Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

[alfablue]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

Shoot the SOB who is trying to shoot me. I refuse to go down cowering in a corner.

That's the theory. It has yet to be tested.

You are one of those people who pretend they are superheros?

Or are you actually a vet who saw action so knows how a gun fight plays out?

 

[alfablue]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

I have seen ordinary people with long, extensive histories of handling weapons, miss a shot at a deer at a range so close it would shock most people. The excitement, adrenaline, nerves and rush to shoot (known collectively among hunters as "buck fever") is insurmountable. Very, very few people are immune, even the most experienced of hunters.

I can't imagine what it would be like if some clown in assault gear shows up and starts shooting up the room. I give the average person no better than one chance out of a hundred of even coming close to hitting the assailant in a situation like that.

Which is why I don't see how having more armed people around would do any good.

Especially untrained ones.

By untrained, I mean full assault training. Not just handing a gun training.

 

[SJHovey]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

Thank you for the lesson. But I do know that.

My point is what you answered before- using it by pulling the trigger as fast as possible doesn't make it more effective.

BTW, I'm not sure about your point keeping the gun on your shoulder and not having to move to run the action. Unless I'm firing at a deaf deer, they will move if you miss. If you are firing at a fast moving deer, you missed something in the hunter course. So reloading the gun from a miss is kind of irrelevant.

This disagreement may just be a product of our hunting grounds. All of my deer hunting has been on the plains of North Dakota, where as any Minnesota hockey fan will tell you trees are few and far between. It is actually not all that unusual for a person to shoot a deer on their second or third shot out here. I've seen it many times.

By the way, I didn't mean to get the thread off topic. I was intending to respond to Kepler regarding the assault weapon issue.

 

[dxmnkd316]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

No, I can't trust you on that what so ever. I've done a lot of shooting in my time, too- with a recoil-less 22, and if you pull that trigger as fast as you can, one would to be very skilled to not move.

There's more to repeated firing a gun than recoil.

And yet, hitting two clay targets the size of a dessert plate (or smaller) at 30-40 yards flying away from you isn't that difficult. The time between the shots is usually a second or less.

If you're shooting a single target with two rounds, your second shot is almost immediately after the first if you miss.

 

[aparch]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

First step would be for the repeal of the ban on the CDC from studying gun violence.


Somewhere there is a middle ground that should be reached by all parties, yet the polarization of our politics are going to want an all-or-nothing solution.

 

[alfablue]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

This disagreement may just be a product of our hunting grounds. All of my deer hunting has been on the plains of North Dakota, where as any Minnesota hockey fan will tell you trees are few and far between. It is actually not all that unusual for a person to shoot a deer on their second or third shot out here. I've seen it many times.

I've only "hunted" in Idaho, and talk to people who hunt in Michigan and Pennsylvania. So, yea, very different environment.

And my "hunting" was more hiking in the woods, heavily armed. I preferred bow hunting, as that was much lighter.

 

[alfablue]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

And yet, hitting two clay targets the size of a desert plate (or smaller) at 30-40 yards flying away from you isn't that difficult. The time between the shots is usually a second or less.

If you're shooting a single target with two rounds, your second shot is almost immediately after the first if you miss.

So you can do it? Or are you talking about someone with practice and training?

And "immediate" is not re-aiming? Just squeezing the trigger as fast as possible? I get the impression that skilled people re-aim, and then fire. Which does take a finite time slower than just pulling the trigger.

 

[joecct]

You are one of those people who pretend they are superheros?

Or are you actually a vet who saw action so knows how a gun fight plays out?

Flight 93 people were not planning on being heroes when their plane took off on 9/11. Yet, when the time arose they rose up. Yes they all died, but they prevented a greater tragedy.

We don't know what we'll do when presented with a life or death situation. We hope to do the heroic thing to stop/mitigate the damage. But we'll never know who will be the hero or what the deed will be.

 

[dxmnkd316]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

You're making an argument that these people are stopping to reaim and get the perfect shot instead of spraying indiscriminately. I don't know what you're getting at.

 

[dxmnkd316]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

And yes, I can do it. And I've only shot clays for a year.

 

[aparch]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

I also find issue with the classification of a mass-shooting as four or more. So if someone opens fire on their wife, two children, and themselves; that counts the same as this San Bernardino wackjob?

Why isn't this nut, and the planned parenhood idiot labled what they really are? Domestic terrorists. Both meet the FBI description for it.

As for his "ethnicity," the San Bernardino shooter (per what I heard on the radio this AM) was an American, born in Chicago.

 

[alfablue]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

Flight 93 people were not planning on being heroes when their plane took off on 9/11. Yet, when the time arose they rose up. Yes they all died, but they prevented a greater tragedy.

We don't know what we'll do when presented with a life or death situation. We hope to do the heroic thing to stop/mitigate the damage. But we'll never know who will be the hero or what the deed will be.

And the time they had to rationalize what was going on and do something was far, far, far longer than what happened yesterday, as well as most shooting incidents.

Please, be a little realistic and rational.

 

[GrinCDXX]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

I agree 100% regarding existing laws. But I think the "military grade assault rifle" is a bit of a misnomer.

The AK rifles these people likely used, and that you can buy in any gun shop, are exactly the same as your standard deer rifle hunters take into the field, except for the appearance. In fact, I've even seen some guys use them as deer rifles.

They fire one bullet per trigger pull. Unless they are illegally modified, or illegally manufactured, there is no "automatic" feature to them that allows Rambo style spewing of bullets.

People will argue that the magazine on such a gun holds more rounds that a typical rifle, but you can buy any size magazine you want for any gun, and nothing prohibits you from carrying multiple clips filled with ammo.

I've always wondered about the psychology of the appearance of the standard AK style semi-automatic rifle. Whether the machine gun / military like appearance of it draws shooters to these guns, but I would want to see studies that suggest as much and furthermore suggest that banning any gun that appears like that will actually reduce the number of these incidents.

Don't assault style weapons have a center of gravity quite a bit closer to the shooter than your typical hunting rifle? It certainly appears that way. I am no expert on handling firearms, but I imagine it would be significantly more cumbersome to move quickly from target to target with a hunting style weapon than with an assault style weapon.

 

[alfablue]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

You're making an argument that these people are stopping to reaim and get the perfect shot instead of spraying indiscriminately. I don't know what you're getting at.

And yes, I can do it. And I've only shot clays for a year.

So you just pull the trigger twice as fast as you can to hit both clay targets?

 

[dxmnkd316]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

Rereadwhat I wrote before that. Try and keep up.

 

[JF_Gophers]

Flight 93 people were not planning on being heroes when their plane took off on 9/11. Yet, when the time arose they rose up. Yes they all died, but they prevented a greater tragedy.

We don't know what we'll do when presented with a life or death situation. We hope to do the heroic thing to stop/mitigate the damage. But we'll never know who will be the hero or what the deed will be.

3 people out of 200+ decided to act. So <1.5% decided to act. That's not very good odds when talking about trying to stop an attack.

It also doesn't account for the odds of success in stopping an attacker once you choose to act.

 

[FreshFish]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

There is no denying that mental health issues play a significant role in many of these acts of public violence.... There is an ocean of need out there for people who are not coping well in the system, ....

Go at mental health the way the Reagan administration went after drug users. Be serious about it. Budget funds for it. Run ad campaigns about it. But helping those with mental illness is essentially an act of generosity and caring for others who are not adequately helping themselves, not an act born of fear and condemnation, and it is harder to sell for that reason.

One of the biggest problems mental health professionals face today are "advocates" for people who are mentally ill. Many states have to deal with legal aid people who sue the states over their attempts to regulate people who have already been diagnosed with permanent mental illnesses, particularly psychiatric ones.

Many schizophrenics, for example, can be functional in society as long as they stay on their medications. However, many of them do not want to take their medications. How do we handle that situation?

Right now, the pattern is, they go off their meds, get arrested, get put back on their meds while in the hospital, get released, go out into the world, go off their meds, get arrested, etc. etc. and the cycle repeats.

Can schizophrenics be legally required to remain on their meds as a condition of their ability to move about freely in society?

Find a viable answer to that question and you'll go a long way to solving the problem you identify.

 

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

Do you honestly think someone who has a gun would have put an end to it? And because nobody was around that had a gun, it was the reason it happened??

Given the number of trained police with actual assault rifles, body armor, and helmets it took to take TWO people out- I can't see one person with a pistol on their hip having any impact on this situation.

Answering violence with more violence isn't an answer- it just kills more people.

They would have thought twice about shooting up somewhere where they might have gotten whacked.

 

[FreshFish]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

Somewhere there is a middle ground that should be reached by all parties

This middle ground will be found in the states, not in the federal government.

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." [emphasis added]

States have the ability to regulate people that the federal government lacks. "well-regulated militias" are state entities, not federal entities.

Treat guns as if they were cars. We do not regulate cars, we regulate car owners and drivers. The states can probably require gun owners to carry liability insurance as a condition of gun ownership within the second amendment guidelines, while the feds cannot, for example.

 

[burd]

Re: Days Since Last Mass Shooting: 0

One of the biggest problems mental health professionals face today are "advocates" for people who are mentally ill. Many states have to deal with legal aid people who sue the states over their attempts to regulate people who have already been diagnosed with permanent mental illnesses, particularly psychiatric ones.

Many schizophrenics, for example, can be functional in society as long as they stay on their medications. However, many of them do not want to take their medications. How do we handle that situation?

Right now, the pattern is, they go off their meds, get arrested, get put back on their meds while in the hospital, get released, go out into the world, go off their meds, get arrested, etc. etc. and the cycle repeats.

Can schizophrenics be legally required to remain on their meds as a condition of their ability to move about freely in society?

Find a viable answer to that question and you'll go a long way to solving the problem you identify.

I think you probably know more about that dynamic than I do, FF, but I don't see it as an enforcement problem but one of service. Our social service agencies are understaffed and underfunded and are not able to follow up on people who become engaged in the system, many of whom need medications of one kind or another to function. These professionals are basically putting out fires.

It's not a Republican problem, but you get administrations like the one we have in Wisconsin, and the situation will only get worse. Can I cite studies showing that this is true? No.