President Obama's Statement on Shootings in Oregon

I deny the absurd claim that the USA is an "advanced country."

So long as there are people and organizations in this country who profit politically and financially from these atrocities by fostering gun fetishism and paranoia about gun control we won't be able to fix this.

Ways to makes things better exist, We need to hold those who stand in the way responsible for the death.

Dear POTUS, how does your office intend to stop criminals from committing crimes? Can we agree that the shooter broke a number of laws? How would another law or set of laws make crime impossible?

The State is not a Savior. It's laws will not protect people in the face of criminal behavior. Tilt at that windmill all you want, and go for full on confiscation if you so desire, but your faith in the State is simply misplaced.

Another gun free zone, another mass shooting.

None of the laws which were proposed and are being proposed are constitutional.

If people want to "fix" this the 2nd amendment needs to be amended.

I don't think that will happen - but that is the solution.

"None of the laws which were proposed and are being proposed are constitutional."

So you use denial by personal opinion on this just as you do with science. How telling.

#2 "Ways to makes things better exist, We need to hold those who stand in the way responsible for the death."

Love that we can blame those law abiding citizens who wish to retain the ability to physically defend themselves. POTUS can come out and make disparaging remarks at such people and target executive orders and cabinet members to victimize those who play by the rules (even if nobody else does). 'Merica

Obviously the more mass shooting there are the more people may buy guns to "protect" themselves.
They may also see any attempt to curtail the purchase of firearms as the Government attempting to put them "in harms way"
Trying to implement any changes on a continental scale are doomed to failure, even such a change here in Europe has never been attempted. Perhaps in the US a start could be made not at the continental or the state level but at the county level

dean #5:

This is not based on personal opinion but on Supreme court decisions.

In addition to being an electrical engineer, I am also a patent attorney - so I read a lot of supreme court decisions and am fairly current on gun control legal opinions.

Heller held the 2nd amendment is a personal right, just like the 1st, fourth, fifth, sixth and so on amendments.

Most of the legal attempts to control guns have been struck down and I anticipate that most of what is being proposed would also be struck down.

Not everything - I am sure we could legislate for mental health and background checks - but if it got to strict it would probably get struck down.

So this is more than just personal opinion - it is part history, part fact and part an informed legal opinion.

Desertphile #6:

Of course amending the 2nd amendment will not change people's behavior.

I am telling you that to ban guns or take away guns or any other law which gun control advocates wish to pass to "fix" this problem - you will need to amend the 2nd amendment.

Do you disagree?

Desertphile:

If you could magically take away all the guns in the USA - do you think people who engage in mass shootings would just shrug their shoulders and give up on mass murder?

Or do you think they would build bombs out of propane tanks, or use knives or some other technique to kill mass quantities of people?

I don't think passing laws or changing the constitution will stop mass killings - do you?

A gun is just a tool - take away the gun and people will just switch to another tool.

Do you disagree?

I am truly interested in your thoughts on gun control.

Dear ron, how do you intend to stop those in possession of guns from committing crimes? Can we agree that the shooter broke a number of laws because he had access to guns & ammo? How would avoiding another law or set of laws to control gun access make crime and/or gun ownership impossible?

The Gun is not a Savior. Its power will not protect people in the face of criminal behavior. Tilt at that windmill all you want, and go for your own full-on gun ownership if you so desire, but your faith in the Gun is simply misplaced.

Another easy-access gun zone, another mass shooting.

"Denialists do not accept the fact that their behavior is frightening and incomprehensible to people who accept reality"

As I've said, locally the anti-vaccination folks are the largest group of science deniers, with a few who view children as property and so base opposition on "don't mess with my property."
The one thing they all have in common with their beliefs is an immense amount of self confidence - not just about the vaccination stuff, but everything. Somehow they've become so sure of themselves that a moment of self-doubt never happens - but as a consequence neither does a bit of reflection on what they say or do. The results, when I've some in class, or a friend or another faculty member sends me a bit of "research" an anti-vaccer has submitted, the fact that it doesn't take long at all to point out the mis-stated or fabricated statistics and explain why they are wrong isn't important. My degrees (or those of other faculty) are meaningless, as are the explanations - because they KNOW they are right.
Long winded comment, but that is the basis for my comment that rickA is very similar to our anti-vaccination folks: no end of comments which are without substance but presented as though they had all the evidential weight of the universe behind them.

They project the same opinion one of my wife's nieces stated about the two of us: "The problem with you two is that you wait to make decisions based on facts rather than what you know is true."

RickA hasn't tried that one yet, but it wouldn't surprise me if he did.

#8 Laws were broken but not "because he had access to guns & ammo". They were simply his weapons of choice.

A gun indeed can protect one in the face of criminal behavior. That would be what they call "The Point of the Argument". There are many documented self-defense uses of firearms every year, from minors to the elderly, the firearm is a great equalizer (but when one believes in Darwinistic Natural Selection where it is appropriate that the strong kill the weak...it does follow Darwin's twisted logic that the weak should remain weak / unarmed).

What's an "easy-access gun zone"?

My arguments don't work in the reverse, and yours don't work in any direction.

"In addition to being an electrical engineer, I am also a patent attorney "

So your opinion on issues like this should be taken just as seriously as the ramblings of an engineer who dismisses evolution, or lawyers who dismiss climate change - not at all seriously.

ron, you're ignoring the (blood) price that goes along with your gun worship. Are you that callous towards everyone? Or (for you) just faceless victims of gun violence, accidental & intentional? I'm sure the families of those Oregon victims feel otherwise. Go ahead and tell us all how you invalidate them.

Go ahead.

More guns bought "for protection" end up killing children & others related to the owner (plus suicides) than kill or deter "criminal behavior" -- by a wide margin.

ron will now invalidate this... Go ahead, ron.

Now tell us how owning that gun protects those children from the criminal behavior of having a loaded firearm available to them in the first place. Go ahead, ron. Tell everyone how my arguments don't work.

Be sure to write it in blood.

I'm not ignoring the blood. I'm advocating the bloodshed of the criminal over the bloodshed of the innocent (current policy's product).

The victims of crime are innocent and should not be disarmed (but, by policy, they were!). Families in Oregon should be armed if they desire to learn proper usage and handling of firearms for personal protection (http://tinyurl.com/o44xeo3). I'm advocating in favor of innocent victims of crime. Others are advocating disarming people who will not break the law. The results are abhorrent to all who don't follow Darwin's delusions.

When seconds count, the cops were 480 seconds away.

Why do we call the cops? Because we need someone to shoot back! Deny that. Go ahead and tell us we call the cops so that we can read poetry together or some such.

Go ahead.

#19 almost never does? Even the CDC disagrees with you. http://tinyurl.com/o3x9q73

#20 Kids using weapons to protect themselves

http://tinyurl.com/osysm6s
http://tinyurl.com/q7u53r7

dean #17 said:

"So your opinion on issues like this should be taken just as seriously as the ramblings of an engineer who dismisses evolution, or lawyers who dismiss climate change – not at all seriously."

It is totally up to you what weight you give my personal opinion. And the fact that I am an attorney does not mean you should turn off your own brain and just agree with what I have to say.

If you choose to give it zero weight - that is up to you.

No hard feelings.

Unless you want to just ask wanta-be mass murders to just please don't kill people - I assume people who want to "fix" this problem will do it by passing laws.

I just thought you should be aware of the problem with most of the gun control laws passed in the USA - which is that they are unconstitutional.

Many have been held unconstitutional by the Supreme Court and they continue to get struck down at the rate of one or two per year.

For example, the law that Heller struck down was a DC law which required the gun to be safed, locked and the ammo had to be in a different room (and I believe also locked).

Heller (who was a retired police officer) pointed out that a gun for self-defense needs to be loaded and ready to be used, to be of any use - and the Supreme Court agreed and struck down the law in DC.

Bans on possession of pistols in Chicago were struck down.

Bans on bearing guns are being struck down (the right to keep and bear arms has two parts).

Bans on guns at Federal parks are being struck down.

And so on - many many laws are getting struck down in many states.

Those are facts (sorry).

So - you tell me what law you think should be passed and I will tell you if I think it will pass muster (if you are interested in my opinion).

If you are not interested - that is ok to.

Desertphile #22:

Then we agree.

I guess I am confused about what you found so objectionable about my point that to "fix" this we need to change the 2nd amendment.

How would you "fix" it?

The interpretation of the 2nd amendment has changed:

"Justice Stevens and his colleagues were not saying, a mere seven years ago, that the gun-control legislation in dispute in Heller alone was constitutional within the confines of the Second Amendment. They were asserting that essentially every kind of legislation concerning guns in the hands of individuals was compatible with the Second Amendment—indeed, that regulating guns in individual hands was one of the purposes for which the amendment was offered.

So there is no need to amend the Constitution, or to alter the historical understanding of what the Second Amendment meant. No new reasoning or tortured rereading is needed to reconcile the Constitution with common sense. All that is necessary for sanity to rule again, on the question of guns, is to restore the amendment to its commonly understood meaning as it was articulated by this wise Republican judge a scant few years ago."
http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/the-second-amendment-is-a-gun-c…

"Does the Second Amendment prevent Congress from passing gun-control laws? The question, which is suddenly pressing, in light of the reaction to the school massacre in Newtown, is rooted in politics as much as law.

For more than a hundred years, the answer was clear, even if the words of the amendment itself were not. The text of the amendment is divided into two clauses and is, as a whole, ungrammatical: “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.” The courts had found that the first part, the “militia clause,” trumped the second part, the “bear arms” clause. In other words, according to the Supreme Court, and the lower courts as well, the amendment conferred on state militias a right to bear arms—but did not give individuals a right to own or carry a weapon."
http://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/so-you-think-you-know-the-s…

The Supreme Court case before Heller was Miller from the 30's.

In Miller the weapon was a sawed off shotgun and the Court held that because the military didn't issue sawed off shotguns to each infantry soldier as a normal part of their arms, that it was ok to regulate sawed off shotguns.

The implication being that since each soldier gets issued a rifle and a pistol, it was not ok to regulate those.

Then Heller held the 2nd amendment is a personal right.

So I don't think it will be very easy for the Court to reverse Heller.

It would be a bit like the Supreme Court reversing Roe v. Wade.

So while it is possible for the Supreme Court to reverse Heller - I consider it very unlikely.

Which is why if laws are desired to control guns, the 2nd amendment will have to be changed (in my opinion).

I don't think that is very likely to happen.