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Also, I would like, if possible, in their toxology report if they could determine the amount of B12 in his system. He was reportedly a vegan because he didnt want to hurt animals. Vegans have a high risk of being deficient in certain vitamins and minerals, especially B12 because it mainly comes from animal products. If you are even slightly deficient in B12 it will render you psychotic and or have mental illness like depression or bipolar or dementia. It screws your brain up.
There is a chance you can become depressed and a chance you can become demented but that is after long time deficiency... in the majority of cases you are extremely fatigued, weak, and lightheaded...
This is true, it can take years because the liver stockpiles B12. No one knows how long he been a vegan though. There are only a few published pictures of him, and he is thin in all of them...in the most recent one he is skeletal looking.
I had surgery that removed the part of my intestine that absorbs B12. But I was unaware that it would cause me a problem. It took about 2 years before I started having problems because of it.
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Now, do I think there will be any meaningful headway made towards an assault weapon free world? Nope. There aren't enough politicians with balls enough to do something like that.
Even if there were enough politicians with balls to do something like that....making assault rifles and handguns illegal won't make them go away. The criminals willl always have them. Why should I be deprived of an effective means to defend myself and my loved ones because some idiot committed a criminal act?
And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.
- John Muir
#GMSTRONG
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Time to ban knives, bows, rocks, bombs, chainsaws, hammers, pickaxes, pipes, baseball bats, screwdrivers, razor blades, pitchforks, cars, swords, nail guns, corkscrews, toilet tank lids, oh I could go on and on 
When those items are used to kill 20 children and 7 adults in a matter of seconds, maybe you will have the point. The other weapon argument just does not hold because of time. The time it takes to kill 20 children.
We havent banned fertilizer and diesel yet... (OKC)
Airplanes killed thousands in the 9-11 attacks...(NYC)
Lets not forget the Bath School bombing in Michigan...plain old dynamite
Sure, and I can kill you with a banana, if I first dip it in liquid nitrogen, and drive a nail through your heart. It does not mean it is going to happen.
If you look at each example, you prove my point.
If you buy more than a minimal amount of the right type of fertilizer, and not a known farmer, you will get a visit.
We have this whole department of homeland security and the TSA as a result of those airplanes.
I believe that you cannot by dynamite without a permit.
Those were one-of instances that did result in changes. Yet we have people shooting off 30 rounds at a time into groups of people and we get of bunch of hyperbole about what else is going to be restricted.
The arguments really have worn thin, and fundamentally it just does not make any sense for someone to own a gun that has a mental record, nor does it make sense for an average Joe to have a weapon that you take out 30 people in 15 seconds.
Welcome back, Joe, we missed you!
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But no.... with alcohol, we accept that the individual is at fault and it is not the fault of the alcohol. We stopped making excuses.
With guns, however, we still point to the gun and say that it is bad, even though it can't be. It can only be what the person holding it makes it, and people don't like the idea that you just cannot predict when some jackwad is going to snap and do bad things with one.... this leaves them powerless, but people feel the need to do something, so they go after the one tangible, controllable thing - even though it will have no damned affect on anything except the people that responsibly own the things.
Wow purp, everybody found this interesting. 
I have two comments and one question.. as it comes to drunk driving, frequently people who don't know how to control their drinking and driving get caught, arrested, fined, etc before they ever do any damage. It doesn't deter everybody from doing it again, but I'd guess it forces a lot of people onto a better path... unfortunately, when somebody snaps and decides to do something bad with a gun, by the time we have identified that person, people are already dead.
Second, and this is sort of important to me, a lot of people do irresponsible things and get people hurt... so your analogy is much more valid if we were talking about things like kids getting shot because dad left his gun on the coffee table or if it went off when somebody was cleaning it... those are accidents by irresponsible people who can't control a powerful tool.. but that's not what we are talking about, we are talking about somebody who, with total intent to kill, gets hold of a tool and uses it for that purpose. If people started intentionally using alcohol or toilet lid covers to kill thousands of people a year, I'm sure we would be having a different conversation about those things as well... Intent is important. See a box cutter is a fairly ineffective tool for killing people on the ground, that's why you can still buy them by the case at hardware stores, they are much more lethal if you take over a plane with one, that's why they aren't allowed on planes any more... So I suppose metal detectors and pat downs at every school, mall, campus, etc is an option...
Now the question... People have said many times, let's blame the people and not the gun, and I'm really cool with that. If we could find a way to identify people that are going to snap and shoot dozens of people and arrest them before they do it, I'm all for that. How do you propose we do that? See, blame is a response to something that has already happened, so blaming the person, assumes the act has already happened.... and while catching and punishing people who use guns illegally is certainly important, it seems to me that we need to discuss ways to stop them BEFORE they do it rather than just knowing who to blame after people are dead... because in almost all of these cases, the bad person shoots himself last, so I doubt if he cares who blames him.
yebat' Putin
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jc 
It's supposed to be hard! If it wasn't hard, everyone would do it. The hard... is what makes it great!
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jc
Let me first say that the tragic shootings in CT has been one of the most heinous, despicable, and heart-breaking criminal acts that has occurred during my lifetime.
It is just plain awful.
And given how terrible this event was, there has been a nationwide outpouring of grief, and the accompanying cries for legislation to stop this kind of thing from happening in the future.
Unfortunately, as to be expected, the main discussions going on in America deal with more stringent gun control policies; with all sorts of proposed restrictions, regulations, permanent bans, and not-so-temporary-what-have-you's.
This really showcases the laziness at work in American society. In a culture of "painless" quick fixes, shortcuts, and out-of-touch lawmakers, these age-old ideas serve only to trim away rights guaranteed to us in the Bill of Rights while providing very little help in addressing the REAL problem at work here.
Yea, I know, you are amazed. You were sure that America's problem was guns. But in reality, guns are being scapegoated by people who refuse to look at the actual problem. They are being scapegoated because it is much easier to blame the gun for the violence. We can stop this from happening if we just ban guns...
..But you see. That is the shortcut, the easy-way-out. That is where you sacrifice your freedoms because you would rather give up your freedoms than face the real problems within your society. That is the laziness--the culture of shortcuts I am talking about.
These out-of-touch politicians keep on pursuing all these substance-less solutions for this country's problems and I am tired of it.
Here is the actual problem with what happened in CT. A 20-year-old young man felt that, at that point in his life, killing 20 defenseless children was the route he was going to take.
You see. Its a cultural thing, and until we change our culture, then these random acts of horrific violence are going to continue, albeit maybe on a different scale, or with different weapons, or by another means. But the intent, the malice, the depravity will still be there---and that is what you need to combat.
And I am quite sure that seeking to change our culture, to get back to a place where killing large groups of innocent people, or children, is no longer a way to showcase your anger/frustration/alienation/etc.
We as a society need to come together and change the way we carry ourselves everyday. Change the way we speak to others, change the way we interact with those around us. Change the way our communities come together. Even change the way our schools educate our children. That is the real answer.
More gun laws are a farce, and very much a cop-out with regard to the situation at hand.
I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch......
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Agreed. The culture needs to change. Mental Health support is needed in many ways. More than I can describe but you can find articles on it on the major news sites.
For one, we need to stop shaming and rejecting people with mental illness. Most people in society recognize that is is offensive to call a gay person a fag. It is inappropriate. So why is it ok to call people with mental issues a nutjob or a crazy or a psycho or any other derogatory term? Stop insulting people who are different and ostracizing them and instead give them some understanding. Give them places they can obtain help at low cost. Give them love instead of rejection.
The culture needs to change. The healthcare system needs to change. Currently the healthcare system makes it extremely difficult and costly for anyone to access mental health services. That majorly needs to change.
Banning guns is like putting a bandaid on a cut artery. Not gonna solve the problem.
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We as a society need to come together and change the way we carry ourselves everyday. Change the way we speak to others, change the way we interact with those around us. Change the way our communities come together. Even change the way our schools educate our children. That is the real answer.
Ok, let's get on it... ready... break.
yebat' Putin
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We as a society need to come together and change the way we carry ourselves everyday. Change the way we speak to others, change the way we interact with those around us. Change the way our communities come together. Even change the way our schools educate our children. That is the real answer.
Ok, let's get on it... ready... break.
I volunteer to give "counsel" to as many of those crazy Latina woman as possible 
KING
You may be in the drivers seat but God is holding the map. #GMSTRONG
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I started to read what you said but then got to the whole lets blame everything but real problem, there is no actual determent to killing. Killers get sent to death row (maybe) or they get released after say 20 years. Killers kick it with the system while the judges allow them to kill more people.
You want to look up a stat try this sometime. How many murders in this country are from 1st time offenders or convicted/accused assult murder criminals.
If a judge lets a killer go free and they kill again the judge should serve a sentence = to the one given the 2nd time killer. If a DA gets a killer wrong they also should serve a sentence = to the time served by the falsly accused.
Nope no one wants real laws that command respect lets just focus on the dumb crap that is the result instead of inflicting real fear into a criminals heart.
You run from the cops you end up bonnie and clyde style, dont run dont die.
You kill someone you will die, the same way you killed them.
You rob someone something will be taken from you, if you have nothing you do have body parts. Perhaps your liver will help save a person.
Today we have a killer living on our dimes here in Ohio because some people feel that hes to fat to kill. Thats why you have these fools. Address the problem from the top down (judges congress DA's) not from the bottom (legal permit holding gun owners) up.
You want big boy pants then try them on. We find they fit fine.
You want kid gloves you find the gov wants you to wear them and legislate me to death. No Thanks!
Of and do a search of homicide rates we are very low per capita I think only 5 per 100,000. I would wadger to bet more people die per 100,000 from being stupid.
I guess the real best comparison would be how many people die overall from un-natural causes to how many die due to guns.I would imagine the difference would be staggering.
If you need 3 years to be a winner you got here 2 years to early. Get it done Browns.
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I agree it is a cultural thing.
It is a culture that has a history of glorification of guns, one that was started by a revolution with guns, and one whos founding fathers attempted to create something totally radical at its time, and knew it may not work,
I am going to go a bit sideways here, but this country was founded with as far radical ideas (not left or right as we know it), but the idea of a representative democracy was radical for its time. What do you mean no monarchy? Essentially we were an experiment, similar to the Bolsheviks or Mao of this century. There was a chance that it may not work, and it would need to be overthrown. Hence some of the language of Jefferson.
I think there have been 2 significant occurrences where the military came in conflict with civilians I believe the Whiskey rebellion and the capture of John Brown when he attacked Harpers Ferry just before the civil war.
We have the civil war, wild west, the prohibition and other tales of conflict that are glamorized. Once movies came about, well.... and then video games... well....
The reality of any individual taking on the government with arms is implausible. The better chance lies within the political system. Most every time there is a political overthrow of some foreign government, we are pulling for the insurrectionists... It is in our nature....
So we wind up with some mentally challenged people who buy the biggest baddest piece of firepower that they can get their hands on, and then turn them on innocent people. It takes a few seconds. Then we throw our arms up in the air and say we can't really do anything about it. And point to everything and anything but the gun, as the person is just socially maladjusted....
If you want to change the culture, well, you will have to change how we glamorize guns.
Going back to my earlier statement, I really believe that we should have classifications for gun owners, and tiers of licensing with periodic training. So the bigger weapon you wish to operate, the more effort you have to put into it.
If there had been a tiered arrangement, the mother would have 1) had secured the weapons or 2) denied a permit for the bushmaster because of the presence of a mentally unstable person in the house, and this would have not happened.
A long way to say that more gun laws are not a farce.
Welcome back, Joe, we missed you!
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jc
Let me first say that the tragic shootings in CT has been one of the most heinous, despicable, and heart-breaking criminal acts that has occurred during my lifetime.
It is just plain awful.
And given how terrible this event was, there has been a nationwide outpouring of grief, and the accompanying cries for legislation to stop this kind of thing from happening in the future.
Unfortunately, as to be expected, the main discussions going on in America deal with more stringent gun control policies; with all sorts of proposed restrictions, regulations, permanent bans, and not-so-temporary-what-have-you's.
This really showcases the laziness at work in American society. In a culture of "painless" quick fixes, shortcuts, and out-of-touch lawmakers, these age-old ideas serve only to trim away rights guaranteed to us in the Bill of Rights while providing very little help in addressing the REAL problem at work here.
Yea, I know, you are amazed. You were sure that America's problem was guns. But in reality, guns are being scapegoated by people who refuse to look at the actual problem. They are being scapegoated because it is much easier to blame the gun for the violence. We can stop this from happening if we just ban guns...
..But you see. That is the shortcut, the easy-way-out. That is where you sacrifice your freedoms because you would rather give up your freedoms than face the real problems within your society. That is the laziness--the culture of shortcuts I am talking about.
These out-of-touch politicians keep on pursuing all these substance-less solutions for this country's problems and I am tired of it.
Here is the actual problem with what happened in CT. A 20-year-old young man felt that, at that point in his life, killing 20 defenseless children was the route he was going to take.
You see. Its a cultural thing, and until we change our culture, then these random acts of horrific violence are going to continue, albeit maybe on a different scale, or with different weapons, or by another means. But the intent, the malice, the depravity will still be there---and that is what you need to combat.
And I am quite sure that seeking to change our culture, to get back to a place where killing large groups of innocent people, or children, is no longer a way to showcase your anger/frustration/alienation/etc.
We as a society need to come together and change the way we carry ourselves everyday. Change the way we speak to others, change the way we interact with those around us. Change the way our communities come together. Even change the way our schools educate our children. That is the real answer.
More gun laws are a farce, and very much a cop-out with regard to the situation at hand.
You have hit a nail square on the head. Your last part I understand because the culture I grow up under was based on for action there is an = re-action.
This is what our government wants us to do dis-arm the public. Fall for it and you will reap the rewards of misunderstanding the situation.
If you need 3 years to be a winner you got here 2 years to early. Get it done Browns.
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I agree it is a cultural thing.
It is a culture that has a history of glorification of guns, one that was started by a revolution with guns, and one whos founding fathers attempted to create something totally radical at its time, and knew it may not work,
I am going to go a bit sideways here, but this country was founded with as far radical ideas (not left or right as we know it), but the idea of a representative democracy was radical for its time. What do you mean no monarchy? Essentially we were an experiment, similar to the Bolsheviks or Mao of this century. There was a chance that it may not work, and it would need to be overthrown. Hence some of the language of Jefferson.
I think there have been 2 significant occurrences where the military came in conflict with civilians I believe the Whiskey rebellion and the capture of John Brown when he attacked Harpers Ferry just before the civil war.
We have the civil war, wild west, the prohibition and other tales of conflict that are glamorized. Once movies came about, well.... and then video games... well....
The reality of any individual taking on the government with arms is implausible. The better chance lies within the political system. Most every time there is a political overthrow of some foreign government, we are pulling for the insurrectionists... It is in our nature....
So we wind up with some mentally challenged people who buy the biggest baddest piece of firepower that they can get their hands on, and then turn them on innocent people. It takes a few seconds. Then we throw our arms up in the air and say we can't really do anything about it. And point to everything and anything but the gun, as the person is just socially maladjusted....
If you want to change the culture, well, you will have to change how we glamorize guns.
Going back to my earlier statement, I really believe that we should have classifications for gun owners, and tiers of licensing with periodic training. So the bigger weapon you wish to operate, the more effort you have to put into it.
If there had been a tiered arrangement, the mother would have 1) had secured the weapons or 2) denied a permit for the bushmaster because of the presence of a mentally unstable person in the house, and this would have not happened.
A long way to say that more gun laws are not a farce.
What about the guy that has no permit and obtained his gun because he knows how to buy on the black market, walks into your house kills your family and then says in court sorry judge I was not raised proper?
How about the jury that says hes not stable to be killed so lets let him live then finally he gets out and kills again?
You could have stopped that whole cycle if only you could have denfended yourself.
No lets take that away.
As far as taking on the military. That is the scared talk that makes me laugh. If you wont protect your own land why should you expect someone else too?
If you need 3 years to be a winner you got here 2 years to early. Get it done Browns.
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We are talking about the killing of 20 children, and 6 adults in Newtown CT.
And what we should do about the number of times these weapons have been used to cause mass murder.
So you are off topic.... quite common.... so please stay on topic...
But if you want a response, the guy would have probably been put to death, hopefully by firing squad...
Welcome back, Joe, we missed you!
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We need to stop talking about guns. The bigger elephant in the room needs to be addressed. Mental health in this country needs to be addressed
The problem i have in all this is the generic term of " mental health". I know a bit about Aspbergers, and this action was not the work of Aspbergers. There was something much worse at work than that. People with Aspbergers tend to be less violent then non Aspbergers people. Now while people with this condition can lash out, what this guy did was not lash out. What he did was a cold, calculated, planned, murder plot.
I have a son who has a Aspbergers diagnosis. I have a fear that now all of a sudden he is going to be pigeon holed by people who dont know a thing about Aspbergers. My son and I shoot guns and bows together, i actually had some idiot on another forum question me as to why i have taught my son to shoot a gun if he has Aspbegers because some dude, who happened to have Aspbergers murdered a bunch of kids. So i guess now all Aspbergers people must be capable of this atrocious crime. When in fact his actions go completely against something an Aspbergers diagnosed person would do.
Notice i say diagnosis, that because i am dubious to it. As a matter of fact, his counselor told me the other day that Aspbergers is going to be taken away pretty soon because it is too vague.
KING
I don't think Aspberger's is/was his only problem and it could have been a misdiagnosis or just part of his mental issues. Combing that with the household he was supposedly living in, it was a bad mix. I heard aspbergers being thrown around, and I never thought that was the cause, but other issues way beyond that diagnosis which may not even be the true diagnosis in his case. But who really knows with this case. Aspbergers seems to be thrown out a lot in this story, and I do doubt that was even his real mental issue in the whole matter.
![[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]](http://i.imgur.com/FUKyw.png) "Don't be burdened by regrets or make your failures an obsession or become embittered or possessed by ruined hopes"
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There's a lot of text here, so I'm going to reply in parts  Quote:
I have two comments and one question.. as it comes to drunk driving, frequently people who don't know how to control their drinking and driving get caught, arrested, fined, etc before they ever do any damage. It doesn't deter everybody from doing it again, but I'd guess it forces a lot of people onto a better path... unfortunately, when somebody snaps and decides to do something bad with a gun, by the time we have identified that person, people are already dead.
Yes, some get caught.... lots don't. Many end up getting into car wrecks and killing innocent people. By the time anyone knew they were DUI, people were already dead. A car is a two ton missile. A drunk driver is a malfunctioning guidance system.
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Second, and this is sort of important to me, a lot of people do irresponsible things and get people hurt... so your analogy is much more valid if we were talking about things like kids getting shot because dad left his gun on the coffee table or if it went off when somebody was cleaning it... those are accidents by irresponsible people who can't control a powerful tool.. but that's not what we are talking about, we are talking about somebody who, with total intent to kill, gets hold of a tool and uses it for that purpose. If people started intentionally using alcohol or toilet lid covers to kill thousands of people a year, I'm sure we would be having a different conversation about those things as well... Intent is important. See a box cutter is a fairly ineffective tool for killing people on the ground, that's why you can still buy them by the case at hardware stores, they are much more lethal if you take over a plane with one, that's why they aren't allowed on planes any more... So I suppose metal detectors and pat downs at every school, mall, campus, etc is an option...
Everything you stated there points to the Human being the problem. A human making a conscious CHOICE to use a weapon.
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Now the question... People have said many times, let's blame the people and not the gun, and I'm really cool with that. If we could find a way to identify people that are going to snap and shoot dozens of people and arrest them before they do it, I'm all for that. How do you propose we do that? See, blame is a response to something that has already happened, so blaming the person, assumes the act has already happened.... and while catching and punishing people who use guns illegally is certainly important, it seems to me that we need to discuss ways to stop them BEFORE they do it rather than just knowing who to blame after people are dead... because in almost all of these cases, the bad person shoots himself last, so I doubt if he cares who blames him.
So, getting rid of all guns everywhere makes more sense than dealing with whackjobs? And don't even pretend to say "we'll only get rid of assault weapons".... because that's completely worthless. What would be the point? One person with two revolvers can unleash the exact same kind of hell as we just saw... it just might be less dramatic. Heck the killer at Sandy Hook had a Glock and a Sig Sauer handgun with him... standard 9mm weapons. Let's face it, a .22 would be enough to kill a 5 or 6 year old quite easily. I'm sure that those handguns got plenty of use in there, too.... I can't see someone using the AR-15 at close range; it's just awkward.
So - all would guns have to go..... and I don't think so. Why should the hundreds of thousands of responsible gun owners out there have to give up their guns because of less than a handful of whackos? It's absolutely absurd. You're legislating for the exception, for the sake of legislating simply because you don't know what else to do.
Why not discuss how to stop them BEFORE? Because you CANNOT. The simple, immutable fact of all of this is that if someone wants to do something like this, unless authorities catch a break and get wind of it, IT CANNOT BE PREVENTED. Take away their guns, and they will use fertilizer (still legal, by the way). Ever hear of a pipe bomb? They're a piece of cake to make and it would make one helluva big mess in a small room. How about a zip gun? What about the ridiculously MASSIVE black market for guns that will pop up? If someone wants a weapon, if someone wants to kill.... they WILL find a way.
So, now you've taken away all the legal guns from the responsible, there is a massive black market for them (guns will NOT go away.... just look at how ineffective we are at keeping drugs off the street) - and the only people that will bother to buy them are the hardcore collectors willing to risk the black market and the people that are looking to do bad things. Now you won't have a favorable ending to stories like this.
The whole debate is akin to 9/11 and the formation of TSA.... it's WAY over-reacting due to emotions, and there isn't enough simple reason being exercised.
Browns is the Browns
... there goes Joe Thomas, the best there ever was in this game.
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jc
Let me first say that the tragic shootings in CT has been one of the most heinous, despicable, and heart-breaking criminal acts that has occurred during my lifetime.
It is just plain awful.
And given how terrible this event was, there has been a nationwide outpouring of grief, and the accompanying cries for legislation to stop this kind of thing from happening in the future.
Unfortunately, as to be expected, the main discussions going on in America deal with more stringent gun control policies; with all sorts of proposed restrictions, regulations, permanent bans, and not-so-temporary-what-have-you's.
This really showcases the laziness at work in American society. In a culture of "painless" quick fixes, shortcuts, and out-of-touch lawmakers, these age-old ideas serve only to trim away rights guaranteed to us in the Bill of Rights while providing very little help in addressing the REAL problem at work here.
Yea, I know, you are amazed. You were sure that America's problem was guns. But in reality, guns are being scapegoated by people who refuse to look at the actual problem. They are being scapegoated because it is much easier to blame the gun for the violence. We can stop this from happening if we just ban guns...
..But you see. That is the shortcut, the easy-way-out. That is where you sacrifice your freedoms because you would rather give up your freedoms than face the real problems within your society. That is the laziness--the culture of shortcuts I am talking about.
These out-of-touch politicians keep on pursuing all these substance-less solutions for this country's problems and I am tired of it.
Here is the actual problem with what happened in CT. A 20-year-old young man felt that, at that point in his life, killing 20 defenseless children was the route he was going to take.
You see. Its a cultural thing, and until we change our culture, then these random acts of horrific violence are going to continue, albeit maybe on a different scale, or with different weapons, or by another means. But the intent, the malice, the depravity will still be there---and that is what you need to combat.
And I am quite sure that seeking to change our culture, to get back to a place where killing large groups of innocent people, or children, is no longer a way to showcase your anger/frustration/alienation/etc.
We as a society need to come together and change the way we carry ourselves everyday. Change the way we speak to others, change the way we interact with those around us. Change the way our communities come together. Even change the way our schools educate our children. That is the real answer.
More gun laws are a farce, and very much a cop-out with regard to the situation at hand.
Quoted for Truth!
I could not agree more strongly.
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... there goes Joe Thomas, the best there ever was in this game.
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jc..
So, what is the solution?
Depends on what the priorities are !
Speaking for myself, the #1 priority is "protecting the kids" while they are at school !
No longer can we say, "what if"...because one of the worst imaginable acts anyone could ever dream of, did just happened in America, a week ago.
My solution is an "armed security professional" inside the school near the main entrance.
This armed professional could be a deputy sheriff, a policeman, someone from a private security firm...I don't care who provides the security, but they must be a "trained professional", capable of pulling the trigger and taking a human life, if necessary to protect the kids inside the school.
Arming teachers should not be viewed as a solution...because teachers are educated and trained to teach, not pull the trigger of a gun. Taking another human beings life might not be as easy as some believe. I would want someone trained in law enforcement, should a school be threatened.
If a teacher wants to carry a gun and is allowed to carry a gun by the state/local law and the school board, fine. But the issue of arming teachers must be examined from all angles and not in lieu of armed professionals.
In Ohio, we see security provided for all football and basketball games..provided by the county Sheriff, in our area...yet the same level of security is not provided to our schools during the school day. Our priorities need to be examined.
Paying for the security could come from a tax levied on the sale of guns and ammo so the state and local districts are not stuck with the bill.
I do have ideas on some of the other issues, but what I'm suggesting here should be done first, while the other issues are discussed.
Also, I view this solution...an armed security professional posted inside the school...as a permanent fix, not a temporary solution.
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Focus on the problem my friend, not the symptom.
The problem is too many damn guns are too easily available to any Tom, Dick or Harry. Talk of anything else is a smoke screen.
"People who drink light 'beer' don't like the taste of beer; they just like to pee a lot."
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If a judge lets a killer go free and they kill again the judge should serve a sentence = to the one given the 2nd time killer.
Judges don't usually make that decision, a jury does. And if you want thousands of innocent people sent to jail because judges are afraid to do their job and enforce the law as it is written for fear of ending up in prison themselves, then this is a good way to go.
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If a DA gets a killer wrong they also should serve a sentence = to the time served by the falsly accused.
Ok, now I get it... you are pretty much just against that whole "fair trial" part of our constitution. 
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Nope no one wants real laws that command respect...
Sorry, but your real laws that command respect sound remarkably like those in Iran and other various other dictatorships where you are guilty if the state says you are guilty, evidence be damned....
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You run from the cops you end up bonnie and clyde style, dont run dont die.
So a kid is about to get pulled over for speeding, realizes he has a little weed in the car, takes off running for a few minutes before getting caught.. the result should be death?
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You kill someone you will die, the same way you killed them.
We should probably execute the killers parents too for raising them that way.
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You rob someone something will be taken from you, if you have nothing you do have body parts. Perhaps your liver will help save a person.
So you rob a convenience store because you have no money and no food so the state takes your liver (which by the way means you die... you only have one liver) ... My God George Orwell never imagined anybody like you.
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Today we have a killer living on our dimes here in Ohio because some people feel that hes to fat to kill.
That guy should have been executed. I remember the story.
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Of and do a search of homicide rates we are very low per capita I think only 5 per 100,000. I would wadger to bet more people die per 100,000 from being stupid.
5 per 100,000 homicide rate is pretty high compared to other countries similar to ours. You do realize that based on our population, going from 4 per 100,000 to 5 per 100,000 represents 3,000 more homicides right? and what does that have to do with anything? The whole, "we can't keep everybody from dying, therefore we can't do anything to prevent homicide", argument is really getting out of control.
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I guess the real best comparison would be how many people die overall from un-natural causes to how many die due to guns.I would imagine the difference would be staggering.
No, the real best comparison is how many die intentionally at the hands of others to how many of those can we prevent. People who die from freestyle rock climbing and people who die because they go into the glades to pet the gators and people who die because their gas water heater exploded accidently and people who die from accidental food poisoning and people who die trying to jump a ravine on a motorcycle are not, in any way, a part of this discussion.... even people who get drunk, speed home, and kill a family on the highway are NOT a part of this discussion. Drunk driving is a problem, it's getting better but its still a problem and if somebody would like to have a real conversation on how to further prevent drunk driving deaths then, by God, let's have that discussion. Somebody start a thread and we can all talk about how to prevent drunk driving fatalities, I'm all for it. None of that has any bearing whatsoever on the problem of gun violence. Gun violence has its own set of factors to consider that are different than pretty much anything else that has been mentioned primarily because the killing we are talking about is INTENTIONAL. It is a bad person intentionally killing an innocent person (or more). I'm sorry if that is confusing to everybody but that makes it different than all of the other examples given.
yebat' Putin
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Now you won't have a favorable ending to stories like this.
You also won't have endings to stories like this:
Link
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That's six people who were shot, five of them fatally, by family or loved ones who mistook them for intruders, in the past six months. Two children, one of which died. Two of the fatal shots were fired by retired police officers. And while they probably will get filed under "accidental death" in the statistics, every one was a shot fired with the intent to kill.
(Apologies if some links are mobile links. I'm on my phone.)
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My solution is an "armed security professional" inside the school near the main entrance.
we do not always agree, but in this case, I do agree with you.
the issue is how to pay for it. even at $20/hour this would be ~$28K/year expense (8hrs * 5days/week * 34school weeks/year).
many cities have multiple elementary schools feeding into multiple middle schools and then several high schools. school funding is already under pressure.
I have seen it suggested that one way to help finance such a venture is through a "license tax" and a "gun tax." In it, you must re-up your gun registration each year and there is additional tax on buying a gun and this money feeds into such a program.
It seems to me that those taxes would have to be extraordinary and just too much to be feasible. So, I am not sure how we would pay for it, but I do support the idea (and trying to figure out how).
#gmstrong
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Yes, some get caught.... lots don't. Many end up getting into car wrecks and killing innocent people. By the time anyone knew they were DUI, people were already dead. A car is a two ton missile. A drunk driver is a malfunctioning guidance system.
The difference remains people don't get drunk, get in a car, and speed through the glass of an elementary school hoping to kill as many people as they can. You are going to have a hard time changing my opinion on the fact that the intent to kill people is an important factor in this discussion...
However, let's play a hypothetical... I invent a fool proof breathalyzer device that gets put in every car in America and the problem of drunk driving ceases to exist, it goes away forever... can we talk about guns now? or are we going to have to move to the next best comparison?
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Everything you stated there points to the Human being the problem. A human making a conscious CHOICE to use a weapon.
I understand that. I have never once made excuses for the person who makes the choice to use a weapon. I have never once blamed the gun itself for what happened. Not once. But you keep acting like I am... Purp, I have a lot of respect for you as a poster but you quote me and then you go off on a tangent that has nothing to do with anything I said... It seems as if you have these canned responses for defense of guns and you are going to use them regardless of what I say...
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So, getting rid of all guns everywhere makes more sense than dealing with whackjobs? And don't even pretend to say "we'll only get rid of assault weapons".... because that's completely worthless. What would be the point? One person with two revolvers can unleash the exact same kind of hell as we just saw... it just might be less dramatic. Heck the killer at Sandy Hook had a Glock and a Sig Sauer handgun with him... standard 9mm weapons. Let's face it, a .22 would be enough to kill a 5 or 6 year old quite easily. I'm sure that those handguns got plenty of use in there, too.... I can't see someone using the AR-15 at close range; it's just awkward.
So - all would guns have to go..... and I don't think so. Why should the hundreds of thousands of responsible gun owners out there have to give up their guns because of less than a handful of whackos? It's absolutely absurd. You're legislating for the exception, for the sake of legislating simply because you don't know what else to do.
Reference my comment above.. not once have I ever said we should take ALL guns or really any guns away from people. Not once. Yet you wrote 2 paragraphs on why it wouldn't work and then you question my motive for wanting to do something that I don't even want to do.
The part I will agree with is about legislating to the exception. Basically almost all laws are directed at the exception... the majority of people don't beat their kids, but we have laws against it because some do. The majority of people don't take a pocket knife on a plane to kill people, but we have laws against because a few did. The majority of people wouldn't drive 120 mph down the highway, but some would, so we have laws against it. The majority of people when they say "I could kill you" don't mean it they are just upset, but we have laws against it because some might. Almost every law we have is to prevent those without the common sense and decency to do the right thing on their own, from doing the wrong thing... then give us recourse to punish them if they do the wrong thing. That's what the law does.
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The whole debate is akin to 9/11 and the formation of TSA.... it's WAY over-reacting due to emotions, and there isn't enough simple reason being exercised.
I agree 100%, which is why I'm not in favor of pushing through any legislation doing ANYTHING until everybody has had a chance to calm down and have lengthy discussions and debates and presented a ton of information...
My exact comments when the Patriot Act was created was that it was far from perfect, it was a knee jerk reaction and that I hoped they would work a lot of it out in the years to come... I'm pretty much still waiting.
yebat' Putin
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I have a major problem with this, which is "armed security professional". What is this, exactly? How are they qualified? How do we weed out the ex-soldiers with PTSD?
How about WE decide how WE should protect OUR children? Every local PTA should have a few folks who hunt or shoot. People with their own children in the school system. Local folks who need a low-paying job, yet who have an interest in doing it well. People known to others in the community. People also more likely to know who the potential whackjobs are.
Have everybody take an extensive course in firearm safety and crowd control. Make sure they can hit what they aim at.
People are freaking out about others who want to own guns, then turn for the protection of their children to people who Chose A Career featuring wearing guns and sometimes shooting people with them.
We, all of us, are the militia. Not Somebody Else. We were not meant to designate a special class to keep and bear arms, that right was won for all of us.
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so, let me get this straight.
you don't trust the PD or a local security company to only supply trusted people to protect the schools (with all their background checks and previous employment records, etc.). but, you do trust the local PTA to put some random mother/father with a gun in the schools on the basis that they hunt and take some course?
#gmstrong
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A private citizen, known to his or her friends and neighbors, a parent with a child in that school, instead of some stranger, who CHOSE to use a gun everyday in his line of work?
Someone who might, if necessary, work for free?
Someone who actually is concerned about doing the job, because it's not just a job?
Why is it you automatically trust those other people? Do they not make mistakes, do they not overstep their authority?
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i don't fully trust anyone. enough craziness happens in this world where that is just not possible.
however, I do trust a process that is put in place to weed out the crazies more than I trust randomly picking someone without that process just because they "care" more.
That "care" can also lead to mistakes. Trained professionals are noted as such for a reason.
#gmstrong
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Yea, I kind of have to agree with you here. I just picture myself with a gun standing guard in the lobby of the school where my son goes... when one of his friends, a kid I know well, walks through the door with what appears to be a gun or maybe it's just a large bulge in his jacket and I have to detain him or maybe I have a few seconds to decide whether to draw on him and maybe shoot him or not.
That's taking a bad situation and making it worse....
yebat' Putin
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Quote:
Yea, I kind of have to agree with you here. I just picture myself with a gun standing guard in the lobby of the school where my son goes... when one of his friends, a kid I know well, walks through the door with what appears to be a gun or maybe it's just a large bulge in his jacket and I have to detain him or maybe I have a few seconds to decide whether to draw on him and maybe shoot him or not.
That's taking a bad situation and making it worse....
Training. You do NOT pull your gun on a POSSIBLE threat in that situation. You simply say "Johnny - whatcha carrying there bud? I need to see.
Even cops don't do that.....pull their gun without reason to believe they'll def. need it.
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Arch, I understand... I wasn't trying to get too deep into the specifics of any particular situation... per the description he gave, not a lot of people are going to submit to extensive training and go through what it would take to stand guard in the lobby for little or no money...
Just trying to point out the conflict of having parents with guns guarding a school where their own kids and their friends go and the confrontations it could create...
yebat' Putin
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Quote:
Arch, I understand... I wasn't trying to get too deep into the specifics of any particular situation... per the description he gave, not a lot of people are going to submit to extensive training and go through what it would take to stand guard in the lobby for little or no money...
Just trying to point out the conflict of having parents with guns guarding a school where their own kids and their friends go and the confrontations it could create...
Understood.
Plus, I also understand it would be a HUGE responsibility, with enormous liability.
As I said before, I do NOT have the answers. I do know that "locking school doors" is not the answer.
We can limit magazine capacity - but, it only takes a couple of seconds to load a new mag.
Ban all semi auto guns - only allow revolvers - with a speed loader, it only takes 5-10 seconds to re load a revolver.
The answer is........I don't know. I do know I sleep better at night knowing I have 12 rounds under my pillow and a phone on my nightstand.....knowing that in a county of 422 sq miles, and at most only 2 deputies are on duty - and if someone breaks into my house, I can take action before the police can arrive. That is also a huge responsibility.
I'd love to share an "incident" that became a non incident - but I won't.
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The answer is........I don't know.
Thank you, neither do I.
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I do know I sleep better at night knowing I have 12 rounds under my pillow and a phone on my nightstand.....knowing that in a county of 422 sq miles, and at most only 2 deputies are on duty - and if someone breaks into my house, I can take action before the police can arrive. That is also a huge responsibility.
And I would fight hard to ensure that you never lose the right to do that legally....
yebat' Putin
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Ban all semi auto guns - only allow revolvers - with a speed loader, it only takes 5-10 seconds to re load a revolver.
I think that's the only semi-practical thing that could happen out of this. Stop making semi-automatic weapons. Banning assault rifles doesn't do jack considering most of these things occur at close range and a semi-auto handgun is probably use more than an assault rifle.
Do I agree 100% with doing that? ehh. It's better than most alternative scenarios I've heard tossed around.
#gmstrong
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Arch, I will also add that I have a decent understanding of the complexity of the issue and a large part of that is defining exactly what it is you want to accomplish when talking about restrictions and bans and all of that.
One of my good friends and coworkers is big into his guns for hunting, sport and personal protection... so we have been talking a lot, going back well before this incident... He has explained to me in great detail how difficult it is to craft language, even if you did want to ban the big scary guns, that doesn't also ban a good number of reasonable hunting weapons, personal protection weapons, etc.... because they share similar characteristics...
It's a complex issue, one that I don't look to go away any time soon.
yebat' Putin
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