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Originally Posted by regular.joe
I think we can all agree that guns and knives and hammers and cars and anything else you could possibly kill another human being with are not really a problem. The issues that cause a disproportionate number of people to kill other people with any instrument really need to be addressed. Which would mean some kind of research and efforts into our social programs.
My conservative friends seem to have some pretty simple mantras....GUNS DON"T KILL PEOPLE....and....NO MORE SOCIAL PROGRAMS.....awesome combination in my book for sticking our collective heads in the sand and just taking what we get, which are a rash of killings that really might be able to be addressed in the long term with some serious thought and effort. Like that will happen.
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Ultimately, your Conservative friends have the right idea. We have lots of social programs - and we aren't paying for them. Keep that up year after year, and keep adding more programs, and before long, those Trillion of dollars in debt, really do start to add up.
A lot of these mass killings have the same elements:
1) The killer is known to be mentally unstable or violent and stressed, or on drugs like Coke or meth, before he kills - but his family or friends lets him acquire semi-auto guns and ammunition, very easily.
In the case of the school massacre, his Mom took her paranoid schizophrenic son, out to the range, so he'd know how to shoot!
WHAT was she thinking, again? Not much since she was his first victim shot. And she was a teacher!
2) We encourage "gun free zones" - like a mass killer will kindly obey the posted sign. I've noticed that very few mass killers have attacked the firing ranges.
They prefer shopping malls, and theaters, and schools with lots of unarmed targets.
3) We don't stress the importance of being strong for yourself, and self-reliant. Instead, we stress how the gov't should take care of us - and then get furious when that doesn't happen.
If you grow up on section 8 housing, food stamps, free lunches (and now breakfasts in some areas, for the students), welfare payments, etc., how will you ever learn to be self-reliant and earn a decent living?
Until I see a balance between social programs and self-reliance, I'm against further programs. Of course, I used to give a ride down to the local senior citizens food bank, to a miserly multi-millionaire. Every month said millionaire got three bags of free food. It was all done with a <wink wink> and a <nod>:
Food Bank manager:
"you need to state your income here, now we don't check this out, but to qualify for this program, you need to have less than $30,000 dollars of taxable income this year. <wink wink>
Multi Millionaire: "OK, $28,500 then".
Food Bank Manager: <nods>
We need to stop private sales of semi-auto's, without a background check - that's how those without gun rights get around the gun laws now. You take guns away from good people though, and you're just another "please kindly shoot other people, because this is a gun free city", sign believer.
Chicago has some of the toughest gun laws in the country. They're also the murder capital of the US, last time I checked, and the city Mayor had asked a Muslim Brotherhood affiliated group, to come in and help patrol the streets.
I remember when East Palo Alto was the murder capital of the US, some years back. Just a miserable place for crime. The dealers came up to you at the stoplight to see what your drug order would be, without so much as a wave of your hand to invite it. Gunfire? Every night, and about one body per morning, somewhere dumped in an alley or field. Lots of police wouldn't go into EPA, period.
Finally, after more than a decade, they put together a massive police, sheriff with federal agents and marshals and went through the city and actually picked up ALL those with outstanding warrants, selling drugs, illegal weapons, etc.
Well, what do you know, East Palo Alto suddenly became a decent little city! Gunfire at night? What gunfire?
They didn't change the gun laws, they just began enforcing the laws they already had, for a LOT of things.