Are The Idiots In Charge Everywhere?

[TerryMcK]

I am not, however, reserving my judgment of the politicians whose pockets are being lined by the NRA, politicians who refuse to even consider enacting some common sense gun control measures

The NRA does not manufacture guns, but they are low hanging fruit to pick on. Sure they donate to politicians, so do unions. Does the autoworkers union get blamed when someone kills another with a car. Check out those statistics.

I don’t think anyone except soldiers need guns that can shoot 100+ rounds a minute

These guns are already out there; should the police not have any.

We may still have school shootings, but it’s unlikely that 19 4th graders are going to be shot at one time if the shooter has to stop and reload.

Yeah, no shooter would ever think to carry multiple guns, and a typical 9mm semi-auto handgun can hold 15 rounds.

[TerryMcK]

I realize it’s too much to expect from the media or politicians; so we will continue to blame the NRA but nobody or nothing in the Entertainment industry.

Movies, TV, video games, rap music, etc are full of violence (mayhem, hatred, gore, murder, etc.) and they continue to get a pass. It has gone on for so long that it has become everyday entertainment; not just for the kids, but adults as well. It is also bolstered by social media. Since the media is part of that industry they will not point a finger at them. It provides a babysitting service for some parents. I’m sure there are also some political pockets being filled by this industry also. Where do many of these shooters get their ideas from.

[ptheland]

Check out those statistics.

I did. And let’s not mince words. 99% of UAW political contributions went to Democrats. https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/national-rifle-assn/recipie… 98% of NRA political contributions went to Republicans. https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/national-rifle-assn/recipie…

I don’t think comparisons of these two have anything to do with the underlying societal issues. Republicans like the NRA because the vast majority of their money goes to Republicans. Democrats like the UAW because the vast majority of their money goes to Democrats.

Period.

These guns are already out there; should the police not have any.

Minor oversight on the previous poster. Of course the police should have guns. And they should have pretty quick access to guns like the AR-15 and knockoffs. I don’t think they need access to the fully automatic mode that the M-16 has, though. At least not all officers. I’d listen to an argument for SWAT teams or other special teams to have those.

Who doesn’t need an AR-15? Average citizens. You can defend your home just fine with a hand gun. Possibly better - a rifle can get in the way when working in enclosed spaces like a home. Police and soldiers do a fair amount of training to learn how to use a rifle (of any type) indoors. It’s not solely for safety reasons that they keep a rifle pointed at the ceiling or floor most of the time. And the distance between the shooter and the target is small enough inside a home that you don’t need the additional accuracy a rifle provides.

As to the guns being out there already:

Yes, a ban and/or buyback is not going to work instantly. It will take some time - perhaps as long as a few years - to get to the point where criminals will have a hard time getting their hands on a banned weapon. But it will happen. And if we don’t do something now, it will be that much longer before we get to the point where criminals don’t have access to these highly effective killing machines.

These crimes - such as mass shootings - are almost always enabled by easy access to weapons. Many mass shooters buy their guns legally. Others obtain them from family members who acquired them legally. Make the access harder, and the crime rate will go down.

–Peter

[ptheland]

Let’s compare guns and cars in a different way.

In 2020, 45,000 people died from gun related injuries.
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/02/03/what-the-da…

In 2020, 38,000 people died in motor vehicle crashes.
https://www.iihs.org/topics/fatality-statistics/detail/state…

What has been our response to motor vehicle deaths?
Mandatory seat belts
Mandatory air bags
Special seats for infants and younger childres
Optional but growing number of automatic braking systems
Mandatory liability insurance
Testing and licensing of drivers

How about other harms caused by cars, notably pollution?
Ever tightening emissions standards for new cars
Ever tightening fuel economy standards for new cars

And I’m just scratching the surface of auto related regulations

How about guns? What has been our legislative or regulatory response to gun deaths?

Ummmm…

Yeah. About that.

OOHHH. I’ve got one. Let’s arm teachers. And put armed guards at schools. Basically, more guns.

And one more statistic:
For decades, auto accidents have been the leading cause of death among children, but in 2020 guns were the No. 1 cause, researchers say.
https://www.npr.org/2022/04/22/1094364930/firearms-leading-c…

If we want to reduce the number of preventable deaths in the US, both among children and adults, we need to do something about guns. At this point, almost anything (that doesn’t involve putting more guns and armed people out there) would be an improvement.

And one more parting question:
How often do you interact with cars? And how often do you interact with guns?

–Peter

[telegraph]

“I am not, however, reserving my judgment of the politicians whose pockets are being lined by the NRA, politicians who refuse to even consider enacting some common sense gun control measures”

Huh? There are 10 thousand gun laws on the books. This perp legally bought guns, passed a background check. A waiting period? Bought them months before. Magazine size? Duh? In CA, you can only buy a pistol with a 10 round magazine. So? Takes you all of 3 seconds to change magazines and if you have a fanny pack or front pack, you can carry 10 magazines easily. Duh! No one yet has proposed a ‘common sense gun control law’ that would stop any mass killers" Remember half of them were ‘borrowed guns’ from locked cabinets of parents.

---

“I don’t think anyone except soldiers need guns that can shoot 100+ rounds a minute”

You cannot buy a weapon that fires 100 rounds a minute…that’s a fully automatic weapon. to own one, you must be over 21, pay a $200 registration fee, pass a real tough background check - harder than the normal one, be finger printed…and report annually on it’s whereabouts.

You can buy a ‘semi-automatic’ that fires ONE shot each trigger pull. That has been the standard for over 100 years of weapons production. Mostly shotguns (up to 5 rounds) and pistols - revolvers up to 6, pistols up to 18 or so - many less.

---

“We may still have school shootings, but it’s unlikely that 19 4th graders are going to be shot at one time if the shooter has to stop and reload.”

Takes all of THREE SECONDS to change magazines. You think that will make a difference?

t.

[telegraph]

Peter: “Yes, a ban and/or buyback is not going to work instantly. It will take some time - perhaps as long as a few years - to get to the point where criminals will have a hard time getting their hands on a banned weapon. But it will happen.”

There are 300 million, repeat, 300 million guns out there. At an average cost of $100 each for buy back - and many $200-800, you think there’s enough money? Let’s see

300 million at $100 each is…3,000 million dollars… 3 billion thousand dollars… I think that is 3 TRILLION dollars.

If people demand ‘fair market value’, it could be 10 trillion dollars…

Of course, half the guns you’ll never get… so there will be 150 million guns floating around.

And, of course, you can buy KILOS of cocaine, prescription durgs, and thousands of pounds of pot on any street corner in any city in the US. You think those ‘dealers’ who already deal in stolen weapons, won’t be selling guns? Importing them? Making them for sale? Joke, joke, joke…

But of course, the number of people killed by deer each year will go up by 1000%. Hunters cull the deer population by a large percent each year. Without them, well, mass killings. In 20 years, I’ve been hit by two deer. Fortunately not seriously but I know half a dozen people who have totaled cars in deer accidents. Just look at the stats for MICH…

“Each year, there are nearly 50,000 reported vehicle-deer crashes in Michigan. About 80 percent of these crashes occur on two-lane roads between dusk and dawn. The most serious crashes occur when motorists swerve to avoid a deer and hit another vehicle or a fixed object, or when their vehicle rolls over”

https://www.michigan.gov/msp/divisions/ohsp/safety-programs/….

“Vermont Fish and Wildlife says there are about 150,000 deer in the state of Vermont. Of that number, about 3,000 are reported to be hit by a car. Officials suspect the actual number of deer hits is closer to 6,000 because not every collision gets reported.”

https://www.wcax.com/content/news/Chances-of-hitting-a-deer-…

“Texas has twice as many motorists killed in vehicles colliding with wild animals than any other state, the Insurance Council of Texas (ICT) reports. According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), more than 5,000 vehicle/animal crashes occur annually on Texas highways and on average, 17 people are killed every year in these crashes.”

https://www.catto.com/blog/2016-11-28/texas-leads-nation-veh…

So you’d kill another 1,000 people a year in the US in deer accidents to save 30 people a year in mass killings by deranged perps? Oh, and a lot of those folks killed will be KIDS in deer accidents.

t

[telegraph]

“What has been our legislative or regulatory response to gun deaths?”

Yet, half of all car accidents are caused by DRUNK or IMPAIRED drivers - many repeat offenders you fail to keep off the road. Why? Doesn’t do any good if a drunk driver T-bones you at intersection while running a red light doing 60 mph in a 40 zone.

What has happened:

Mandatory Federal background checks.

Prohibition of gun possession by criminals.

Guns with safety mechanisms designed NOT to go off if dropped.

Federal law that specifies MANDATORY five year sentence in fed prison for use of firearm in a felony. Local officials don’t use it because they want the glory of sending a perp to the local jail (for six weeks and six weeks probation for 27th gun crime) so they can brag they are ‘tough on crime’. Duh! We got laws to put gun perps away. You don’t use them!

There are 10,000 gun laws on the books.

We now have prosecutors that let out 25th convicted gun criminals on $10 bail money…and they usually get arrested again, and get a $10 bail pending trial…for which they never show up anyway and it’s 3 years away… that’s the problem…soft on crime. soft on criminals.

First offense gun crime should get you put away. Period. Five years. No ‘poor little Johnny grew up in broken home’…bit…

There used to be program on TV called Baretta…his tag line was ‘you do the crime, you do the time’… no six weeks in jail for 27th conviction armed robbery…

While I’m at it…look no further than Hollywood and the million rounds per movie of gun fire…everyone would have been seriously dead along with 10,000 bystanders…but no…not one bullet hits the good guy…and the bad guy blows up…

Then look at violent video games…kill…kill…kill teaching stalking and killing and killing and killing…thousands of rounds…to collect points… sadistic violent games that desensitize people to the pain of actually being wounded and dying…

t.

t.

[XMFRob]

Telegraph,

I’ve read a bunch of posts by you over the years.

Most of them I agree with, some I don’t. No big deal. It’s OK to not agree all the time. Inevitable, in fact.

I’m just piping up to thank you for injecting a degree of THOUGHT and common sense into a typical emotion-driven gun discussion. Just thanks. That’s all… a welcome respite from the other stuff.

Oh! Yeah, I agree with everything you just said.

Rob
Former RB and BL Home Fool, Supernova Portfolio Contributor & Maintenance Fool
He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.

”If you are in the right companies, the potential rise can be so enormous that everything else is secondary. Every $1,000 I and my clients put into Motorola in 1957 is now worth $1,993,846 — after all the ups and downs of the stock and of the market…

If I’d sold Motorola because I thought it was overpriced 10 or 15 years ago, chances are I would not have known when to get back in, and I would have missed a tremendous profit. If one of my stocks gets overpriced, I warn my clients that things may be unpleasant for a little while but it will rise to a new peak later.” Phillip Fisher

[MissEdithKeeler]

already out there; should the police not have any.

Yeah, no shooter would ever think to carry multiple guns, and a typical 9mm semi-auto handgun can hold 15 round

Oh, puh-leeze. You know what I meant.

. Does the autoworkers union get blamed when someone kills another with a car. Check out those statistics

Please read what I wrote again. I was not being especially critical of the NRA, but rather the politicians beholden to them.

Yeah, this kind of silly rhetoric is why we’ll never have meaningful, logical gun laws. There is a reasonable middle ground. No one wants to talk about that, though.

Done now.

[ptheland]

There are 300 million, repeat, 300 million guns out there.

Closer to 400 million, actually.

300 million at $100 each is…3,000 million dollars… 3 billion thousand dollars… I think that is 3 TRILLION dollars.

Let’s fix that math, shall we.

300 million at $100 each is 3 followed by 4 zeros followed by the million label. $30,000 million. Adjusting the units from million to billion, we drop three zeros and get $30 billion.

Now, fix that to 400 million guns, and the cost is $40 billion.

While I’ve proposed getting rid of all guns, that’s not going to happen. I think starting with all AR-15 and knock-off guns is more realistic. Other than the enjoyment of shooting - something I fully understand, as I have enjoyed the shooting I’ve done in my life - I can’t think of a good reason to own an AR-15 or similar.

There are about 20 million of those in the US. Buying those back at $100 each would be $2 billion.

–Peter

[JimKredux]

A potential problem is that AR-15’s cost between $500 and $2000. Otherwise a great plan,and in my mind well worth at least $200 billion.

JK

[syke6]

300 million at $100 each is…3,000 million dollars… 3 billion thousand dollars… I think that is 3 TRILLION dollars.

I realize it has been a while since you were at RPI, but apparently RPI didn’t teach exponents back then, but it is really easy. You simply add them. So take 300 million and add two zeros…

If you think “exponents” are wild, wait to you hear about “trigonometry.”

But don’t take my word for it, I went to public schools.

[ptheland]

A potential problem is that AR-15’s cost between $500 and $2000. Otherwise a great plan,and in my mind well worth at least $200 billion.

OK. But now we’re overpaying.

20 million guns times $2000 per gun is 4 followed by 4 zeros, or 40,000, then the million. 40,000 million or $40 billion. Tops.

With an annual federal budget over $4 trillion, we’re down in the rounding error territory.

Senator Dirksen’s “billion here and billion there” comment is getting pretty dated.

–Peter

[telegraph]

“A potential problem is that AR-15’s cost between $500 and $2000. Otherwise a great plan, and in my mind well worth at least $200 billion”

Just the tip of the iceberg. So they won’t use an AR-15. They’ll use a M1 Carbine or something else. Or a modified shotgun with 20 shot magazine… Or any similar weapon…

Or a handgun… of which there are a hundred million…and some of them have 18 round magazines and it takes 3 seconds to change magazines and you can carry 10 of them easily.

Nearly all ‘gun crime’ is with pistols.

Almost no one uses an AR-15 to commit suicide.

t.

[ptheland]

Almost no one uses an AR-15 to commit suicide.

But they are the go-to choice for mass shooters.

Remember, it’s not just the weapon, its also the round it shoots. The AR-15 can shoot rounds which are far more deadly than the rounds coming from a 9mm handgun. AR-15 rounds can carry more gunpowder, which gets you higher velocities than a 9mm. And the AR round is designed to tumble when it hits flesh, doing much more damage. A 9mm round tends to go straight when it hits flesh. Damage doesn’t spread as far from the bullet’s path as an AR.

Of course, either one can kill you. But the AR-15 rounds are much more effective at that job.

–Peter

[telegraph]

Peter:“Remember, it’s not just the weapon, its also the round it shoots. The AR-15 can shoot rounds which are far more deadly than the rounds coming from a 9mm handgun. AR-15 rounds can carry more gunpowder, which gets you higher velocities than a 9mm. And the AR round is designed to tumble when it hits flesh, doing much more damage. A 9mm round tends to go straight when it hits flesh. Damage doesn’t spread as far from the bullet’s path as an AR.”

Of course, with a longer barrel, you get higher velocities with an AR-15 - but they are not designed to ‘tumble’. But…the Las Vegas shooter fired 2000 rounds of ammo and killed just 57 people…hardly a ‘weapon’ to kill if that was your goal with 2000 shots.

With a 9mm pistol, all you need is common hollow point bullet rounds - to kill effectively. Mushrooms inside the body. Massive damage. Then there are .45 cal pistols - popular in WW2 and made by the millions. Heavier bullets.

t.

[ptheland]

With a 9mm pistol, all you need is common hollow point bullet rounds - to kill effectively.

Here’s a few 9mm rounds, including a couple of hollow points.
https://youtu.be/NvYWWwylz-I?t=27

Then there are .45 cal pistols

OK. Let’s look at that. (There are two shots starting here)
https://youtu.be/VocPUYvA_iM?t=1135

Now, let’s look at an AR round:
https://youtu.be/fX4ODh1g4eM?t=30

Notice any differences? And which one do you think is going to do more damage?

This is the point I’m getting at. Bullets fired from an AR do a whole lot more damage than a 9mm or .45cal. A LOT more.

Like I said, any of them can kill with a single shot. But wounds from an AR round are far more likely to be lethal. And I still have no idea why ordinary citizens need that kind of killing power.

–Peter

[ptheland]

but they are not designed to ‘tumble’.

PS. Yes, they are. Take a closer look at the slow motion footage I linked above. See how the bullet turns sideways?

But…the Las Vegas shooter fired 2000 rounds of ammo and killed just 57 people…hardly a ‘weapon’ to kill if that was your goal with 2000 shots.

He was shooting from the 32nd floor of a hotel. That’s going to be more than 100 yards off the ground. And he was shooting diagonally across an intersection into the festival grounds. Looking at a map, that’s around 300 yards or more horizontally. And that’s just to the closest edge of the festival grounds. The grounds themselves extend another 200-300 yards beyond that. And as soon as the first 100 rounds or so were fired, people started scattering, making them much harder targets to hit.

It’s not surprising at all that it took 2000 rounds to hit 57 people. Unless you are a skilled marksman, your only hope of actually hitting something at that range is to “spray and pray.” Which is exactly what he did, using AR-15s fitted with [at the time legal] bump stocks to fire more rounds faster.

These school shootings are done with the same weapon at 10 - 20 feet. Not hundreds of yards.

–Peter

[ptheland]

Gotta do one more bit of fact checking (AKA, pointing out your lies and disinformation)

But…the Las Vegas shooter fired 2000 rounds of ammo

It was actually 1058 rounds, the vast majority from the AR-15s.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Las_Vegas_shooting (for this and other figures below)

killed just 57 people

Mostly for the record here: 61 total, including himself. 58 died at the scene or shortly thereafter. (59 when you include the shooter.) Two were added to the official death toll after succumbing to their injuries a year or two later.

And you forgot the injured. 411 were injured by the gunshot wounds and/or associated shrapnel. Another 456 injured in the chaos surrounding the shooting.

If you total that up, that’s 928 injured or killed from those 1058 rounds. Pretty darn efficient if you ask me.

–Peter

[TerryMcK]

I don’t think comparisons of these two have anything to do with the underlying societal issues. Republicans like the NRA because the vast majority of their money goes to Republicans. Democrats like the UAW because the vast majority of their money goes to Democrats.

My post had nothing to do with liking the NRA. I was just pointing out that they are the low hanging fruit with mass killings, whereas, the entertainment industry or unions gets a pass for tragedies of any kind.

For what it’s worth, I am Conservative, but I gave up my NRA membership many years ago along with contributing to any political candidate.