Originally Posted by Semo '75

Ultimately, the whole concealed-carry thing is something of a non-starter. Unless you're arguing that someone intent on breaking the law by murdering a lot of people would have been stopped by a law against carrying a concealed firearm.

The problems was his easy access to a firearm and ammunition. He only had to pass to most rudimentary background check and off he went with his gun. There is no restriction in Arizona on ammo - buy what you want.

Originally Posted by Semo '75 ...

True story: On the day of the shooting, a legal, law-abiding gun owner named Joe Zamudio heard gunshots and ran to the scene. When he got there, he saw an older man waving a pistol yelling, "I'll kill you!" Thanks to his familiarity with firearms, he saw that the pistol had jammed. Instead of shooting the man, he tackled him. Bystanders told him that he had the wrong guy and then he noticed the melee on the ground. He joined in and helped subdue Loughner.

Fortunately, Loughner's gun jammed after he loaded his second magazine so unarmed bystanders were able to wrestle his gun away. Had his gun not jammed, Zamudio might have been the one who stopped him from killing more people.

... or he might have started a shooting match, where too many someones started shooting at everyone. In fact, I would count on that as the most likely.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

As I understand it, though I haven't been reading every possible article on Loughner, his behavior was erratic enough to get him kicked out of college but not erratic enough that he showed up on any 'don't sell him a gun' list when he bought his weapon...

A legal problem with that is that to deny someone a Right guaranteed as an individual right, you need a level of proof significantly above hearsay...

In Heller, the court never said the "right" was unrestricted. In fact, they specifically did not overturn gun laws en mass.

Originally Posted by JohnMc82

And despite having some of the strictest gun laws in the country, Chicago and DC also have some of the highest violent crime and murder rates.

So is gun control really the "easy" way to fix it?

You can't limit guns if jurisdictions in your immediate vicinity run gun shops that are wide open to anyone. The guns in gun-control cities come from elsewhere, and are legally purchased. This has been studied to death.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Not to dump on you too much, but here is the real data set on gun violence. All the worst offenders, with the exception of the District of Columbia, are lax regulation states, and the lowest levels are in strict regulation states.

Roger that. Just finished following your data set to the source, which by the way is a CDC report titled "Deaths: Final Data for 2007" in Volume 58, Number 19 of the National Vital Statistics Reports. Good stuff.

Please note that my data was "homicide rates" / 100,000 from 2008. Your data was "Injury by Firearms" / 100,000. According to the footnotes of this report "Injury by Firearms" includes the following:

Causes of death attributable to firearm mortality include ICD–10 codes U01.4, Terrorism involving firearms (homicide); W32–W34, Accidental discharge of firearms; X72–X74, Intentional self-harm (suicide) by discharge of firearms; X93–X95, Assault (homicide) by discharge of firearms; Y22–Y24, Discharge of firearms, undetermined intent; and Y35.0, Legal intervention involving firearm discharge. Deaths from injury by firearms exclude deaths due to explosives and other causes indirectly related to firearms.

I would counter both data sets are "real". You may counter with the supposition that your data set is more relevant to this forum. I won't argue that point but will address your issues based on your data.

Your data set does not support the argument that gun violence is driven primarily by lenient regulatory controls on firearms. Even in your data, there are several states with lenient regulatory controls that have lower levels of violence then states with stricter regulatory controls. Particularly egregious examples of this (although not limited to these two examples) from your 2007 data set are New Hampshire with a low level of Injury by Firearms / 100,000 at 5.8 and also one of the lower firearms regulatory regimes. Vermont has one of the most lenient set of firearms regulations on the books but has only a 9.6 / 100,000 Injuries by Firearms ratings. Also note that CT and RI are in the data set's six lowest Injuries by Firearms / 100,000 with values of 4.3 and 5.1 respectively. Yet their firearms regulations are "mainstream" not "strict". Of the seven most non-violent states by your data set, one has one of the most lenient sets of firearms regulations in the country and two others have regulatory controls that can not be characterized as strict. Given this data from your own data set, the statement "the lowest levels are in strict regulation states" is questionable.

To examine the first part of your statement, "All the worst offenders, with the exception of the District of Columbia, are lax regulation states..." Of the top seven worst offenders, with the exception of the District of Columbia, Alaska, Louisiana, Wyoming, Arizona, Nevada, Mississippi and New Mexico, all have lenient gun control regulations. However, even if you look at my data, these states, with the exception of Wyoming, are all in the top sixteen states for fire arms related homicide rates. Recall that I did not attempt to argue that lenient gun regulations correlates with lower homicide rates. There are several states with lax gun regulations that have high homicide rates. I was and still am suggesting that correlation between gun control/regulations and homicide rates is extremely questionable.

My original point is that effective attempts to reduce violence must not be reduced to a regulatory control argument. Professor Kaiser recently hypothesized that violence appears to have an urbanization component.

In addition to that, I hypothesize that violence is less a function of firearm regulatory controls and more a function of several other components including: urbanization, economic disparities, weakened civic institutions, cultural aspects, contact between disparate cultures - particularly if two or more are predisposed to violence and economic disparities unduly affect one or more of them, and Nomad archetypes passing through the ages of 14 to 24. I have not had time to research sufficient evidence for these but the post you quoted me did provide some evidence for the Nomad hypothesis.

NOTE: A minor point - but while the data set you referenced via your website link led back to the CDC report, your website data set had numerous entries that were .1 to .5 Injuries by Firearms / 100,000 higher than the CDC report. I am unable to explain the discrepancies, but felt it was insufficient to invalidate your data set. It is likely that the website was only partially updated to 2007 data when the reference was changed from 2006.

Thank you for your interest in the post. I am always pleased when we focus on data and attempting to create effective solutions from the data we have, however imperfect our data or our solutions. This approach generally yields better results than solving problems with beliefs formed by emotional and credibility arguments.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

You seemed to go out of your way to ignore the 30-round magazines Loughner used. I'm OK with the Glock, but the mags have to go.

Nah. I didn't go out of my way to avoid talking about them. I was responding to Eric's claims about semi-automatic weapons being inherently military grade. And, if you followed my participation in this thread, I was specifically calling attention to the factors that allowed Loughner to get his hands on a firearm.

I don't really care about high-capacity magazines. I could take them or leave them. In this case, a dangerous individual got his hand on a firearm and that, to me, is at the heart of this issue. I don't think that this guy should have had a semi-automatic pistol. I don't think that this guy should have had a double-action revolver. I don't think that this guy should have had an 18th century muzzle-loading duelling pistol.

What was it, specifically, that failed? It's interesting that Bob Butler is the only one who even attempted to answer that.

Originally Posted by RyanJH

Roger that. Just finished following your data set to the source, which by the way is a CDC report titled "Deaths: Final Data for 2007" in Volume 58, Number 19 of the National Vital Statistics Reports. Good stuff.

Please note that my data was "homicide rates" / 100,000 from 2008. Your data was "Injury by Firearms" / 100,000. According to the footnotes of this report "Injury by Firearms" includes the following:

Causes of death attributable to firearm mortality include ICD–10 codes U01.4, Terrorism involving firearms (homicide); W32–W34, Accidental discharge of firearms; X72–X74, Intentional self-harm (suicide) by discharge of firearms; X93–X95, Assault (homicide) by discharge of firearms; Y22–Y24, Discharge of firearms, undetermined intent; and Y35.0, Legal intervention involving firearm discharge. Deaths from injury by firearms exclude deaths due to explosives and other causes indirectly related to firearms.

I would counter both data sets are "real". You may counter with the supposition that your data set is more relevant to this forum. I won't argue that point but will address your issues based on your data.

Your data set does not support the argument that gun violence is driven primarily by lenient regulatory controls on firearms. Even in your data, there are several states with lenient regulatory controls that have lower levels of violence then states with stricter regulatory controls. Particularly egregious examples of this (although not limited to these two examples) from your 2007 data set are New Hampshire with a low level of Injury by Firearms / 100,000 at 5.8 and also one of the lower firearms regulatory regimes. Vermont has one of the most lenient set of firearms regulations on the books but has only a 9.6 / 100,000 Injuries by Firearms ratings. Also note that CT and RI are in the data set's six lowest Injuries by Firearms / 100,000 with values of 4.3 and 5.1 respectively. Yet their firearms regulations are "mainstream" not "strict". Of the seven most non-violent states by your data set, one has one of the most lenient sets of firearms regulations in the country and two others have regulatory controls that can not be characterized as strict. Given this data from your own data set, the statement "the lowest levels are in strict regulation states" is questionable.

To examine the first part of your statement, "All the worst offenders, with the exception of the District of Columbia, are lax regulation states..." Of the top seven worst offenders, with the exception of the District of Columbia, Alaska, Louisiana, Wyoming, Arizona, Nevada, Mississippi and New Mexico, all have lenient gun control regulations. However, even if you look at my data, these states, with the exception of Wyoming, are all in the top sixteen states for fire arms related homicide rates. Recall that I did not attempt to argue that lenient gun regulations correlates with lower homicide rates. There are several states with lax gun regulations that have high homicide rates. I was and still am suggesting that correlation between gun control/regulations and homicide rates is extremely questionable.

My original point is that effective attempts to reduce violence must not be reduced to a regulatory control argument. Professor Kaiser recently hypothesized that violence appears to have an urbanization component.

In addition to that, I hypothesize that violence is less a function of firearm regulatory controls and more a function of several other components including: urbanization, economic disparities, weakened civic institutions, cultural aspects, contact between disparate cultures - particularly if two or more are predisposed to violence and economic disparities unduly affect one or more of them, and Nomad archetypes passing through the ages of 14 to 24. I have not had time to research sufficient evidence for these but the post you quoted me did provide some evidence for the Nomad hypothesis.

NOTE: A minor point - but while the data set you referenced via your website link led back to the CDC report, your website data set had numerous entries that were .1 to .5 Injuries by Firearms / 100,000 higher than the CDC report. I am unable to explain the discrepancies, but felt it was insufficient to invalidate your data set. It is likely that the website was only partially updated to 2007 data when the reference was changed from 2006.

Thank you for your interest in the post. I am always pleased when we focus on data and attempting to create effective solutions from the data we have, however imperfect our data or our solutions. This approach generally yields better results than solving problems with beliefs formed by emotional and credibility arguments.

After reviewing this, my wife pointed out that I should define lenient, normal and strict firearms regulatory regimes. In the context of my previous post, I simplistically define the terms as follows (and am open to redefining them for the sake of civil debate):

Lax or Lenient Regulations:
(At least this level of controls or less)

-Long Guns
--Permit required to purchase rifles/shotguns? NO
--Registration required to own rifles/shotguns? NO
--Licensing of rifle/shotgun owners required? NO
--Permit required to carry rifles/shotguns? NO

-Hand Guns
--Permit required to purchase hand guns? NO
--Registration required to own hand guns? NO
--Licensing of hand gun owners required? NO
--Permit required to carry hand guns? YES (concealed and vehicle carry)

-Other Requirements
--State waiting period? NO
--FBI/NICS background check required? NO

Normal Regulations:
(At least this level of controls or but less than Strict)

-Long Guns
--Permit required to purchase rifles/shotguns? NO
--Registration required to own rifles/shotguns? NO
--Licensing of rifle/shotgun owners required? NO
--Permit required to carry rifles/shotguns? NO

-Hand Guns
--Permit required to purchase hand guns? NO
--Registration required to own hand guns? NO
--Licensing of hand gun owners required? NO
--Permit required to carry hand guns? YES

-Other Requirements
--State waiting period? YES
--FBI/NICS background check required? YES

Strict Regulations:
(At least this level of controls or more)

-Long Guns
--Permit required to purchase rifles/shotguns? State issued Firearms ID
--Registration required to own rifles/shotguns? NO
--Licensing of rifle/shotgun owners required? NO
--Permit required to carry rifles/shotguns? State issued Firearms ID

-Hand Guns
--Permit required to purchase hand guns? YES
--Registration required to own hand guns? NO, but police record of all transfers required.
--Licensing of hand gun owners required? YES
--Permit required to carry hand guns? YES

-Other Requirements
--State waiting period? YES
--FBI/NICS background check required? YES

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

OK, then where do you draw the line? Can I own an artillery piece (actually they are legal many places). How about a jet fighter (believe it or not, they are for sale on eBay). Can I own thermobaric weapons? How about nukes?

If you say yes to all of these, then you are either being disingenuous, or you're just plain scary. If you drew a line, where and why?

How about if I say yes to some of them?

Yes, it is legal to own artillery pieces in a number of places in the country. How frequently do you see them employed in crimes? Do we see people wheeling out antique Spanish-American war guns to rub banks or to shell enemy gangs? No? Why not?

The reason is that the people who actually own cannons are war reenactors, collectors, and companies that provide weaponry to film productions. Their ownership is strictly regulated, and the types of ammunition that can be sold even more so. Their ownership harms exactly nobody.

And what about jet fighters? They're not even weapons. Is there some reason that I should be more afraid of a decommissioned (i.e. deweaponized) jet fighter than any other private plane? There are still a few WWII surplus jeeps tooling around in the hands of collectors too. Should their owners turn them in?

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

The problems was his easy access to a firearm and ammunition. He only had to pass to most rudimentary background check and off he went with his gun. There is no restriction in Arizona on ammo - buy what you want.

Right. So, like I said, the concealed-carry law was irrelevant. It was controls in other places that failed. The concealed-carry law had absolutely no impact.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

... or he might have started a shooting match, where too many someones started shooting at everyone. In fact, I would count on that as the most likely.

Right. The problem is that the actual factors in this case fly in the face of your "gun owners are loose cannons" argument.

Specifically:

• Zamudio turned off the safety while it was concealed and didn't draw it.
• When Zamudio arrived at the scene he was not so trigger happy as to shoot the man who had disarmed Loughner. He correctly assessed that the gun was jammed. Instead of drawing on the man with the gun, he tackled him. He didn't start shooting wildly.
• When Zamudio helped to subdue Loughner, he considered drawing to more effectively do so, but ultimately decided against it not wanting to add more chaos to the scene.

Yes. There is the possibility for misunderstandings to happen in chaotic situations. Of course, those same misunderstandings can (and do) happen under other circumstances. Had there been a police officer nearby, he might just as well "started a shooting match" or hit the wrong person. I mean, it's not like police don't riddle the wrong person with bullets, hit innocent bystanders, or use inappropriate levels of force. (In fact, I can think of any number of gun owners I have known who I'd rather have on the scene than, say, the cop who smashed me in the sternum for the crime of smoking a cigarette outside of a club when I was a teen. Or his buddy who laughed, for that matter.)

Originally Posted by Semo '75

How about if I say yes to some of them?

Yes, it is legal to own artillery pieces in a number of places in the country. How frequently do you see them employed in crimes? Do we see people wheeling out antique Spanish-American war guns to rub banks or to shell enemy gangs? No? Why not?

There was guy in my home town that owned a WW-II 3-incher. He couldn't get ammunition for it, but he could get casings and, shocking to me, primers. So, he reloaded his own, using baseballs as his "ball" ammunition, and fired the thing on a regular basis ... at trunks driving on the highway.

FWIW, someone shot him dead in an argument. Both were armed.

Originally Posted by Semo '75 ...

The reason is that the people who actually own cannons are war reenactors, collectors, and companies that provide weaponry to film productions. Their ownership is strictly regulated, and the types of ammunition that can be sold even more so. Their ownership harms exactly nobody.

As I noted, not always and not reliably.

Originally Posted by Semo '75 ...

And what about jet fighters? They're not even weapons. Is there some reason that I should be more afraid of a decommissioned (i.e. deweaponized) jet fighter than any other private plane? There are still a few WWII surplus jeeps tooling around in the hands of collectors too. Should their owners turn them in?

Who's to say that you can't get the weapons if you can get the plane. They don't have to be State of the Art to be devastating.

Originally Posted by Bob Butler 54

To me, not a question with an obvious answer.

Well, you admitted that you haven't read up a lot on the issue. Would it change things if you learned that he had contact with law enforcement because of death threats he had made?

"As we understand it, there have been law enforcement contacts with the individual where he made threats to kill," [Sheriff] Dupnik said during a press conference Saturday evening. But he wouldn't say who those threats were aimed at.

That's from this article.

How did it happen that a young man who attracted police attention by making death threats was able to walk into a gun store and buy a pistol?

I don't have an answer for that and, because this whole thing has become a political football game, nobody's really asking that question. From what I understand, Arizona does the bare minimum when it comes to background checks. It's obvious they should do more, but if charges were never pressed, it wouldn't have shown up on any background check.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

There was guy in my home town that owned a WW-II 3-incher. He couldn't get ammunition for it, but he could get casings and, shocking to me, primers. So, he reloaded his own, using baseballs as his "ball" ammunition, and fired the thing on a regular basis ... at trunks driving on the highway.

If it was that blatant it sounds like a pretty serious failure of law enforcement. You'd figure that the cops would get called at some point and confiscate the cannon, right? Was anyone killed or injured as a result of it?

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Who's to say that you can't get the weapons if you can get the plane. They don't have to be State of the Art to be devastating.

I'm certain that it's theoretically possible for someone to make weapons for jet fighters in their garage, or maybe acquire weapons from the black market. And then find an engineer or team of engineers on the black market willing to figure out how to reweaponize the aircraft and jury-rig those homemade or illegally acquired weapons to work with it. And then, maybe, the owner could shoot down a plane or blow something up...

But that sort of thing is a case that's on the edge of the edge of the edge of the edge of the edge.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

If you can't even trust the government to administer a mild and moderate gun control law (which is all we're gonna get, and not even that for a while), then you can't trust them to administer traffic laws and car licenses or anything else.

Oy. I know I am just feeding the troll but...

I think what many of us are saying here is that we don't trust the government to do anything particularly well. Have you been to the MVA recently? Have you looked at the convoluted mess that is the IRS?

What do you want Eric? Cause it seems like you want a cradle to the crypt Nanny government, that does everything for you, takes care of you in every possible way. Really? That is incomprehensible to me.

Put yourself in the position of a burglar/rapist/generally bad guy. If you are looking at a street and planning which houses on which to ply your trade, and you know that everyone on the left side of the street is citizen who lawfully owns a gun, and everyone on the right side of the street is unarmed but has 9-11 on speed dial to summon law enforcement, which side of the street do you hit?

The police don't stop crime. If you are lucky, they might be able to catch the people who killed your child, raped your wife or stole your stuff, but very rarely do they actually prevent anything from happening.

You need to step up and do that.

Originally Posted by Semo '75

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

There was guy in my home town that owned a WW-II 3-incher. He couldn't get ammunition for it, but he could get casings and, shocking to me, primers. So, he reloaded his own, using baseballs as his "ball" ammunition, and fired the thing on a regular basis ... at trunks driving on the highway...

If it was that blatant it sounds like a pretty serious failure of law enforcement. You'd figure that the cops would get called at some point and confiscate the cannon, right? Was anyone killed or injured as a result of it?

As far as I know, no one got injured, though several trucks were damaged. This guy was a known violent crackpot, but that didn't seem to keep him from doing whatever he wanted to do ... right to the end.

Originally Posted by Dedalus

Oy. I know I am just feeding the troll but...

I think what many of us are saying here is that we don't trust the government to do anything particularly well. Have you been to the MVA recently? Have you looked at the convoluted mess that is the IRS?

What do you want Eric? Cause it seems like you want a cradle to the crypt Nanny government, that does everything for you, takes care of you in every possible way. Really? That is incomprehensible to me.

Put yourself in the position of a burglar/rapist/generally bad guy. If you are looking at a street and planning which houses on which to ply your trade, and you know that everyone on the left side of the street is citizen who lawfully owns a gun, and everyone on the right side of the street is unarmed but has 9-11 on speed dial to summon law enforcement, which side of the street do you hit?

The police don't stop crime. If you are lucky, they might be able to catch the people who killed your child, raped your wife or stole your stuff, but very rarely do they actually prevent anything from happening.

You need to step up and do that.

H-m-m-m. You sound a bit paranoid. have you ever been robbed ... or shot? Have you even been seriously threatened? If not, then why the hysteria?

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

As far as I know, no one got injured, though several trucks were damaged. This guy was a known violent crackpot, but that didn't seem to keep him from doing whatever he wanted to do ... right to the end.

Hopefully you've moved to a place with more competent law enforcemment.

I don't think that people should be firing baseballs out of cannons at passing trucks, but with the regulations in place, the best the guy could manage with his (presumably legally acquired) cannon was the rough equivalent of throwing chunks of concrete onto passing cars from overpasses, something that some number of people do every year. So, in a way, the existing regulations worked, although your local police obviously dropped the ball after that.

Originally Posted by Dedalus

Oy. I know I am just feeding the troll but...

I think what many of us are saying here is that we don't trust the government to do anything particularly well. Have you been to the MVA recently? Have you looked at the convoluted mess that is the IRS?

Yeah, dude, this topic jumped the shark a long time ago. No matter what you say about people's lack of trust in the government to do anything meaningful or constructive, they'll twist it.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

H-m-m-m. You sound a bit paranoid. have you ever been robbed ... or shot? Have you even been seriously threatened? If not, then why the hysteria?

Your attempt at character assassination is irrelevant to the argument. I wasn't asking you, but answer the question. You gonna break into the house with the armed owner, or the one with the unarmed owner?

Hysteria? Dude, I am an Xer from a blue collar city, we grew up with more violence than the howdy-doody childhood of the previous generation. Do you keep up with current events? Crime might be on the decline, but it isn't extinct.

I don't live in fear of crime, but I lock my doors and keep my wits about me.

Don't try to skirt the question by trying to paint the questioner as paranoid.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

H-m-m-m. You sound a bit paranoid. have you ever been robbed ... or shot? Have you even been seriously threatened? If not, then why the hysteria?

That's kind of a cheap shot, given that you've been arguing that cannons and decommissioned surplus vehicles should be outlawed outright because a guy once shot a baseball out of a cannon and some rich evil genius just might hire engineers to figure out a way to arm the vehicle again.

Who's paranoid here, exactly?

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

H-m-m-m. You sound a bit paranoid. have you ever been robbed ... or shot? Have you even been seriously threatened? If not, then why the hysteria?

You ever had your car stolen? Then what's with all the locking it and taking the keys with you? To say nothing of alarm systems ()... Are you paranoid or something? Why the hysteria?

Originally Posted by Xer H

Yeah, dude, this topic jumped the shark a long time ago. No matter what you say about people's lack of trust in the government to do anything meaningful or constructive, they'll twist it.

I know. I was trying to catch up on the thread today... sometimes I think some of these guys just say things to elicit a response, lol...

Where's The Cat, with his awesome YouTube find of Virginia Woolf?? (or something equally relevant)

Cue, dude!

Originally Posted by Semo '75

From what I understand, Arizona does the bare minimum when it comes to background checks. It's obvious they should do more, but if charges were never pressed, it wouldn't have shown up on any background check.

A better summary of Arizona firearms regulations can be found here. An imprecise summary of their regulatory regime follows:

-Long Guns
--Permit required to purchase rifles/shotguns? NO
--Registration required to own rifles/shotguns? NO
--Licensing of rifle/shotgun owners required? NO
--Permit required to carry rifles/shotguns? NO

-Hand Guns
--Permit required to purchase hand guns? NO
--Registration required to own hand guns? NO
--Licensing of hand gun owners required? NO
--Permit required to carry hand guns? NO

-Other Requirements
--State waiting period? NO
--FBI/NICS background check required? NO (except federally licensed dealers)

Note: AZ state law no longer requires a concealed carry permit for AZ citizens meeting eligibility requirements, although they will still issue them for reciprocity agreements with other states.

As far as I can tell, AZ does not conduct any additional background checks unless issuing the optional concealed carry permit. Federal law requires federally licensed firearms dealers to conduct a minimal background check using the FBI/NICS system but that does not apply to private sales or gun shows in Arizona.

It is unlikely that Loughner would have been prevented from acquiring the weapons he did in most states regardless of the strictness or leniency of their firearms regulatory regimes - exceptions to this might include states that require local authorities to issue permits at their discretion. He did not have any felony convictions, was 22 years of age and would have passed the FBI/NICS background check.

While his case is emotionally compelling, it is on the extreme margins of firearms regulatory issues. Our time would be better spent in determining a way to strengthen our civic institutions so that people like Loughner can be identified, entered into the NICS prohibited persons data base, and most importantly, treated before they cause themselves or others harm in one of an infinite number of ways.

In the early 1960s, approximately one million Americans were living in institutions like that one shown in "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest". During the 1970s most of these mental health institutions were closed down, in part due to an over emotional response to injustices to the mentally ill highlighted by "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," but also with the hope that the new psychotropic drugs and community-based health care would take over the burden. Hope is not a plan.

This website indicates that approximately 700,000 mentally ill people are currently processed through prison / jail annually.

http://www.safetyandjustice.org/node/237

Prior to the recession HUD estimated that the number of homeless people in the US was about 640,000 on a single night in January with 1.6 million people seeking emergency shelters throughout 2008. Estimates have varied as high as 3 million people currently homeless. In 1996, approximately 55% of the homeless people taking a survey, self identified as having mental health problems.

Based on these data points, I believe the 1.5 million people that would be in mental health institutions in the 1960s are currently homeless or in prison and are receiving even less care than they would have in a mental health institution.

I believe Loughner represents a mental health problem, not a firearms regulatory problem. Increasing or banning firearms across the United States would be a tragic misdiagnosis of this issue and would be unlikely to create a safer environment in the short to medium term - probably decades. I concede that it might work long term but would fail to address the underlying issues and might make it even easier to dismiss these issues - not to belittle the tragedy caused by this type of violence but, at least in our society, insufficient discomfort equals insufficient attention.

Originally Posted by RyanJH

I believe Loughner represents a mental health problem, not a firearms regulatory problem. Increasing or banning firearms across the United States would be a tragic misdiagnosis of this issue and would be unlikely to create a safer environment in the short to medium term - probably decades. I concede that it might work long term but would fail to address the underlying issues and might make it even easier to dismiss these issues - not to belittle the tragedy caused by this type of violence but, at least in our society, insufficient discomfort equals insufficient attention.

I see what you're getting at and appreciate your point, but I have to point out that in Arizona anybody can petition the court to force someone to undergo a mental health evaluation, and it's easier to get someone committed in Arizona than most other states.

People knew that Loughner was troubled, but nobody reported it to anyone who mattered. The cops knew that he was making death threats to people, but he wasn't charged with any crime for doing so. When all is said and done, those two facts contributed to the tragedy more than any other.

I would like to suggest that everyone take a deep breath and a good long think.

The idea that because we can't trust the government, we have to arm ourselves, is apparently very emotionally satisfying to people (like Nomads) who have always had trouble trusting authority, perhaps because the authorities they were first exposed to didn't deserve their trust. That's perfectly natural. The problem with this idea is that it means the end of civilization.

Yes, that's right. The whole idea of civilization is that instead of settling all disputes violently, man to man, or (more often) family to family, we all submit to a system of law which apprehends, tries, and punishes offenders. I would suggest that that idea has been key to all the progress that humanity has made over the last couple of millennia--however erratic it has been.

I would also like to suggest that the US government, at its most oppressive, has been relatively benevolent within a historical perspective. We focus (as we should) on the times that we have betrayed our ideals; but actually, we have done a pretty good job of sticking to them. When people say, as they say here, that our ideals are meaningless, they are opening the door to anarchy, or worse.

"I don't trust the government to do anything" is not a solution. We have no alternative but to try to make government work. Allow me to conclude with the end of Democracy in America.
"For myself, who now look back from this extreme limit of my task, and discover from afar, but at once, the various objects which have attracted my more attentive investigation upon my way, I am full of apprehensions and of hopes. I perceive mighty dangers which it is possible to ward off-mighty evils which may be avoided or alleviated; and I cling with a firmer hold to the belief, that for democratic nations to be virtuous and prosperous they require but to will it. I am aware that many of my contemporaries maintain that nations are never their own masters here below, and that they necessarily obey some insurmountable and unintelligent power, arising from anterior events, from their race, or from the soil and climate of their country. Such principles are false and cowardly; such principles can never produce aught but feeble men and pusillanimous nations. Providence has not created mankind entirely independent or entirely free. It is true that around every man a fatal circle is traced, beyond which he cannot pass; but within the wide verge of that circle he is powerful and free: as it is with man, so with communities. The nations of our time cannot prevent the conditions of men from becoming equal; but it depends upon themselves whether the principle of equality is to lead them to servitude or freedom, to knowledge or barbarism, to prosperity or to wretchedness."

It's up to us.

Originally Posted by KaiserD2

I would like to suggest that everyone take a deep breath and a good long think.

The idea that because we can't trust the government, we have to arm ourselves, is apparently very emotionally satisfying to people (like Nomads) who have always had trouble trusting authority, perhaps because the authorities they were first exposed to didn't deserve their trust. That's perfectly natural. The problem with this idea is that it means the end of civilization.

I think there are other elements to the Xer view than just mistrust of government, although that is there too. But one thing that has become very apparent to me as I've read many different posts on all kind of different subject matters over the past year on this forum, is how very influenced the Xers were by all the post-apocalyptic movies, books and other media sources we grew up on. The image of a world destroyed, with gangs of thugs roaming around and having to have a gun to protect yourself and your food is very much ingrained in our minds and have become part of our psyche. I just think somewhere deep down inside we all have this fear those images we saw will some day come to pass.

We are the children of the cold war. Many of the early Xers or Jonesers lived under the constant knowledge that both Russia and the US had enough nukes to destroy the world ten times over. We weren't afraid of terrorist coming after us, like the millies are. We were afraid of the entire world being just gone in an instant. That's some pretty heavy stuff to have hanging over your head when you are kid. It's probably the Xers who are more likely to believe in all the 2012 stuff. As I've said before, when we were kids it wasn't really so much a question of if it was going to happen, but when it was going to happen. We have transfered the end the world scenarios from nukes to catastrophes caused by global warming or other types of threats to human kind.

So when people talk about having to arm themselves because the authorities may not be around to protect them, I have to wonder if they aren't subconsciously pulling out some of images they saw in the movies of that possible future and that is playing into it...Just a thought.

And remember, in all those movies we saw. If you didn't have gun. You were dead meat.