Originally Posted By ecdc Before you think the NRA, read this, Donny. <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/12/the-nra-and-the-positive-good-of-maximum-guns/266571/" target="_blank">http://www.theatlantic.com/nat.../266571/</a>
Originally Posted By DyGDisney Thank you, NRA, for showing us what a truly fearful people we have become, and for helping to usher us more quickly toward a status more befitting of underdeveloped countries.
Originally Posted By DyGDisney And Thank You, NRA, for suggesting that our already financially strapped government pay for an armed guard at every public school in this country. Oh, of course your lovely members could volunteer there...couldn't they. Well the day some gun nut plays John Wayne at public schools is the day my children are homeschooled.
Originally Posted By DyGDisney And thank you, NRA, for making our country the laughing stock of the developed world. English journalists had to tell their audiences that LaPierre's comments were, indeed, not a joke.
Originally Posted By DyGDisney And thank you, NRA, for showing us how many "Christian" people out there have forgotten that being a Christian is being "Christ-like". Christ, being the ultimate pacifist, would have NEVER taken up a weapon against even an enemy.
Originally Posted By DyGDisney And one more thank you to the NRA for placing their obsession with guns and their love of money above the lives of children -- and everyone else in this country. The FACT is that if you own a gun you are 4.5 times more likely to find yourself in a situation in which you feel the need to USE that gun. I wonder why that is....I guess the NRA has convinced people that violence is truly the only way to settle your problems.
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder Columbine shows why armed security would not work. <a href="http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2012/12/21/columbine_armed_guard_colorado_shooting_shows_that_nra_s_shield_program.html" target="_blank">http://www.slate.com/blogs/the...ram.html</a>
Originally Posted By skinnerbox OK, there's obviously a dead elephant in Donny's living room that he's failing to acknowledge. And the fact that he's refusing to acknowledge it is the major disconnect regarding his question. Donny... why are there guns and other weapon-related paraphernalia in your house? I grew up learning how to shoot a shotgun. My dad had his and my mom had hers. Two shotguns. No bulletproof vests, no handguns, no automatic or semi-automatic weapons. Just old-fashioned single barrel shotguns. That's it. And they were locked up in a metal vault without being loaded when they weren't being used outdoors, far away from the house. I get the impression that you didn't give your kids gun safety training simply because they go hunting with you, like I did with my parents. You gave them gun safety training so they could be armed and ready to defend your family and property in case some evil nasty bad guy tries to break into the house. You're a prepper. And you want your kids to be preppers just like you. Does their training also include attending teabagger rallies to learn how to properly hate Democrats?
Originally Posted By barboy ///I've never come close to being killed in an airplane./// There is no way to know that. Maybe you came close to an inflight collision without you knowing.......it's not like the captain is going to get on the mic and say to the passengers "WOW, THAT WAS A NEAR MISS!!!!". What about equipment failure? How could you possibly know if instruments were mis calibrated or on brink on failure? Or what about that freak in seat 48 F who at the last minute decided to a abort her plan to cause mayhem. You do not necessarily know just how near death can be in the skies........just like any other place be it on land or sea.
Originally Posted By barboy ///You are safer in an airplane than in the car. It's not a cliché, it's a fact./// ......depends
Originally Posted By leobloom >> it's not like the captain is going to get on the mic and say to the passengers "WOW, THAT WAS A NEAR MISS!!!!". << Reminds me of the George Carlin bit about airline companies calling it a near miss. Bull$%@, he said, it's a near HIT.
Originally Posted By barboy ....getting back to stats about gun danger in the house. I would like to preface something 1st: I hate guns.....I HATE ALL OF THEM......and for the most part I want nothing to do with those("ordinary folk") who would keep them. There is something wrong thses gun keepers and/or lovers. As a rule when they die by their own guns I don't cry for them for if one lives by the sword then may they die by it......sort of like Connecticut 'mom'.....she, appearantly, lived by the gun and ultimately died by it. Now if one is well trained, not trigger happpy, mentally and physically stable, has well working firearms, consistently keeps guns properly locked, doesn't have children/idiots/violent/unbalanced people in the house, then one can throw those aggregate stats of accidental gun violence out the window. Having a gun in the home is as safe or dangerous as one makes it.
Originally Posted By barboy ///Reminds me of the George Carlin bit about airline companies calling it a near miss. Bull$%@, he said, it's a near HIT./// Very true!!! Carlin had it right.
Originally Posted By barboy ///You're a prepper/// DAMN STRAIGHT!!! I'm a prepper He's a prepper She's a prepper We're all a prepper Wouldn't ya like to be a prepper too
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder Carlin- "Let the daredevils get ON the plane, I'M getting IN."
Originally Posted By Dabob2 "There is no way to know that. Maybe you came close to an inflight collision without you knowing.......it's not like the captain is going to get on the mic and say to the passengers "WOW, THAT WAS A NEAR MISS" Near misses must, by law, be reported (and the ATC system knows about them anyway ) and often make the news. Because they are rare. If they don't make the news they are nonetheless public information. ///You are safer in an airplane than in the car. It's not a cliché, it's a fact./// ......depends " No. Like Obama's birthplace, it doesn't "depend."' It's a fact. Numbers are numbers. If you flip a coin and it comes up heads, that event is over, but it doesn't change that the probability was 50% before you threw it. Or the next time you throw it. The odds of you having an accident in a car are much higher than you having one in a plane. Simple fact. You can cut down those odds by being a good driver, having a well maintained vehicle, etc. but there are still too many elements out of your control. The numbers don't lie, and they're really not even that close.
Originally Posted By barboy ///The odds of you having an accident in a car are much higher than you having one in a plane/// .....based on aggregate numbers or **OVERALL MACRO** stats, "yes"; but in micro scenarios maybe, myabe not----it most certainly depends on many factors. Which senario would you feel more safe as a passenger: 1) riding in a well maintained, medium to larger car, on dry roads with center barriors, going 30 miles per hr. using seat belts driven by a safe and undistracted driver...... or 2) taking a 'hopper' flight in nasty weather in a smaller prop plane operated by a young pilot with few air miles destined for Lukla deep in Nepal
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <based on aggregate numbers or **OVERALL MACRO** stats> ...which is the only thing that makes sense to talk about, to be meaningful statistically. When you talk about small sample sizes like your #2, it becomes statistically meaningless. Your #1 is larger, but even more of THOSE people will die on the roads than in the air, due not so much to themselves as to other drivers they have no control over.
Originally Posted By barboy ///which is the only thing that makes sense to talk about,/// I can't agree with that. Here it comes again: it depends If the immediate topic is about something like national legislation/policy then, well, yep, let's look at the overall numbers. .....but when someone like ecdc invokes unspecified macro stats to help justify his micro environmental stance regarding guns in his home then it's appropriate to comment, I say. ....same thing with drives and flights. We should get all macro when talking about DOT and FAA policy but when I'm driving on vast private Kansas farm acres(yes, years back I used to do that), then I think about personal or micro odds.....those national stats on death and serious injury from driving just don't apply.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <We should get all macro when talking about DOT and FAA policy> Yes, exactly. And that IS what we are talking about, unless we want to get all Reductio ad absurdum. <but when I'm driving on vast private Kansas farm acres(yes, years back I used to do that), then I think about personal or micro odds.> Think about whatever you like. Your personal situation is statistically meaningless to anyone else. That is not the case with ecdc choosing to keep guns or not. The stats there are clear; even people who are good about locking them up and doing what you should do suffer more gunshot deaths (accidental or crime-of-passion) than those who don't keep them. Just as people who are excellent drivers have accidents that are either their fault or someone else's.
