Gun violence

[AccessBlaster]

 

[NauticalGent]

I don't know the differences between republican and Democrats, or never heard of the people they refer to, the only one I know is some bloke called Biden.

Not much really, although there are some on here who would argue for days about it. This VENN diagram says it all:

What we really have is an illusion of choice. The idiots in power need it. Without it, the citizens would stop bickering of the stupid stuff and concentrate on holding our "leaders" accountable.

Were I a politician, I would live in fear of smart people like Doc, Pat, SteveR, Isaac, AB (one side) and Frothingslosh, Moke123 (the other side) to quit arguing amongst themselves and turn their attention on me...

To the folks I mentioned, I do not presume to know any of you enough to speak to your political beliefs and do not mean to paint you with a broad brush. I am just going off your responses to the political posts and using you as a demonstration of the power of unity. If I misspoke, I ask for some patience and leniency...

 

[Steve R.]

Once again, the politicians make an immediate (abstract) emotional demand to "solve" an issue without thinking of the damage those "solutions" would cause. Hard (concrete) solutions that would require a commitment of resources and take time to implement, such as supporting the police, actually locking up convicted criminals who used guns, and/or addressing fatherless homes are ignored since that wont don't generate votes for them. For politicians, its all about the (abstract) optics, not implementing actual (concrete) solutions.

Tucker Carlson: Red flag laws will not end mass shootings but will end due process

Tucker Carlson reveals the negative impact red flag laws would have on American gun owners as lawmakers work toward gun control on "Tucker Carlson Tonight."

www.foxnews.com

 

[Pat Hartman]

I'm not in favor of Trump for another term

Doc, are you saying that you disapprove of Trump's policies or his mannerisms?

For those of you in favor of more gun laws:
1. Chicago has some of the most restrictive gun laws in the country.
2. Chicago has the highest death by gun rate in the country. I think it now beats out Baltimore.
3. Existing gun laws are not enforced (around the country, not just in Chicago) because they would be racist because the majority of the gun violence in Chicago is black on black and they would be arresting far more blacks for gun offenses than whites.

Ultimately, the gun "laws" in Chicago ARE racist because they do not protect the poor and vulnerable who happen to be black and who end up being the majority of the victims of gun violence. Allowing this situation to continue is done because the left needs a way to disarm the law-abiding population and this is an excuse.

Someone please explain the logic of:
1. Adding more gun laws that won't be enforced if the majority of the people breaking the law are black
2. Allowing criminals to go free and not protecting the innocent victims

The way to stop gun violence is to stop the people committing it. One way is to have Draconian laws to punish carrying a gun while committing a crime and even more Draconian laws for using a gun in the commission of a crime whether it is fired or not. That solves the weekly gun sprees in the big cities where it is often innocent bystanders getting shot, including children sleeping in their own beds.

The mass shootings are a different problem. For the most part, these crimes are committed by mentally ill people. We used to be able to identify and take care of these people but that system was destroyed in the 70's when our mental hospitals were closed. Yes, there were abuses but closing the hospitals and putting the mentally ill out on the street did absolutely nothing to help the vulnerable and also led to the increased homeless problem. So the "solution" was akin to throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

 

[moke123]

For those of you in favor of more gun laws:
1. Chicago has some of the most restrictive gun laws in the country.
2. Chicago has the highest death by gun rate in the country. I think it now beats out Baltimore.
3. Existing gun laws are not enforced (around the country, not just in Chicago) because they would be racist because the majority of the gun violence in Chicago is black on black and they would be arresting far more blacks for gun offenses than whites.

FYI, Chicago is # 9 in USA. St. Louis is #1 , followed by New Orleans.

 

[Isaac]

FYI, Chicago is # 9 in USA. St. Louis is #1 , followed by New Orleans.

Depends on the perspective.

1. Philly and Chicago are #'s 1 and 2, in cities of 1 MM or greater population. (Also, within that category, NYC had the greatest recent increase). https://everytownresearch.org/report/city-data/ (Disclosure, that's 2020 data).
2. In overall murders, for cities 1 MM population or more, Chicago is #1. Chicago also had the greatest recent increase. (I admit, TX cities are #2 and my hometown of PHX is not doing too well either).

I prefer to group cities by population at least to some extent, because the cultural dynamics are so very different and I think it makes the most sense to look at it like that.

Here's another thing to remember when it comes to murders vs. gun crimes: Many liberal prosecutors are dropping the gun charges because they add time to the sentence (a liberal dream - reducing people's sentences!). This can affect the way data is reported to all of the many sites that we so freely and easily cite with zero evidence as to their accuracy (everyone, me included).

Another thing to keep in mind: We (I included) commonly use FBI crime stats when referencing or positing widely known crime trends such as people talking about inner city crime, rural crime, gun crime, and crime by perpetrator or victim's race.

However, (as I often mentioned in the covid discussions, when people claimed things like "Nigeria's death rate is such-and-such"), our data is only as good as the comprehensiveness and accuracy of the reporting mechanisms. If one little thing gets changed in who reports what how, none of our stats will even be right.
Check out this article, showing that an enormous amount of Philadelphia crime wasn't even reported:

Philadelphia police underreported crime data to FBI for city's bloodiest year on record

A new report details the Philadelphia Police Department did not provide the FBI with a full crime report in 2021, the year the city recorded the most homicides in its history.

www.foxnews.com

Personally, I'm starting to question a lot of crime data. At the end of the day none of us can be sure, unless we were the personal supervisors of the systems and people who reported it, and audited it ourselves. I suspect much of it is way off, or worse yet, is reported accurately, but then "standardized" to fit someone's intake system (as we do so often in the data world) in a way where things are lost in translation.

One thing we do know for sure: Real and actual stories of liberal, left-wing, democratic, George Soros (yes @moke123 , George Soros) - installed District Attorneys who have been so radicalized to favor and coddle hardened criminals that the people they serve are MAD as hell - and have just recalled them, additional ones TBD..

 

[Pat Hartman]

Chicago's 797 homicides in 2021 highest in 25 years, most of any US city

Last year ended as one of the most violent on record for Chicago with more fatal shootings than any year in the last quarter century.The Chicago Police Department reported 797 homicides in the city in 2021, the most in Chicago since 1996 and more than any other city in the country. The 2021...

news.yahoo.com

It is quite possible that there are other statistics per 100,000 than gross numbers. Maybe that is what you are looking at. But BFD. That doesn't change my point.

You are deflecting as usual.

 

[Isaac]

@Pat Hartman I agree - start enforcing existing run laws
This is a huge gap - once it is filled, we can re-group and see if we need more gun "control" or not.

Also, one of the problems with the 'assault rifle' discussion is that most of the people discussing it are either too young or too DNC-informed to realize we already tried that. During that decade, the violence that they were hoping to improve literally didn't go down at all.

Why keep doing something we already know doesn't work?

1. People commit shootings
2. We already have laws that prohibit shooting each other
3. Start enforcing them - including punishment for doing so, and you solve the damn problem without taking excellent self defense options away from regular people (the 99% of us).

Why is this so darn hard? Because Democrats have become radically obsessed with coddling criminals and it goes along with the "blame everybody else" phase that our society is in. Blame another race that I don't own a home (even though the qualifications for owning a home are the same for everyone with zero regard to race), blame another race for standardized tests (even though the test is just that-STANDARDIZED), Blame everyone else for my choices, etc. etc. Blame the government because I'm committing crimes. Blame the Republicans because I used a gun.

No! Blame the democrats for refusing to enforce existing laws, then constantly creating more and new ones - and doing this cycle over, and over, and over. Doesn't anyone see through the fiction of constantly needing more laws because we refuse to enforce the good ones we already had.

 

[AngelSpeaks]

Born and raised in Chicago, i live in the next county. Chicago and Cook County are cesspools. Hubby and I have been avoiding Chicago since Beetlejuice became mayor. We used to have membership to the Museum of Science and Industry but not as anymore

 

[The_Doc_Man]

Doc, are you saying that you disapprove of Trump's policies or his mannerisms?

His abrasive nature, I believe, hindered his success, though I acknowledge he had good policies. However, if it looks like he's winning, I don't know if the Democrats wouldn't start the insurrection to meet or exceed the events of Jan. 6th, 2020. If you think Trump Derangement Syndrome was bad before, I think it would be monumentally worse this time if he gets in again. I would hope that viable Republican candidates are available, because I don't think the country could stand the upheaval if Trump is what the Republicans offer. It will probably be another case of me having to vote, not FOR a candidate that I like - because I won't like any of them, but AGAINST the candidate I hate the worst. That is why I voted for Trump in 2016. Not FOR him. Against Hillary. And voting for a 3rd party candidate in the USA is a wasted vote.

 

[NauticalGent]

And voting for a 3rd party candidate in the USA is a wasted vote.

Because the other way has worked so well?

 

[AccessBlaster]

Because the other way has worked so well?

Good point.

If we are afraid to vote for a candidate because the opposition threatens violence or upheaval then we have already lost PERIOD!

 

[Pat Hartman]

Trump WAS the third party candidate. He just managed to get on the ticket as a Republican even though he'd been a life long Democrat so he outsmarted them both to begin with and that's why the establishment Republicans hate him even more than the Democrats. The rank and file Republican is through with the dog po po Republicans in Congress. And I think the real Democrats feel the same way about their "representatives".

 

[NauticalGent]

Good point.

If we are afraid to vote for a candidate because the opposition threatens violence or upheaval then we have already lost PERIOD!

The mantra about "I'm not voting for ______; I'm voting against _____" is the reason why this will never get better. It is a ridiculous concept and plays right into the cycle we all claim to be sick of. The purest definition of insanity: Doing to same thing over and over and expecting different results.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

The mantra about "I'm not voting for ______; I'm voting against _____" is the reason why this will never get better. It is a ridiculous concept and plays right into the cycle we all claim to be sick of. The purest definition of insanity: Doing to same thing over and over and expecting different results.

I strongly disagree. When we have crap for candidates, it becomes necessary to pick the lesser of two evils. The real question is WHY we have crap for candidates. We have to break the expectation of the voters to see what is in it for THEM and never mind whether the candidates actually know something.

The Democrats are all about majorities. They harp on popular vote and handing out welfare. But Marcus Tullius Cicero knew better.

"In a republic, this rule ought to be observed; that the majority should not have the predominant power."

"We should be careful that our benevolence does not exceed our means."

"In this statement, my Scipio, I build on your own admirable definition, that there can be no community, properly so called, unless it be regulated by a combination of rights. And by this definition it appears that a multitude of men may be just as tyrannical as a single despot and indeed this is the most odious of all tyrannies, since no monster can be more barbarous than the mob, which assumes the name and mask of the people."

Here is the best SHORT definition of apparent modern Democratic thinking, from Ambrose Bierce:

"Democracy is four wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch."

We need to get people out of the mind-set that government OWES us anything except protections from invasion and from internal lawbreakers.

 

[Isaac]

Not much really, although there are some on here who would argue for days about it. This VENN diagram says it all:

View attachment 101213

What we really have is an illusion of choice. The idiots in power need it. Without it, the citizens would stop bickering of the stupid stuff and concentrate on holding our "leaders" accountable.

Were I a politician, I would live in fear of smart people like Doc, Pat, SteveR, Isaac, AB (one side) and Frothingslosh, Moke123 (the other side) to quit arguing amongst themselves and turn their attention on me...

To the folks I mentioned, I do not presume to know any of you enough to speak to your political beliefs and do not mean to paint you with a broad brush. I am just going off your responses to the political posts and using you as a demonstration of the power of unity. If I misspoke, I ask for some patience and leniency...

You make good points, very little of which I don't agree with.
But there is all the "unseen" stuff - the stuff conservatives/believers like me & family believe in which may or may not be (usually isn't) an explicitly "platformed" political issue, but all of which tends to be made possible by the general Republican leaning toward limited government power and a strictly meritocracy system where personal responsibility and the power of personal choice is paramount.
Many people are saying these days "Oh, the Republicans don't even stand for that any more". Well to that I say, you can only operate within the confines of the current time. I think most of them would if there was the slightest snowball's chance in hell that they could, but you can't go around writing legislation that eliminates the Dept of Education before you've even won the fight about people expecting free college tuition and forgiven loans. You can only push back at the point you are currently in. So they may come across as doing too little, so little that it begs the question what their conservative credentials really are, but that's only something that sounds reasonable to conclude if you've lost all sight of the perspective of actual reality, current-day Washington.
If I went to Washington, I would go with these principles in-tow, but I wouldn't be able to accomplish more than a tiny percentage of them at any given time - it wil be a long, gradual move back to common sense fiscal and national policy if it ever even happens. You can't paddle a place in the river that you aren't in yet.

Now then. About Trump. As I've said before I think the vast majority of his policies and ideas were very much spot-on.
The only question is could he 1) win an election, and 2) effectively govern to any degree, given the baggage that he has--whether justified or not--baggage I mean including what the Dem's have either legitimately or trumped up against him.

I say no. Trump needs to fade away. Someone like De Santis needs to run in 2024. Hopefully they run against Biden, if the Dems are that stupid (which I highly doubt they are, they won't make that mistake again - they were terrified how close they came to losing in 2020, and shocked, for some odd reason).

@NauticalGent I don't pretend to be doing any good in arguing amongst ourselves, really. It just gives me a chance to vent and probably does me some amount of good by honestly reading and honestly "taking in" other people's viewpoints, even the ones I don't like; sometimes they have a point that makes me learn something and occasionally I say so. Whether anyone who reads my stuff ever does the same (concede a point to their inner most self in humility), who knows. Probably, as there are many people better than I in this world !
As for taking this passion to our representatives, I'm not sure what else can be done.

Despite all the talk about both parties being equally useless, Rhino's etc., I don't really agree with that. I think it's a symptom of having to compromise too much.. having to. It is my opinion that if there were a Republican president and a Republican Senate and House for 4 years straight, the country would do so well that people may never elect a D president again, until a R screws up badly enough to deserve it.

If Republicans can find a way to overcome the Democrats' race-crazed mania that gets them votes, (which their #1 shining hope is Hispanics, by a LONG shot, that's why Soros just bought all of FL radio), we might get back to a normal, decent, hard working stable population. Which I think most people would be if not for modern public and radical leftwing grievance ideology creeping in that makes them earnestly search for (and find) grievances galore.

 

[NauticalGent]

I rest my case...

 

[Pat Hartman]

If the Republicans stood for anything anymore, they would have overturned ObamaCare as they had promised to do if they ever had the chance. But instead John McCain chose personal hatred for Trump over the good of the Republic.

McCain was such a horrible choice as a candidate that in 2008, I considered voting for Obama. I know, I know. When Congress was going to vote on the bailout bill and both candidates were on the road and then decided to come back to vote on it, I decided I would vote for whoever voted against the bail out. But, like the two peas in a pod they were, they both voted for it so I voted for Ralph Nader. He probably got more votes that year than any other year that he ran.

Then there was the year we had Bush vs Kerry. How's that for a choice? Both members of the same secret society at Yale

 

[The_Doc_Man]

My first REAL taste of voting for the lesser evil was back when Edwin Edwards and David Duke were candidates for governor. I had the choice to vote for the bigot or the crook. I chose to vote against the bigot because I thought he would do more lasting harm. In the Trump/Clinton race, that was again my motive.

 

[NauticalGent]

And the beat goes on...