[paraclete]

I don't know Clete. A handgun with a large capacity clip can mow down a lot of people in a short time. Two clips and more will die. A killer can find what he wants and does, and no one is the wiser until he's done.

Yes I know there are exotic handguns with rapid fire capibility, but make a start, go back to banning assault weapons and do the registration thing so sales are policed. You might just stop the odd crazy. You have the ability to go after the illegal market
Do it

[talaniman]

It would seem an easy thing, but lawmakers must be pressed a LOT more before we can even have tighter background checks, which are popular with 7 in 10 Americans. Chicago has strict gun laws, but every city and small town around it has lax laws, if any.

[paraclete]

It would seem an easy thing, but lawmakers must be pressed a LOT more before we can even have tighter background checks, which are popular with 7 in 10 Americans. Chicago has strict gun laws, but every city and small town around it has lax laws, if any.

And therein lies your problem, sold out by states rights. Surely you can have federal law that is enforceable or are you a nation of rebels

[jlisenbe]

Yes I know there are exotic handguns with rapid fire capibility, but make a start, go back to banning assault weapons and do the registration thing so sales are policed.

Assault weapons are already banned.

And therein lies your problem, sold out by states rights. Surely you can have federal law that is enforceable or are you a nation of rebels.

There are many federal laws that are enforced, including one in the Constitution that provides for the ownership of guns. However, believing in liberty as we do, or at least used to do, we understand that an overbearing, ponderous central government is the enemy of liberty.

[talaniman]

The subject at hand is how to prevent mass shootings. Got any ideas? What do you do about the liberty of innocent unarmed victims? If liberty is walking around with a gun, then we have that already.

[paraclete]

The subject at hand is how to prevent mass shootings. Got any ideas? What do you do about the liberty of innocent unarmed victims? If liberty is walking around with a gun, then we have that already.

It really isn't as difficult as you think, but there is something in your thinking, your ethos, that prevents it. It is that the gun is sacrosanct. Your constitution is couched in such general terms that even lethal weapons are permitted, even weapons that could not have been conceived by those who wrote the constitution, in that day weapons were single shot. And so, as a consequence, you have these events. Cause and effect. In some other nations where the gun is not sacrosanct, such events are rare

[jlisenbe]

Someone might want to consider why it is that these mass shooting incidents have grown so prevalent over the past twenty five years. We had LESS strict gun laws prior to that but basically no mass shootings. What has happened over the past 25 years that has caused this? It has nothing to do with "assault weapons". We've had guns for centuries. What changed?

[paraclete]

Someone might want to consider why it is that these mass shooting incidents have grown so prevalent over the past twenty five years. We had LESS strict gun laws prior to that but basically no mass shootings. What has happened over the past 25 years that has caused this? It has nothing to do with "assault weapons". We've had guns for centuries. What changed?

It is a really good question, War. Your nation has been in a constant state of war, this causes disruption, many PTSD cases, families destroyed. People have anxiety, are distrustfull of others, and you have the immigrant problem adding to uncertainty, drugs, prison destroying lives, a police force that can no longer be trusted. All these factors lead to intolerance, frustration..

Trump tapped into it. people wanted something different, but he hasn't delivered, he can't

[talaniman]

More loonies? More psychopaths? More criminals? More homicidal maniacs? We can't tell by looking can we?

It is a really good question, War. Your nation has been in a constant state of war, this causes disruption, many PTSD cases, families destroyed. People have anxiety, are distrustfull of others, and you have the immigrant problem adding to uncertainty, drugs, prison destroying lives, a police force that can no longer be trusted. All these factors lead to intolerance, frustration..

Trump tapped into it. people wanted something different, but he hasn't delivered, he can't

Well said.

[jlisenbe]

It is a really good question, War. Your nation has been in a constant state of war, this causes disruption, many PTSD cases, families destroyed. People have anxiety, are distrustfull of others, and you have the immigrant problem adding to uncertainty, drugs, prison destroying lives, a police force that can no longer be trusted. All these factors lead to intolerance, frustration..

In the 40's we had WW2. In the 50's it was Korea. In the 60's it was Vietnam. In the 60's and 70's there was not a rash of mash shootings, so I don't think your war theory holds water.

[talaniman]

I was in Texas in '66 when a loony massacred 14 people. I have seen assassinations of leaders and would be leaders. I have seen cops and army beating heads in the streets, and killing students on college campuses. You must not be paying much attention at the violence that has pervaded since the last world war.

Didn't you have a TV growing up?

[jlisenbe]

Oh come on. Read a little. Do a little research. Learn something. Mass shootings are largely something from the past twenty years. Again, 15 minutes on the internet would have shown you that.

Behold: https://www.washingtonpost.com/graph...=.c3664ccf32e4

[talaniman]

Looks to me like an old problem has greatly escalated and we have done nothing about it. What did we do then? What do you think the causes of these mass shootings are? Don't you suspect these events were in large part predictable? Here at least but it's not exclusive just to us.

I would give you links but following them would be a lot more than a few minutes.

[jlisenbe]

We have disposed of our moral bearings. We used to have the Ten Commandments, for instance, posted in our public schools. We used to pray in our public schools. Those acknowledgements of God were, in my view, very persuasive in convincing students they should follow a particular moral code. Now it's just every man for himself, and the results are predictable.

Far more disturbing than mass shootings are the thousands and thousands of homicides committed every year. No one had a more dramatic impact on that than former Mayor Giuliana in New York City. Maybe we should examine what he did.

[talaniman]

I've always wondered about the tablet of commandments Moses broke in anger. What did we miss? Would you be open to prayer in school that was not of the Christian teachings for non Christian students? When others of different faiths religion or moral teaching are excluded then every man for himself is an inevitable outcome, and is public education the correct forum for teaching moral behavior, or do the parents have that responsibility.

As to crime and order...https://www.city-journal.org/html/ho...ory-13197.html it still takes a village.

[jlisenbe]

Best quote from the story. "Clearly, Giuliani and Bratton were heroes in reclaiming public spaces." Truth is, it never happened until Giuliani became mayor. The change was dramatic. The moral of the story is to elect republican mayors.

Takes a village? No, it takes intact, healthy families. Does the village have a place in things? Yes, but it cannot take the place of family.

As to public schools, the prayer in New York state which the Supreme Court used to end prayer in schools was as follows: "Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers and our country." Do you see anything offensive in that? I am convinced that if we had been praying that prayer in every school in America the past fifty years, we would have a very much different country.

[Wondergirl]

As to public schools, the prayer in New York state which the Supreme Court used to end prayer in schools was as follows: "Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers and our country." Do you see anything offensive in that? I am convinced that if we had been praying that prayer in every school in America the past fifty years, we would have a very much different country.

I attended a public school in NC during the early '50s. We had Bible verse competitions, sang hymns, and prayed together. There still were schoolyard bullies, pregnant teen girls whose female family members helped them abort, a pecking order by which the kids on the bottom rung were shunned or at least picked on. If human behavior has gotten worse, it's not from lack of prayer in school but because the Internet and social media have given kids all sorts of new ways to be unkind.

[jlisenbe]

I attended a public school in NC during the early '50s. We had Bible verse competitions, sang hymns, and prayed together. There still were schoolyard bullies, pregnant teen girls whose female family members helped them abort, a pecking order by which the kids on the bottom rung were shunned or at least picked on. If human behavior has gotten worse, it's not from lack of prayer in school but because the Internet and social media have given kids all sorts of new ways to be unkind.

Please tell me you are not trying to suggest that out of wedlock births, drug use, and violent behavior have not spiraled up greatly since the 1950's.

"If human behavior has gotten worse." Are you kidding? It's the most easy development to document I can imagine.

All of this was well under way far before the internet and social media became widespread. You're kidding yourself.

BTW, I'm not in favor of public schools becoming branches of evangelical churches. I understand that many parents do not send their children to school to hear the Bible being read, but I do suspect there must be a middle ground between that and what we have now.

[jlisenbe]

Pretty good quote on this subject.

"You see, it matters whether people around the world understand these ancient stories. It deeply matters. We are becoming unmoored, because we no longer share the structure these stories undergird. This is psychologically destabilizing. It’s producing a pathological and desperate nihilism that is increasingly common and, at the same time, a pronounced proclivity for the ideological certainty that mimics but cannot replace true religious belief. Both consequences are bound to be, as the evidence certainly indicates, divisive and truly dangerous."

[paraclete]

Pretty good quote on this subject.

"You see, it matters whether people around the world understand these ancient stories. It deeply matters. We are becoming unmoored, because we no longer share the structure these stories undergird. This is psychologically destabilizing. It’s producing a pathological and desperate nihilism that is increasingly common and, at the same time, a pronounced proclivity for the ideological certainty that mimics but cannot replace true religious belief. Both consequences are bound to be, as the evidence certainly indicates, divisive and truly dangerous."

Philosophy will get you nowhere, but New Zealand has found the moral imperative, lives are worth more than guns. They will remove assault weapons and semi automatics, pity it took the death of many for someone to get a backbone Let us hope that other nations will see what it takes, because guns do kill and the absence of guns kill no one