At Least 14 Killed in Colo. Movie Shooting

[CrazyIrish]

Tell me, what evidence do you have of gun control "not working" by way of Mexico?

Am I mistaken, or is Mexico located directly beneath the area most lax in gun laws of America? Doesn't that mean something to you?

Very few of the guns used in Mexico come from the US. Any assertion otherwise is fairly absurd.

Lets say you need 5000 "assault rifles" for your cartel. Are you going to:
A. Place a call to any one of a thousands of combloc dealers that can get you real deal, full automatic, top quality russian AKs for around 250-300usd each
B. Pay straw buyers to visit gun stores across the border, rarely able to buy more than 5 or 10 rifles at a time. These rifles being semi-auto and 2 or 3 times as expensive each. Then sneak them back over the border.

Of course if you have an ATF that wants to make people think that more gun control is required by ensuring guns purchased in the USA are seen to be used in your nefarious crimes, and is willing to subsidize option B for you...

 

[Dhruin]

Senseless murders happen in every country, not just the US. There are many countries with much higher homicide rate than us.

True.

Now put that in context.

Honduras
El Salvador
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Venezuela
Belize
Guatemala
Jamaica
Bahamas
Colombia
South Africa
Dominican Republic
Trinidad and Tobago
Brazil
Dominica
Saint Lucia
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Panama
Guyana
Mexico
Ecuador
Nicaragua
Grenada
Paraguay
Russia
Barbados
Costa Rica
Bolivia
Estonia
Moldova
Haiti
Antigua and Barbuda
Uruguay
Thailand
Ukraine
United States

 

[DArtagnan]

Very few of the guns used in Mexico come from the US. Any assertion otherwise is fairly absurd.

Lets say you need 5000 "assault rifles" for your cartel. Are you going to:
A. Place a call to any one of a thousands of combloc dealers that can get you real deal, full automatic, top quality russian AKs for around 250-300usd each
B. Pay straw buyers to visit gun stores across the border, rarely able to buy more than 5 or 10 rifles at a time. These rifles being semi-auto and 2 or 3 times as expensive each. Then sneak them back over the border.

Of course if you have an ATF that wants to make people think that more gun control is required by ensuring guns purchased in the USA are seen to be used in your nefarious crimes, and is willing to subsidize option B for you…

Are you saying that because Mexicans have much easier access to assault rifles and have violence issues - there's no point in trying to control the amount of guns on the street in America?

Because that's a pretty amazingly poor argument

 

[CrazyIrish]

Are you saying that because Mexicans have much easier access to assault rifles and have violence issues - there's no point in trying to control the amount of guns on the street in America?

Because that's a pretty amazingly poor argument

Sigh...Do you even follow your own argument? Lets walk you through what you typed:

Tell me, what evidence do you have of gun control "not working" by way of Mexico?

Am I mistaken, or is Mexico located directly beneath the area most lax in gun laws of America? Doesn't that mean something to you?

I then showed that cartels in Mexico have no problem putting their hands on weapons and it has nothing to do with their proximity to states that have what you call "lax" gun laws. The average Mexican citizen has almost 0 access to guns, unless they dig out their dad/granddad's half century old Colt .38 super. That sounds like "not working" to me.

Polite and intelligent discussion would be easier if you didn't abandon everything you previously stated everytime you post a new response.

 

[JemyM]

True.

Now put that in context.

Honduras
El Salvador
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Venezuela
Belize
Guatemala
Jamaica
Bahamas
Colombia
South Africa
Dominican Republic
Trinidad and Tobago
Brazil
Dominica
Saint Lucia
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Panama
Guyana
Mexico
Ecuador
Nicaragua
Grenada
Paraguay
Russia
Barbados
Costa Rica
Bolivia
Estonia
Moldova
Haiti
Antigua and Barbuda
Uruguay
Thailand
Ukraine
United States

The context I see, is that no European or otherwise "western" countries are above the United States in that list. The European nations begins with eastern nations like Latvia (4.1) which have low gun regulation and then Finland (2.1) which have a very high access to guns (and also have a couple of school massacres just like the US). The only west-european nation above 1.0 is the United Kingdom at 1.23.

 

[blatantninja]

I don't see gun ownership necessarily being the driver behind the higher homicide rate in the US, but rather an overall crime problem. If you look at murder statistics, the vast majority of gun related deaths seem to be attached to some other crime. The risk of getting randomly shot, or shot as the result of an argument or something equally petty is pretty low.

It's also always interesting to point out that the place in the US that always had the strictest gun laws, Washington DC, also had the worst crime rate (and often murder rate) in the country.

These mass killings, like this attack and say the one at Virginia Tech a few years ago, are far more indicative of a failure of our mental health system than an issue of gun control.

 

[JemyM]

I don't see gun ownership necessarily being the driver behind the higher homicide rate in the US, but rather an overall crime problem. If you look at murder statistics, the vast majority of gun related deaths seem to be attached to some other crime.

Guns empower criminals?

are far more indicative of a failure of our mental health system than an issue of gun control.

You believe that the US have on average far more nutcases than your average European nation? Would a heavily tax-infused mental health system solve the problems?

 

[BillSeurer]

It's also always interesting to point out that the place in the US that always had the strictest gun laws, Washington DC, also had the worst crime rate (and often murder rate) in the country.

Controlling guns at even a state level let alone a city level is useless when you can drive a few minutes and buy all the guns you want.

 

[CrazyIrish]

Guns empower criminals?

Guns empower everyone. Criminals just press their advantage far more than law abiding citizens do. If that were not the case then guys like Holmes and Behring would've been dropped before they got their third round off.

 

[blatantninja]

Guns empower criminals?

I don't doubt it, but since the vast majority of guns that are used in crimes are illegally owned anyway, gun control laws don't have any effect on that.

You believe that the US have on average far more nutcases than your average European nation?

yes, because we have far more people than the average European nation.

Would a heavily tax-infused mental health system solve the problems?

No, because funding is only one of the problems with the mental health system here. The law changed a few decades ago and in the US someone can not be put in a mental hospital against their will unless it can be proven that they are a continuing threat to themselves or others. Its one of the main reasons that homelessness has exploded in the US over the same period.

You can throw all the money you want at the system, but unless the law changes, you are dependent upon people seeking help and taking their medications regularly on their own.

 

[blatantninja]

Controlling guns at even a state level let alone a city level is useless when you can drive a few minutes and buy all the guns you want.

I agree. Gun control laws only keep guns out of the hands of people that are law-abiding.

 

[Thrasher]

Don't agree with that. If gun laws prevented legal easy access, then fewer criminals and psychos would have them because of the difficulty of access.

 

[blatantninja]

Don't agree with that. If gun laws prevented legal easy access, then fewer criminals and psychos would have them because of the difficulty of access.

In theory, yes you are correct, however there are so many guns in our country already, plus it is pretty easy to smuggle them up from Mexico, so you're never going to significantly restrict the access by criminals. Plus, most guns used in homicides are handguns, and they are already pretty restricted on purchase. Restricting the ability for me to go and buy a rifle or shotgun isn't going to change crime stats one bit.

 

[Thrasher]

That's just is a defeatist attitude. Eventually the market will dry up if it's currently saturated. And many shootings are not by career criminals, just your occasional crazy or thug.

 

[blatantninja]

That's just is a defeatist attitude. Eventually the market will dry up if it's currently saturated.

You'd have to stop the guns coming in over the border though. We spend untold billions on stopping drugs coming over the border and barely make a dent, how are we going to do better with guns?

And many shootings are not by career criminals, just your occasional crazy or thug.

Agreed, but again restricting guns from the law abiding isn't going to really change that.

 

[JemyM]

Guns empower everyone. Criminals just press their advantage far more than law abiding citizens do. If that were not the case then guys like Holmes and Behring would've been dropped before they got their third round off.

Most people aren't ready to kill even if they had a firearm in their hands and not eager to carry a weapon either.

 

[JemyM]

I don't doubt it, but since the vast majority of guns that are used in crimes are illegally owned anyway, gun control laws don't have any effect on that.

All illegal weapons were once legally owned. A nation with a lot of firearms simply have more firearms.

yes, because we have far more people than the average European nation.

Crimes per capita means crimes per person, which is an average score. It's not based on how many.

No, because funding is only one of the problems with the mental health system here. The law changed a few decades ago and in the US someone can not be put in a mental hospital against their will unless it can be proven that they are a continuing threat to themselves or others. Its one of the main reasons that homelessness has exploded in the US over the same period.

You can throw all the money you want at the system, but unless the law changes, you are dependent upon people seeking help and taking their medications regularly on their own.

Perhaps it's just the culture that is rotten and there's nothing that can fix that. The entire system have to collapse first, like most west-european nations did during WW2.

 

[Thrasher]

If you make the guns harder to access fewer crazies, and criminals will have them. The defeatist attitude that it will have no effect since they will just get them from across the border or elsewhere is incorrect. We may have to agree to disagree on this.

 

[blatantninja]

All illegal weapons were once legally owned. A nation with a lot of firearms simply have more firearms.

Not necessarily. Guns coming from Mexico were never legally owned in the US. As for guns that are stolen from lawful citizens, I don't think denying people the right to bear arms is justified because of criminal actions of others.

Crimes per capita means crimes per person, which is an average score. It's not based on how many.

Well, you didn't say per capita. I don't think it is significantly higher though per capita.

Perhaps it's just the culture that is rotten and there's nothing that can fix that. The entire system have to collapse first, like most west-european nations did during WW2.

I don't think culture has anything to do with if someone is mentally ill.

 

[blatantninja]

If you make the guns harder to access fewer crazies, and criminals will have them. The defeatist attitude that it will have no effect since they will just get them from across the border or elsewhere is incorrect. We may have to agree to disagree on this.

My point is that the guns that ARE generally being used to commit crimes are already hard to access legally.