harold]

You obviously want to do nothing...

You obviously haven't read many of my posts on the subject. I'm in favor of EFFECTIVE gun control legislation. (the Federal Firearms Act of 1934 is one such.)

I have no use for Ms Feinstein's worthless assault weapons ban proposal because it is simply a rehash of the ban that expired in 2004 -- which accomplished nothing. I have no use for feel-good eye-wash legislation that simply satisfies the "there oughtta be a law" knee-jerk reaction.

I also don't see any point in banging one's head against Supreme Court precedent or Constitutional amendments either. Effective laws can be crafted without denying the realities of existing restrictions on gun control.

 

[sr71plt]

I also don't see any point in banging one's head against Supreme Court precedent or Constitutional amendments either. Effective laws can be crafted without denying the realities of existing restrictions on gun control.

You don't seem to get that it isn't a matter of banging one's head against Supreme Court precedent. It's about changing the law--and/or the Constitution--and thereby changing the Supreme Court ruling or simply bypassing it. The Constitution doesn't say you have the right to own an AK-47.

It's about trying to keep this killing from being so damn easy in a short period of time.

 

[sr71plt]

I peeked and it is a bitch post about us talking about something that isn't porn related.

I wouldn't mind if he was saying what he thought or felt about something but to have him point at different things he has read as if he were a mute, I ain't into it at all.
back on iggy.

One wonders why he can't get that he's simply irrelevant to an erotica discussion board. I'm sure he'd go elsewhere if where he's gone before hasn't just deleted him. He just shows how impotent he is by banging away at this board. Can't even do it in his own words.

 

[Weird Harold]

The Constitution doesn't say you have the right to own an AK-47.

If one emphasizes the militia clause, the Second Amendment can be construed as only permitting weapons useful as militia weapons -- like a fully functional AK47 or M16 variant.

It's about trying to keep this killing from being so damn easy in a short period of time.

You're apparently concerned primarily with preventing the 20th or 30th fatality. I'm more concerned with finding a way to prevent the FIRST fatality. Knee-jerk calls for banning "assault weapons" don't address either viewpoint.

You're welcome to try to fight the supreme court precedent(s) and Constitutional law if you want. It's going to be a very long and fruitless fight, but you're welcome to tilt at that windmill if you so desire.

I personally prefer to look for ways to address the problem that don't take on the entrenched and obdurate forces involved in the "gun control" debate. Better mental health care, better information sharing among law-enforcement agencies, better enforcement of existing laws, a federal standard for concealed carry qualifications, etc. Those are things that can be addressed now, without running into the "fixed fortifications" of pro or anti-gun factions.

 

[mikey2much]

Its either health or its security

If it is a health problem, we can deal with it through treatment of the known persons on the radar. I am sure that there is a way to find who they are because I am sure they have all tried to find help and most were turned away because of budget issues.

If the problem is deemed to be a security issue, then they will have all the money they need and they will invade the last stronghold of privacy, our medical records. This will result in special jails being built and more employment in the fastest growing trade in America, prison guards.

It is one more fork in the road that our country has reached. So far it seems to me that we always make the wrong choice.

I don't like it but I expect to see new laws and jails not new clinics and doctors. There is little profit in helping sick kids, while the prison industry has proven to repay investors pretty well. That is the American way.