one piece of gun knowledge Aren’t there guns where holding it sideways is a good idea? I seem to remember that in particular cases the gun jerk can be used in combination with a sideways hold to fire a sweep of bullets.
Edit:
Actually, that would be the argument for saying “gun-banning laws don’t stop crime”. As in, if someone’s interested in killing someone, they’re going to just use a knife or some other means. But pkbites specifically said gun crime. Slightly different matter; I can willingly believe that gun-banning laws do stop gun crime. Or at the very least just one of them.
Anyway, I still say that being so certain as they apparently are is pretty damn wonky.
Let’s take the argument further, then. If gun laws were effective, guns would never be used in a crime. Every state has gun laws, some more stringent than others, yet gun crime still exists. Someone who commits a crime with a gun does not stop to think about whether they are breaking the law or not. Since the only people who break laws are criminals, the laws that are written specifically to govern their behavior are ineffective. Therefore, they are not dissuaded by gun laws, and hence the assertion that gun laws have never stopped a single crime. The crimes are committed in defiance of the laws, and they are only identified as crimes after the law is broken.
Again, it’s a bit of a specious argument because you cannot quantify it, but it makes for a good discussion. Unfortunately, it’s one that has no resolution, so I’d rather not have it here, since every gun thread eventually devolves into unprovable non-specific assertions like that one.
I would say to you that they don’t have to be 100% effective in order to be effective; you could say exactly the same thing about every criminal law. And i’d say that it may not be the breaking of the law that puts them off, but the added annoyance of having to jump through hoops in order to get a gun that does. And I could say that having guns more readily avaliable may lead to problems of the “heat-of-the-moment” kind.
But really my point was just to say that I find it very odd that pkbites is so darn certain about their true reality.
Not necessarily. To make an analogy to myself, I am vaguely interested in trying pot. If it were not illegal, I probably would do so. The fact that it is illegal is enough to stop me.
I regularly read about criminals being caught because they did something that could have been avoided with just a little foresight.
I protect my SSA number, but only to a certain extent. Anyone who knows my name and the town I live in could easily pay 20 bucks and look up my social security number in a database. My SSA number is also the Tax ID number for my business, and I give it out to lots of people.
And I don’t shred my garbage. Somebody could easily fish out a letter addressed to me and plant it at a crime scene. But I’m not worried about that for 2 reasons: First, most criminals are not James Bondesqe super criminals. Second, even if somebody did plant something like that at a crime scene, I could easily establish an alibi through all the electronic records that show my whereabouts during the day.
Look, I used to be paranoid about all the information being collected about me. Cell phone records; ATM records; surveillance cameras; EZ-Pass records etc. But as I’ve learned over the years, those records actually protect me. Just as they protected Reade Seligmann.
Do you disagree that lots of criminals are caught using methods that the criminal could have easily frustrated with a little foresight?
It seems to have lost a little steam. We need non-discretionary CCW in places like New York, New Jersey, and California.
Which means that you are not inclined to commit a crime, so you don’t. The fact that a gun crime is committed means that the law didn’t stop the person. In other words, you can’t legislate intention. Intention is not a crime. Since something cannot be evaluated as a crime until it is committed, the law by definition did not stop the crime, and taken en toto the law failed to stop the crime 100% of the time.
Yes, it’s a tautology. That’s why it can’t be measured and is both right and wrong simultaneously and is therefore meaningless.
Criminals obey the law some of the time. Even a hard core gangbanger is unlikely to shoot his rival if he’s right in front of a uniformed police officer.
In my opinion, most gun control laws don’t work for a few reasons. Most importantly, our civil rights and search and seizure laws make it pretty unlikely that a typical street thug will actually get busted for packing. In reality, a street thug is probably in much more danger from other street thugs than he is in danger of being caught with a gun. So of course he’s gonna carry.
If the police were allowed to stop and frisk any young man who seemed suspicious, especially in certain neighborhoods, then gun control laws might actually work. (I’m not advocating that such policies be adopted, I’m just pointing out the problem with a lot of gun control laws.)
Indeed. This is a goofy aspect of the Patriot Act, that when renewing my CDL, to maintain a HazMat certification, I must be fingerprinted and have the FBI determine I’m a non-terrorist, before renewing my CDL with HM endorsement.
Somehow, I cannot imagine a terrorist calling his buddies and saying, “You need someone else to drive the truck containing explosives to destroy the evil infidels. My license is lacking the proper credentials.” :rolleyes:
I think the main concern is that terrorists will take legitimate jobs in order to gain access to hazardous materials. It seems like a valid concern to me.
Personally, I’m glad to hear that anyone who is trying to get a job hauling hazardous materials needs to be fingerprinted.
Resurrecting this old thread, butCA today has certified that the microstamping technology is now unencumbered by patent and available to two or more manufactures. They decline to state how the patent is unencumbered and which manufactures offer this technology. As a result of this certification, the law is now in effect and no new models of semi-automatic pistols may be added to the roster of “not unsafe” handguns to be sold in CA after July 1, 2014.
Unless there are manufacturers willing to incorporate the microstamping technology and pay to have their firearms tested in CA, this means that all new models of semi-auto pistols that don’t meet this criteria that virtually no handgun meets, have been banned.
I’m sure this will be litigated, and I hope CA loses a metric shitload of money, but I must say again, CA has fucking stupid gun laws.
They didn’t say ‘Let’s not do anything.’. They said ‘This is a very stupid idea and current gun laws are sufficient’.’
When Mayor Nutter made some handgun laws here in Philly, a lot of people said ‘This is a stupid idea and current gun measures are sufficient.’. When Mayor Nutter made tougher penalties for straw purchases*, I don’t recall anybody complaining.
*when somebody who can legally buy a gun does so for and turns around and sells it to somebody who cannot legally buy a gun. It’s a lot like getting a friend who is 21 to buy beer for you
