• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Gun attack at Batman film premiere in Denver [W:120]

Status
Not open for further replies.
The average criminal can get an illegal gun in less time than it takes a person to legally buy one, they know who has what already. It took me 30 minutes to buy mine legally because of the paperwork and background checks and cost me multiple hundreds. The average crook can buy a filed gun for probably about 40$ in five minutes. Oh, and my city/state didn't have a waiting period, much like most "psst, come here" shops.

I couldn't get one in 5 minutes, or even 30 minutes, be it legally or illegally. My commute would be way longer. :lol:
 
Yep, no problem. If you know how to get your hands on some hard illegal drugs like crack, meth, or heroin, or you know someone who does (and I assume that most people do know at least one person who has battled a serious drug problem), then you can get a gun illegally pretty easily, too.

****, if you know the location of a halfway house in your area, you could probably figure out how to get a gun. All you have to do is figure out which guy nearby said halfway house is the local dealer and get him to move you down along the line to get the gun. You gotta do it without making yourself look like a cop or getting yourself killed, of course, but it's not like committing crimes is a risk-free venture.

This reminds me of "Office Space."

"Just give me the name of one drug dealer, I have good networking skills."
 
The average criminal can get an illegal gun in less time than it takes a person to legally buy one, they know who has what already. It took me 30 minutes to buy mine legally because of the paperwork and background checks and cost me multiple hundreds. The average crook can buy a filed gun for probably about 40$ in five minutes. Oh, and my city/state didn't have a waiting period, much like most "psst, come here" shops.

Which is why this is a bad test case for gun control. If you're intent on shooting up a movie premiere, you're going to do it. You'll get a gun and you'll do it. Laws don't stop criminals.

To be honest, I really see the voter ID laws the same way. If you really want to commit voter fraud, you'll get a fake ID or 3. It's not that hard.
 
Cite a competition where 100 round drums are used that is IPSC, USPSA, IDPA, etc recognized and I will cede this point. You won't find it btw.
Which is why I specifically mentioned "bush league" there are plenty of unaffiliated competitions out there, not all of them are known. Hell, if a group of people want to compete on private property that's enough reason for me.

Large magazines allow longer time on target. No other way to spin it, no other way to say it. You can argue semantics of mag changes all you want. The average mag change takes approximately 3-5 seconds. That is about 9-15 more rounds the shooter gets off with a large mag. Not to mention the time needed to settle back into shooting position, reacquire targets, and start pulling again. You're looking at about 20 less rounds the individual shoots due to that mag change.
What right do we have to own a 100 round drum or body armor? I'm not saying we should restrict guns. I'm saying we should restrict an accessory that has no practical application in the civilian world. Should 203 grenade launchers be legal to sell? They are an AR platform accessory. There is a fine line between "rights" and empowering someone to be dangerous. Once of the main roles of the Federal gov't is to protect the people. I don't agree with laws that protect me from myself. This isn't one of those. This is protecting people from other people who would do them harm. Again, there is no other application in the civilian world where a 100 round drum is needed.
And you know that time on target is only one aspect of the equation. You always anticipate the shot, recover from recoil, and recover the mark anyway. Any decent shooter can acquire the target in a reasonable time. Besides, drum mags are more likely to jam anyway.....but you knew that.
This......

disproves this.
Nope, sure doesn't. You are arguing that any "advantage" is a reason to ban something, I'm saying it's not that big of a deal and it isn't. Frankly if a gun jams it's a disadvantage over the other one, we can't ban gun jams or require that they jam every 20 rounds or so. Frankly it's as I've said, the burden of proof is extremely heavy upon those who want to restrict a right, and there are 1) Not enough drum mags out there to be a factor 2) It's not some kind of unfair advantage that makes the gun a "super weapon" and 3) Doesn't of itself endanger anyone.
 
Which is why this is a bad test case for gun control. If you're intent on shooting up a movie premiere, you're going to do it. You'll get a gun and you'll do it. Laws don't stop criminals.

To be honest, I really see the voter ID laws the same way. If you really want to commit voter fraud, you'll get a fake ID or 3. It's not that hard.
You could still eliminate some fraud with a voter ID law, at least we could get the dead and pet voters out of the equation.
 
:lol: It's pretty damned accurate, though. Most people have no clue how easy it can be to break the law.
There was an article done around ten years ago I ran across, it basically said there are so many local, state, and federal laws that the average person commits around 2k "crimes" unwittingly per day.
 
You could still eliminate some fraud with a voter ID law, at least we could get the dead and pet voters out of the equation.

They are about as effective as gun laws for preventing the crime they purport to prevent. They do far more to prevent law abiding citizens from exercising their rights than they do to prevent criminals form violating the law.

It's actually quite ironic that people who oppose gun control support vote control.
 
There was an article done around ten years ago I ran across, it basically said there are so many local, state, and federal laws that the average person commits around 2k "crimes" unwittingly per day.

I'm thinking about big crimes, actually. Ones that aren't broken accidentally.
 
They are about as effective as gun laws for preventing the crime they purport to prevent. They do far more to prevent law abiding citizens from exercising their rights than they do to prevent criminals form violating the law.

It's actually quite ironic that people who oppose gun control support vote control.
Vote control has more history than gun control if you look back far enough. Unlike the 2nd voting was a priveledge until the early 20th century. Now, do I disagree with it being a right? No. Do I think it's more important to prove your identity to choose leadership than it is to buy adult materials? Absolutely.

Hell, I'm of the opinion that one irresponsible vote hurts more people than any gun ever did and wish we could eliminate the uninformed votes on both sides. Not the votes I disagree with mind you but the ones that are basically less thought out than a lever pull on a slot machine.
 
I'm thinking about big crimes, actually. Ones that aren't broken accidentally.
I get that, just backing you on how easy it is to commit crime, one doesn't even have to try. But even intentional commission of a crime is easy, police have so many resources and they must rely on being able to pinpoint a crime in progress or committed crime through the evidence trail. Either way they usually catch the criminal after the fact.
 
What the SC has said is that the 2d Amendment confers an individual right to own a weapon, but that does not mean that there are no limits on the right. It just means that any limits that are imposed have to survive a strict scrutiny test. Just like we have a right to free speech, but there are a few exceptions where speech can be limited.

"shall not be infringed."

It is pretty clear. I can't even fathom a way of it being said more simply or more clear.
 
"shall not be infringed."

It is pretty clear. I can't even fathom a way of it being said more simply or more clear.

"infringed" =/= "unlimited" Two different words, two different meanings.
 
Vote control has more history than gun control if you look back far enough. Unlike the 2nd voting was a priveledge until the early 20th century.

Freedom wasn't a "right" for most of history by that logic. Just because a right was infringed upon doesn't mean it wasn't a right.

Now, do I disagree with it being a right? No. Do I think it's more important to prove your identity to choose leadership than it is to buy adult materials? Absolutely.
I oppose all ineffectual laws that do more to inhibit the legal exercising of rights than they do to prevent crime. Voter ID laws are just such a thing. They purport to eliminate a nearly mythical problem with something that serves to make it harder for law abiding citizens to vote.

Hell, I'm of the opinion that one irresponsible vote hurts more people than any gun ever did

That's such an absurd belief, given the fact that most people's votes don't even matter. Most irresponsible votes do absolutely nothing. Whereas irresponsible gun ownership kills people.

and wish we could eliminate the uninformed votes on both sides. Not the votes I disagree with mind you but the ones that are basically less thought out than a lever pull on a slot machine.

Then you really do not want a democracy, because when you get right down to it democracy is government of the idiots, by the idiots, for the idiots.
 
FThen you really do not want a democracy, because when you get right down to it democracy is government of the idiots, by the idiots, for the idiots.

There's a reason why the founders built in protections against popularism in our Republic.
 
There's a reason why the founders built in protections against popularism in our Republic.

Yet the protections failed because the system has a major design flaw: winner-take-all elections were possible. These systems breed two-party politics, two party politics feeds off of populism and ignorance.
 
There's a reason why the founders built in protections against popularism in our Republic.

Yes there is and it has a whole lot with just who they were and what class they tended to represent.
 
Yet the protections failed because the system has a major design flaw: winner-take-all elections were possible. These systems breed two-party politics, two party politics feeds off of populism and ignorance.

It was eventually engineered to do that, yes. But the winner take all was another protectionism against popularism as was the electoral voting system. The fact that we stopped regulating government, watching it, and restricting it has certainly lead to a level of intervention within the system to close off political competition and promote oligarchy. But the system isn't quite "self sustaining" to start with. It's a Republic, if you can keep it. That's always been the deal, it's a Republic if we can keep it. Which means it must be kept, it will not keep itself, and if We the People fail to uphold this Republic, we will lose it. And perhaps that was the biggest failure of all, relying on the People to be attentive and intelligent in their duty to uphold the Republic.
 
Now I want to buy an M1A/M21/M25 even more.

One man with a scoped rifle would have stopped most of this tragedy.
You can't carry a rifle around in public, and certainly not into a movie theater.
 
Yet the protections failed because the system has a major design flaw: winner-take-all elections were possible. These systems breed two-party politics, two party politics feeds off of populism and ignorance.

Two party politics pushes people and issues towards compromise and the center. A rogue party cannot simply flap around in the fringe with a couple percent and actually get people into congress to spout extremist crap. The US 2 party system also prevents a wave of "do it in the street" by offering these two flavors: economic authoritarianism or social authoritarianism; in this way, someone must pick one or the other and our cart doesn't fly off its wheels.

I'd prefer a more diverse, multiparty system, but let's not ignore the why and whatfor of the US 2 party system.
 
Two party politics pushes people and issues towards compromise and the center. A rogue party cannot simply flap around in the fringe with a couple percent and actually get people into congress to spout extremist crap. The US 2 party system also prevents a wave of "do it in the street" by offering these two flavors: economic authoritarianism or social authoritarianism; in this way, someone must pick one or the other and our cart doesn't fly off its wheels.

I'd prefer a more diverse, multiparty system, but let's not ignore the why and whatfor of the US 2 party system.

While it is true that in our dynamics, we favor 2 major parties our system isn't exactly (or rather initially wasn't) a 2 party system as our system was not designed for parties.
 
It was eventually engineered to do that, yes. But the winner take all was another protectionism against popularism as was the electoral voting system.


Winner-take all isn't a protection against populism, though. It all but guarantees that a two party system emerges. Two-party systems are entirely about populism. The supposed protection against populism assured it would become the norm.

In fact, it didn't take long at all for it to become all about populism. Definitely by the time Jackson was elected we were a populist nation.
 
The theater was in a gun free zone.
For clarity: Colorado does not list malls and cinimas among it's 'restricted' or 'sensitive arias' such as government buildings and post secondary schools as gun-free zones. It was the cinema's own policy not to allow firearms.

I would have carried into this cinema despite the policy.
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom