Actually, these weasel moves could well work. Chicago never actually banned handguns, they simply required you as an owner to register them, then refused to register another handgun after 1982. So it’s not a ban on handguns, it’s a refusal of a non-essential city service. Illinois, incidentally is one of two remaining states that have no concealed carry laws and of course, no preemption laws.
DC could simply not issue business licenses to gun dealers, or go the Chicago Route, and
Robert’s your father’s brother, no guns for DC residents.
Chicago Mayor Mickey Mouse (Little Richie Daley for the uninitiated) had the unmitigated gall to rant and rave about the stupidity of the SCOTUS decision, saying effectively “you don’t need guns for protection, blah, blah something, something else” . Standing next to him? You guessed it. Two armed men.
Bullshit! You sawed-off, hypocrite, mick douchebag. People can’t protect themselves from these mutts who are already breaking the law without breaking the law themselves? That don’t make good sense, hell, that don’t even make good nonsense.
D.C. did the same thing. There was never an actual ban on handguns, it was just that your handgun had to already be registered as of 1976 in order to be eligible to be re-registered…
<sigh> tune up your banjos, it’s time for another chorus of “dueling statistics”. Is it really necessary to point out, AGAIN, that statistics that only count deaths don’t reflect deterrence?
From that article: “The remaining 2 percent included legal killings, such as when police do the shooting…”
I’m loving that blithe little suggestion that when a police officer kills someone, it’s always justified and legal. :dubious:
It really is a delightfully opinionated article. The article didn’t mention which public health “experts” it was referencing, but the few studies I’ve heard of concluding that gun owners are at higher risk of homicide have been soundly debunked over the last several years - IIRC, their methodology was to include a lot of gangsters and crackhouses as “gun owners” and “gun owning households” in their statistics. Which observation should indicate that any study that tries to define “gun owner” as a broad category while glossing over the much more important demographic variables is fundamentally flawed.
Nor the times when the threat of a gun is used to avert a crime.
Strange. I have seen statistics for decades that show you are at greater risk of getting shot if you have guns in your home. Many .many studies. Are now you claim they are all debunked. I do not think so.http://www.bradycampaign.org/facts/factsheets/?page=home
Heh. You’re citing the Brady Campaign? They’re just about the most desperate, shrill, and biased anti-gun organization in existence. They’ve never cared about the truth, just about whatever fear-mongering scare tactics they can use to further their ultimate goal of completely disarming the American public. A case in point being this page: I notice that the only relevant study they’ve cited is Kellermann, et al. That’s the name I was thinking of. The study is from back in 1988, and it has been debunked. Here is an example of one such debunking.
But even if one were to assume for the sake of argument that Kellermann was correct, it’s still up to each individual to decide if they want to keep a gun in their home, and accept all the responsibility that entails. An increased risk is not even the ghost of an argument for a curtailment of civil liberties.
I don’t know about deterrence, but I live in a state that allows concealed carry. So far over 50,000 concealed carry licenses have been sold. You have to pass a background check, attend a concealed carry class and pay for the license before you can carry a gun. In a news article recently it was stated that the police had run into no problems with the people who carry guns, and there have been two robberies and one rape stopped by a concealed carry person that they know of. In another incident a driver was run off the road and attacked by a person with road rage. The driver was a concealed carry person and shot and killed his attacker. There is a lot to be said on both sides, but in my state it is doing ok right now.
Well, not to minimize the debunking of the deeper meaning of this argument, but on a base level, how can this not be true?
It’s like saying that if you live in a home with fireworks, you are more likely to suffer a fireworks-related injury than if you didn’t live in a home with fireworks.
Maybe he did. But until they get transporter technology working so a cop can appear instantly, it’s nice to have the means to stop someone else from killing you before the cops arrive.
The road rager was 38 years old and the man he attacked was over 60, the man warned the road rager to stop, that he had a weapon, before he was forced to kill him. Yes, there were witnesses and the road rager had a history of assulting people. No death or killing is good one. But what would you have done?
I have dealt with road ragers, belligerent people in a bar. Even gotten into a few fights way back when. But in all cases the issue was resolved with no one dying or even needing a trip to the hospital. I have wondered if I had a gun in those cases if things might have turned out differently (in two cases I could imagine I very likely would have pulled the gun and probably used it). Without the option of using a gun I had to seek other means of extricating myself from the situation and I did which ultimately resulted in a better outcome. The other way there may be two dead people (which I believe I would have gotten away with shooting had I legally had a gun…certainly for a bit there I was afraid for my life and witnesses thought I was about to get my ass kicked too).
Ever think of wounding. Legs ,arms etc. How about driving to police station. ? Murder is the last option on my list,not the first or only. Stay in the car, locked. Show gun to scare away. Lots of options.
This is a fantasy that only ever plays out in Hollywood movies. You just don’t “shoot to wound,” ever. It’s a stupid idea for a lot of reasons. You’re far more likely to miss, for one; in a stressful situation where someone is assaulting you, it’s often hard enough just to aim for center-of-mass. Even if you do hit, you’re not very likely to actually stop the aggressor; an arm or leg shot with a handgun probably won’t even slow them down, unless you’re lucky enough to snap a bone or sever an artery, and the latter would result in swift death by blood loss anyway. Finally, “shooting to wound” is a great way to wind up in jail - a prosecutor would quickly point out that if you were willing and able to intentionally shoot someone in the leg, you couldn’t have really felt that your life was in very much danger.
There is no middle ground when you are shooting someone with a gun. You do not ever do it unless it is an acceptable outcome for the person you are shooting to die.
Yes, there certainly are plenty of options when you’re analyzing the situation in retrospect from the comfort of your own computer at home. Obviously since he repeatedly told the raging man that he had a gun and was going to use it if necessary, using the gun wasn’t his first option (warning the guy repeatedly was). Furthermore, if you warn a guy that you have a gun and will use it on him, and that guy still advances, it’s safe to say he’s pretty intent on doing some serious harm to you.
And in reality, no one ever “shoots to wound.” It’s either shoot to kill or nothing. You can’t expect a person under the tremendous pressure of having a guy advancing toward you to become a master marksman and take aim for a foot or leg.