DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Palus Politicus Parkland School Shooting..17 dead

According to The Digest of Education Statistics there are 98,200 public schools in the U.S. The vast majority of these schools are over 50 years old. Many 100 years old.

Also the vast majority of these have never had a single individual shot on school grounds under any circumstances.

Wikipedia lists less than a total of 40 school shootings in the history of the United States. Since the 1760s.

That’s 40 school shootings in 258 years.

Gunshot as a the cause of death of students in school is microscopic.

Far more students have died in schools from a hundred other causes.

So you go ahead and watch your TV and social media and live in your fantasy world of paranoia.

And call for armed security detachments in all 98,200 public schools.

This is what happens when you use wikipedia as a source.

Why they get drug in is because the ones screaming the loudest about students dying are typically the biggest most vocal supporters of killing babies.....it causes you to lose credibility.

Hi Vers! Thanks for the kind words. One thing I perhaps know better than anything else is that what I don't know far exceeds what I do know. So my inclination is to lean on the expertise of others, to learn from their choices and see if it worked or failed.

I totally agree with you that just banning guns won't work. Switzerland has 24 percent gun ownership per capita. Norway 31. US is far higher at 101. But we don't see the firearm deaths in Europe that we do in the US.

It's also not entirely a mental health problem. The US has a higher mental illness rate than the rest of the world though. I think our prevalence of psychotropic drugs contributes but that's just my hunch.

Other Western countries are struggling with tech addiction like we are. Europe is more secular than the US. I think Americans do tilt to be greedier than Europeans but you still have free markets in Europe so we can't paint them as altruists. Yet they have significantly fewer gun deaths. I don't see the correlation between secularism and gun violence since Europe is much more secular.

The major difference is it's harder to get a gun in Europe than in the US. We can argue over whether that's a bandaid to the real issues in our society, and that's a fine argument. But sometimes we need to look at the most effective way to fix a problem. When a river is in our way, we build a bridge. We don't go up river and wonder how the water got there, as you may as well try to move the mountains.

Does anyone dare bring up the vast multicultural differences we see in the US vs what we see in other countries?? Or is that a no-go zone?

No, Haus is brought up the idea on how minorities are intrinsically violent before.

Somewhere between 10 and 15. That should be sufficient and not different from other styles of guns.

I did no such thing. I have posted factually accurate information regarding racial differences in crime rates. Any such ASSumptions beyond that were made by you.

It's an interesting question although I don't think it's a particularly good explanation for the phenomenon of mass shootings.

At the same time, I don't think it should be off-limits for discussion. Why would it be.. that it might hurt somebody like CHS's feelings?

It is pretty sobering when you put it like that. The thing is that the money is there. As a society, we spend in ridiculous excess on many things, but when it comes to security at schools, what we are doing is obviously just not good enough.

And I don’t think it is the magic cure all either...but when American results are compared to results of other countries that have a greater homogeneous make up then that of the US coupled with the timing multiculturalism in the US and the rise of mass shootings....you at least have to say ....hmmmm...

(As a piece of the 500 piece puzzle...too bad most are playing by with kindergarten 5 piece sets looking for answers).

Whities go to school to kill while blackies lurk in the shadows on the way home from school ... brownies just drive by while yellows drug and enslave them. I think that just about covers the stereotypes right?

I view mass shooting as such a minor cause of death that it's just silly to be in an uproar. It's almost always some kid that went off the deep end with emotion issues that if they didn't have a gun would be using bombs or anything else handy. Your 10,000 times more likely to die crossing the street than be the victim of a mass shooting.

There's one big difference. Auto accidents and pedestrian deaths are to be expected. Getting a call from your child's school saying he was killed in a mass shooting isn't. Nor should it be.

Agreed. I find it odd that white males commit these atrocities at such a large rate. I wonder what information lies there.

j/c

I'll just place this here for the board's consideration. It popped up in my fb feed earlier today.


Ten Lies Distort The Gun Control Debate

In a ritual as central to American life as football on Thanksgiving, each new mass shooting spawns a wave of unfocused political energy that quickly dissipates into “thoughts and prayers.” No matter how many people die, no matter the cruelty of the methods or the youth and innocence of the victims, we cannot translate our outrage into sensible gun control measures.

Key to this failure has been a dense fog of misinformation, shrouding debate and thwarting any potential response. Cutting through the gun lobby’s campaign of confusion will be key to building public consensus around reform. Unless we pierce this fog and develop a focused political agenda, Las Vegas will recede from consciousness, one more mass slaughter on our way to the next one.

Here’s a review of the top ten lies obscuring the gun debate.

Lie #1: There is no connection between mass gun ownership and gun deaths.


It seems obvious that a country flooded with guns will have higher rates of gun deaths than countries with few of these weapons. Why are land mines and hand-grenades forbidden in the so-called “Land of the Free,” despite their obvious value in home defense? Because everyone understands that placing these killing machines in circulation would get a lot of people killed. So why don’t we recognize the same problem with guns?

Obvious answers are never enough for us, so America has been running a deadly experiment on this question for decades. The results are exactly as you would expect. Mass gun ownership leads to higher rates of gun death. Careful regulation can limit that death toll, but not eliminate it.

We are not the only wealthy, stable country with broad gun ownership, though it’s a small club. Switzerland provides a useful comparison, since it is the only place that comes close to our levels of gun ownership, with about half of our per capita firearm ownership. Their experience demonstrates the obvious realities.

Though gun ownership among the Swiss is relatively common, regulations are tight by American standards. All guns are tracked. Many of the guns in private hands are issued by the government. Sale and possession of ammunition is tightly controlled. With a few exceptions for less-lethal weapons, every private gun sale is recorded.

Thanks to careful regulation and lower rates of gun ownership, the Swiss suffer lower rates of gun related deaths and injuries than the US. Despite these constraints, Switzerland experiences much higher rates of gun death than their less-armed neighbors. In other words, regulation can help, but the connection between gun ownership and gun deaths is unavoidably linear.

Lie #2: We don’t need stronger gun regulation because gun violence is declining.

This lie is fun because of the way it depends on careful framing. Gun violence, defined as crimes committed with guns, has been declining for decades. That makes sense, since crime in general has been declining for decades. However, despite a lower crime rate, guns are now competing with automobile accidents for one of the leading causes of premature death in the US. When accidents and suicides are included in the statistics, gun deaths have been consistently rising while most other causes of death declined. And when gun deaths and injuries are compared to rates in other countries, it is hard to build a chart big enough to properly picture America’s towering rates of slaughter.

Lie #3: We didn’t have this problem “in my day” because people loved Jesus and didn’t play violent video games.

According to Franklin Graham, gun violence happens because Americans “turned our backs on God.” His “kids these days” explanation of gun carnage is a favorite of drunk uncles in MAGA caps all over the country. Though these claims frequently sour Thanksgiving dinners, they lack empirical support.

Mass murder has always been a feature of American life, from the slaughter of Native Americans, to the lynchings of black citizens. We just haven’t always had such broad, unregulated, cheap access to such incredibly lethal toys. There’s nothing new about “lone wolf” killings, either, though our modern flood of unregulated high-powered weapons has made them more common and deadly. School shootings are as old as school. Young Matthew Ward murdered his teacher in front of the class in Louisville in 1853. He was acquitted.

Until fairly recently, our most lethal single instance of “lone wolf” mass murder was a school bombing carried out in 1927 in rural Michigan, killing 44 people. The most lethal era to be a police officer in the US was the first third of the 20th century. Thousands of black Americans were killed in mass-violence in the same era, like the white riot that destroyed Tulsa’s “Black Wall Street” in 1921.

In general, we are living through an era of declining crime and mayhem. Gun deaths stand out now against a backdrop of relative public calm.

Lie #4: The Second Amendment blocks gun regulation.

Americans happily place curbs on our rights to religious freedom, blocking people from committing acts of violence, fraud or abuse in the name of faith. Free speech is limited by laws banning libel or incitement. Americans have a constitutionally protected right to obtain an abortion, yet many of the same people advocating Second Amendment absolutism suddenly lose interest in the constitution when the subject turns to reproductive rights. As a general rule, people tend to cite constitutional protections when they don’t want to debate the merits of an issue. Gun advocates are passionate about civil liberties until those liberties become inconvenient.

Lie #5: The solution to gun violence is more gun ownership.

This lie would be too bizarre to earn column space, but politicians are actually using it build policy, putting guns in places like schools, churches and bars. There is no empirical basis for the claim, but it is sometimes accompanied by one misleading data point.

In a twist on Lie #2, gun advocates sometimes point out that a massive rise in gun sales in recent decades has coincided with a long decline in crime rates. Reductions in crime have also coincided with a long trend of rising ocean temperatures, and an increase in the number of black quarterbacks in the NFL. Without some explanation of cause, this factoid is useless.

Further complicating this argument is an inconvenient fact – crime rates have been falling in recent decades all over the civilized world. How has the surge in US gun sales somehow triggered simultaneous declines in criminal activity in Britain, Germany, France and so on? It hasn’t, because there is no connection between US gun sales and declining crime rates.

There’s another interesting dimension to this lie. Gun sales have surged in recent years in the US, but gun ownership is declining. Fewer American households own a gun than at any point in the past half a century. Only three percent of gun owners possess about half of all the weapons in circulation in the US. Today in the US, the average gun owner possesses eight weapons. America has far more guns in private circulation than at any time in its history, but three quarters of Americans do not own one. Mass gun ownership has no relationship to declining crime rates.

Lie #6: Chicago has tight gun restrictions and mass gun violence. Ergo, gun laws don’t work.

Chicago’s seemingly intractable problem with gun violence is one of America’s fondest fascinations. It’s also a myth. Chicago has more gun murders than other large cities like New York and Los Angeles, thanks mostly to its long, unsecured border with North Alabamastan (sometimes called Indiana). However, Chicago’s murder rate still lags far behind the nation’s leaders, many of which are in red states with loose gun restrictions.

America’s capital of gun violence is in deep-red Louisiana. New Orleans suffers from four times the rate of gun murders as Chicago. Such terrifying urban hellscapes as Kansas City, Memphis and Atlanta all rack up much higher rates of gun violence than Chicago. Expand the inquiry beyond crime, to include accidental gun deaths and suicide, and Chicago simply recedes from the frame. The obvious conclusion also happens to be an empirical fact: states with high levels of gun ownership have higher levels of gun death.

With its supposedly restrictive gun regulations, why should Chicago even show up on the list? Only through a determination to avoid the obvious can one struggle with this question.

A Chicagoan can walk across a street into Indiana and purchase firearms from an unlicensed seller with no tracking of that transaction. That person can then walk back across the street into Chicago and commit a crime. This is a common practice. Most of the guns used in a crime in Chicago are originally purchased in Indiana or Mississippi. And of course, Indiana’s rate of gun deaths is roughly a third higher than in Illinois.

In a strictly technical sense, most of those untracked transactions are illegal. However, our gun laws have been crafted to make enforcement virtually impossible, a fine introduction to the next lie.

Lie #7: We should enforce existing gun laws before imposing new ones.

Calls for more determined enforcement of existing gun laws are the most darkly cynical lie in the debate over guns. Our gun laws are carefully crafted to be unenforceable.

One law stands out as the most critical obstacle to enforcement of gun restrictions. A minor provision of the 1986 Firearm Owners Protection Act bans states or federal agencies from building gun registries. Six states already possessed some form of registry, thus were exempted, but further efforts to break the enforcement of gun regulations made it difficult for them to leverage that information in any useful way.

Congress has protected gun companies from lawsuits. Threats from the NRA have blocked the Centers for Disease Control from researching gun deaths. State and federal laws block law enforcement officials from effectively tracking weapons used in crimes.

Chicago’s frustrating efforts to crack down on gun traffickers illustrates the problems with existing gun laws. Absence of tracking makes enforcement impractical if not impossible. This blind spot fosters a rich climate for illegal gun traffickers in Indiana. Even when federal officials catch someone funneling weapons illegally into Chicago, obtaining convictions is difficult. Police invest little in enforcement efforts because prosecutors regularly decline cases. Prosecutors decline these cases because convictions are so rare. Without federal help, local law enforcement in Chicago has almost no means to stop the flow of guns. Without smart laws, even federal assistance has limited value. Calls to focus on enforcement of existing laws, rather than reforms, are a cynical ploy.

Lie #8: We need guns to protect ourselves from the government.

Claims of a Second Amendment right to overthrow the government may be false, but they get us very close to understanding the honest motives behind the gun lobby.

Until 2008, no federal court had ever recognized an individual constitutional right to own a firearm. If anyone imagined that the Constitution protected a right to use violence to overthrow the government, that idea was put to rest in 1794, when George Washington marched an army across Pennsylvania to squash citizens’ “Second Amendment remedies.”

If the Second Amendment was about resisting the government, why have we only enjoyed a personal right to firearms for less than ten years? And why don’t we have the right to obtain other critical supplies for our jihad, like mortars, land mines and fighter planes?

A dark truth lurks in the “Second Amendment remedies” lie. What fuels the most passionate wing of the gun lobby is the American tradition of mob violence. A population armed with infantry weapons is no match against the organization and equipment of a modern nation-state, but with the inaction or complicity of local law enforcement a well-armed population can run riot over unprotected minorities.

What happens when citizens take up arms against the government? Study the history of the Black Panthers. Despite being reasonably well-armed and organized, they were systematically hunted down and killed until the movement died out. Absent some zone of safety, protected by complicit law enforcement or benefiting from a smaller "sub-state," private use of weapons is ineffective. Reconstruction featured many similar examples. Racist militias failed to capture New Orleans in the Battle of Liberty Place in 1874 despite being reinforced by Confederate veterans and strengthened with weapons captured from US forces. However, these same militias found success in the rural countryside, where they enjoyed the complicity of local law enforcement.

Private weapons are ineffective in resisting the government, but highly effective as an unrecognized extension of government. Well-armed white paramilitaries were the lynchpin of Jim Crow, waging a campaign of terrorism in black communities. Their private activities allowed local governments to impose crippling limits on black citizens while escaping accountability. Many black Americans were armed as well, but their weapons did them little good. Racist militias could operate with the tacit backing of local law enforcement, while any use of force by black residents in self-defense was be ruthlessly punished.

Behind the “Second Amendment Remedies” lie lurks a dark reality: private arsenals have always been the bloody left hand of white supremacy. When gun enthusiasts shrug off the mass slaughter of innocent civilians to preserve “freedom,” they aren’t talking about your freedom or mine.

Lie #9: No legislation can curb gun deaths in the US.

Americans now have more guns in circulation than citizens. No credible regulatory scheme, no matter how smart or ambitious, is likely to bring the rate of gun deaths in America in line with global standards anytime soon. Whatever we achieve politically in the near term can only be a down-payment on a better world for our children.

There are a few smart measures that could begin to slow the carnage and place us on a path to a safer future. If we start soon and persist over time, future generations can enjoy lives relatively free from mass gun violence while preserving their historic right to own weapons. Perhaps our most promising model would borrow lessons from the regulation of our other most dangerous product – automobiles.

No one is permitted to drive on our roads without obtaining a license. Every automobile is registered. Every transaction is taxed. All vehicle owners are required to maintain insurance to cover potential harm. Despite tight regulation, car ownership is ubiquitous. Cars remain a major cause of injury and death, but insurance has played a critical role over the years in driving safety improvements. More than any other force, insurance companies' advocacy and political pressure has driven the industry to improve safety and curb highway deaths.

Our habit of imposing complicated and confusing restrictions on weapons by type and shape is largely theater, designed to create a sensation of progress while avoiding the fundamental problem. Instead, we should adopt a simpler, more powerful solution. Register every gun and every gun sale. Require gun owners to obtain a license. Make liability insurance a requirement for every gun owner, tracked to every gun. Require proof of insurance for every sale. Track sales of ammunition, just like we track the sale of Sudafed. Make these gun and ammunition registries available to law enforcement. It is a simple, constitutional approach that preserves the right of responsible adults to own as many weapons as they want, so long as they can demonstrate responsible, safe ownership.

Registration and insurance would not stop every crime, just like they fail to stop every automobile death. They would, however, begin to bring down gun deaths almost immediately. Faced with registration and insurance costs, declines in casual gun ownership would accelerate. It would become very expensive to maintain a gun-nut arsenal of dozens of weapons. Insurance costs would power the spread of trigger locks, gun safes and other safety protections. Registries would empower police to enforce gun laws. Liability suits and criminal actions against irresponsible gun owners would severely constrain criminals’ access to weapons. Instead of waiting for the ATF to crack down on illegal sellers, lawyers representing murder victims would quickly bankrupt today’s crop of amateur gun smugglers. Liability risks on sellers and insurers would make it more difficult for the obviously mentally ill to build an arsenal.

Personal freedom, constrained by personal responsibility, with limits imposed by markets rather than government. It’s an approach to gun control that any Republican should love, right?

Lie #10: Americans oppose tighter gun regulation.

When presented with concrete proposals to regulate guns, majorities of Americans almost always favor them. That support is so universal that it spreads across partisan lines. In fact, a ballot proposal on gun control passed in Nevada of all places. More than 90% of gun owners support universal background checks. A majority of Republicans support a national gun registry.

These ten lies have confused the public and diffused the political momentum of gun control advocates. A clearer understanding and concentrated focus will be key to achieving any legislative progress. We should approach this problem like our lives depend on it.

Chris Ladd, former GOP Precinct Committeeman, author of The Politics of Crazy and creator of PoliticalOrphans.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/chrisladd/2...e/#7de17d5c1fad

Nice lotta nonsense in that article. For example, there are rich citizens who own military grade planes and weapons. No, I won't name names either. When the amendment was written private citizens had full access to anything the military did. FULL not Partial access. Right now there are fully armed private militia with tanks, rocket launchers, helicopters, etc. in the united states. In some cases with full state approval.

This idea that states and cities can write local laws removing your federal rights is evil in my eyes.

Also you try telling people in rural america that they shouldn't have guns to protect themselves when a call to the police means you are left defenseless for 30 minutes at best or days at worst. Hell some places don't even have cops on the weekends or at night. Yet you think you have the right to tell them to give up the guns that might save their lives from predators? Get real.

If you want to stop terrible things happening at school then how about you worry about the things that kill over 100,000 kids a year vs the mass shootings that kill less than 400 a year. I mean even getting 1% of kids to stop using drugs would save more lives than happen from mass shootings.

But by all means use extreme and rare situations to steal the rights away from millions of Americans so they can live their life in even more fear of death. Because the police are not there to protect you. Police are there to punish the criminal AFTER the crime is committed. I prefer my gun keeping me safe than the police any day of the week.

Trump Jr. ‘likes’ tweets attacking Florida massacre survivor

https://nypost.com/2018/02/20/trump-jr-likes-tweets-attacking-florida-massacre-survivor/

Wow! Classless.

I am sorry, but armed guards at our schools is not the answer to this problem.

Better access to mental health care, and large societal changes are the answer. Of course that will obviously not happen for various reasons...

I swear sometimes I think im living in the Twilight Zone...

THIS we can agree upon.

So I do I understand that you believe that the public has a right to the same weaponry technology as the government without any restrictions? Just looking to make sure I understand your first point clearly.

jc



link

How the FBI handled two tips related to Nikolas Cruz

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nati...cruz/352142002/

The FBI received two tips about Nikolas Cruz, the self-confessed gunman in the Feb. 14 killings at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., but did not act on them.

Here's what happened:

First tip: Sept. 24, 2017

Ben Bennight, a bail bondsman at AFAB Bail Bonds in D'Iberville, Miss., saw a message on his YouTube channel “BenTheBondsman” from a commenter identifying himself as “nikolas cruz” that read:

"Im going to be a professional school shooter"

Bennight emailed a screenshot of the comment to the FBI.


FBI response (Feb. 15)

Special Agent Rob Lasky, special agent in charge of Miami Division:

“In 2017, the FBI received information about a comment made on a YouTube channel. No other information was included with that comment which would indicate a time, location or the true identity of the person who made the comment. The FBI conducted database reviews, checks, but was unable to further identify the person who actually made the comment.”


Second tip: Jan. 5, 2018

An anonymous person called the FBI’s Public Access Line, located in Clarksburg, W.Va., to warn about Cruz. The person cited concerns about:

"Cruz’s gun ownership, desire to kill people, erratic behavior, and disturbing social media posts, as well as the potential of him conducting a school shooting."

FBI response (Feb. 16)

The FBI said it did not follow established protocols to follow up.

"Under established protocols, the information provided by the caller should have been assessed as a potential threat to life," the FBI said.


"The information was not provided to the Miami Field Office, and no further investigation was conducted at that time," the FBI statement said.

The Justice Department has ordered a review.

Other red flags for Cruz

Law enforcement: Broward County sheriff's deputies were called out to the Cruz home about 30 times over the past seven years, according to news reports.

School officials: Other sources reported that school officials used email to warn teachers of Cruz's behavior. One teacher said they were told that Cruz should not be allowed on the school campus with a backpack. Cruz was expelled from Stoneman Douglas High in 2017.

Social workers: An investigator with Florida’s Department of Children and Families learned Cruz was cutting himself in late 2016 after breaking up with his girlfriend. The investigator was “concerned about (Cruz's) talk about wanting to purchase a gun and feeling depressed,” according to the agency’s investigation records.

Health workers: School officials asked Henderson Behavioral Health in Broward County to investigate reports of Cruz had cutting himself and fighting with another student. According to the DCF on Oct. 7, 2016, a school official reported that Henderson had "determined that (Cruz) was not at risk to harm himself or others."


If they don't follow systems in place what good it going to do to add more?

Distracted Driving

https://www.nhtsa.gov/risky-driving/distracted-driving


In 2015 alone, 3,477 people were killed, and 391,000 were injured in motor vehicle crashes involving distracted drivers.

During daylight hours, approximately 660,000 drivers are using cell phones while driving. That creates enormous potential for deaths and injuries on U.S. roads. Teens were the largest age group reported as distracted at the time of fatal crashes.

More statistics on distracted driving and other risky driving behaviors are available here.

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http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/anderson.cooper.360/blog/2007/01/raw-data-kidnapping-statistics.html

Monday, January 15, 2007


Raw Data: Kidnapping statistics

The discovery of the two missing boys in Missouri got some of us here at "360" wondering: Just how prevalent is kidnapping in the United States?

While researching this question today, I came across some interesting statistics. According to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (citing U.S. Department of Justice reports), nearly 800,000 children are reported missing each year. That's more than 2,000 a day.

The NCMEC says 203,000 children are kidnapped each year by family members. Another 58,200 are abducted by non-family members. Many others are runaways or pushed out of the home by parents.

Despite these huge numbers, very few children are victims of the kinds of crimes that so-often lead local and national news reports. According to NCMEC, just 115 children are the victims of what most people think of as "stereotypical" kidnapping, which the center characterizes thusly: "These crimes involve someone the child does not know or someone of slight acquaintance, who holds the child overnight, transports the child 50 miles or more, kills the child, demands ransom, or intends to keep the child permanently."

Of these 115 incidents, 57 percent ended with the return of the child. The other 43 percent had a less happy outcome.

And now we have people claiming this shooting was just another false flag operation, and the students are crisis actors.

Source?

Not that I doubt you-- it's more about curiosity, as this happens after every major school shooting, terrorist attack, and similar tragic events. Just accept it as a given that there will be some who claim that. They pop up on social media from time to time.

It makes you wonder who is trolling, and who actually believes it...

j/c...

In yesterday's school news....

Jackson student shoots self with rifle in school; frightened parents rush to scene

Social media rumors of another gun threat lock down Alliance High School

Boy, 8, says he feared being hurt so he took gun to Ohio school

Florida State Representative's aide fired after calling Parkland student activists "actors"

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/benjamin-ke...ervative-media/

How much would it cost to cover a reasonable level of security at all schools across the country? Note: I'm not asking about whether or not it is worth it. I'm more interested in the raw numbers.

Figure 100,000 schools across the country. I really have no idea what security, metal detectors, and armed guards at entrance(s) would cost but even at $1 million annually per school (this seems low), that comes out to $100 billion per year across all schools combined.

Somebody nudge my math in the right direction.

Granted it was an aide and not the Representative himself, but that's still kind of crazy.

I mean its not like you can make a homemade rocket launcher tape some ball bearings to a firework and shoot it into a concert if you can't find a gun right? Or maybe you want to get fancy and have a crop duster airplane spread a cloud of flour with red white and blue coloring over a crowd and shoot off a bottle rocket... if the giant fireball doesn't get them the stampede through bottle necks will.

You can't stop nuts from mass murder. It's just too easy to kill an unarmed and defenseless crowd of people for someone who is hell bent on murder and mayhem. They always go where they can kill the most people and get the most attention doing it. Schools, concerts, and large social events will always be a prime target. Of these Schools are by far the easiest target because they are seldom defended and the kids are too scared to fight back.

How many you think would die if a marine with ptsd went into a school with a knife wanting revenge on the school that bullied him as a kid before he became a killing machine? He doesn't need a gun to kill every person in that school. There are over 500,000 ex soldiers with post traumatic stress disorder ... WHY is it ok for our children not to be protected?

300 mass shooting deaths per year vs over 100,000 student deaths per year. People need to get their priorities straight.

I never claimed it was the representative himself, but it doesn’t matter. Make no mistake that the aide isn’t close to the only one who believes nonsense like that.

How many followers does infowars and Alex Jones have?

And others around the country who believe in these kinds of sick crap.

Sandy hook, Vegas, others, and now this supposedly have crisis actors? Pathetic.

Not sure about Infowars because the only time it ever comes up here is when some liberal whines about it. I never actually see it used as a legitimate source.

And I have to agree that it is kind of sick to pull the crisis actor thing. There are many people going through very real suffering after these tragedies.

I don't think anyone with any serious intellect think that democrats are hiring killers to murder children in order to push along their agenda of disarming the population so that they can be controlled easier. I mean they have hired protesters to stage unrest that is not there and that has led to violence and riots but to flat out murder kids is something I don't think they are capable of. I've never really cared for Alex Jone of infowars so I don't know what goes on with all that.

You want some real change? How about this ...

Since we've already determined that the Bill of Rights is "outdated" and should have no bearing on current laws, since the forefathers obviously had no foresight into the problems of the future ... then both the Second AND First Amendments should be under some serious scrutiny.

First, let's ban the ownership of all guns until the age of 21. You could also have a gun "leasing" program, where those in the military or law-enforcement under 21 could technically get a waiver and lease a gun to be under their possession. Their superior could revoke the lease if they felt they were unfit to possess a firearm. At age 25, you would be old enough to purchase semi-automatic guns.

Okay, gun control guys happier? Lets move on to the 1st Amendment then ...

First restrict the news media from releasing any name or personal information about the shooter. No more living in infamy for them. They will be a faceless statistic.

Then, let's make all PG-13 movies, no-admittance to anyone under 13 and required to have an adult present up until 18. Then make all R-rated movies, no-admittance to anyone under 18. Then do essentially the same thing with TV and video games. No sale to anyone under 18 for an M rated video game and no TV broadcast exposure for anything PG-13 and up (including the commercials). Any minor caught doing a violent crime and it's found that their parents allowed them to watch those things under-aged ... then the parents face consequences as well. Same as parents that let their kids drink under-aged.

Maybe if we stop overloading the hormones of under-aged males with sexually explicit content and then only allow them to watch movies that would be considered by today's standards "not violent enough to be enjoyable" (And I've heard movies described like this countless times) ... then maybe we'll have less homicidal lunatics running around? And if they have even less of a chance of legally arming themselves at that age, even better.

And if any of you are saying to yourselves, "Well, I've watched all kinds of violent movies when I was younger, and I didn't feel the need to shoot up a school. Why should *I* have my personal liberties infringed?" ... Well, then you just described 99.99% of gun owners.

I’m cool with that.

So what happens now.

Draft it up as a bill, I already wrote it once.

Did you contact the guy you voted for with your ideas?