US Gun laws are "License to murder"

Actually, I think the stats you quote is more likely to be 15,000 people over the age of 19 years old in the USA were killed by murder in 1991. Even then I suspect it is an gross underestimation.

If you are worried by the number of people killed in automobile accidents each year then you would know that the number could be significantly lower if mandatory seat belt legislation was introduced.

Stone, I don't know where you live in the United States but it is the law to wear a seatbelt and cops around here will bust you for it without even thinking about it if they pull you over and you aren't wearing one, and will bust you further if you have kids and the kids aren't. How the cops enforce it where you are, who knows, but the states I've lived in recently ticket for it.

The 15K I quoted is actually a number I got from my brother, who's been advocating locally for the concealed carry ban for campuses to be lifted. He said it's yearly gun related deaths overall, minus suicides.

glad im not in the US :S

Ringshadow, fair enough, It’s good that seat-belt laws are enforced in your state. It will help save many lives. I’m not from the states, so I had to look up the seat-belt laws. They vary widely, with different states having different levels of regulation. Mostly it seems tokenism, and like gun regulation, there seems to be little commitment to reducing unnecessary deaths.

It all comes back to people objecting to seat-belt laws or gun regulation because any law is seen as an infringing on civil liberties. It is also falsely believed that that since deaths are caused by seat-belts in accidents, that the government has no right to legislate an activity (buckling up) that may cause a person's death in the hopes it will maybe save others. Go figure!

It’s s similar story with guns. Most gun deaths are a result of accidents. For example, Ferrum student's death unusual: Accidents rarely involve non-hunters. On a more reassuring note, Medford school teacher loses again in bid to carry gun to school.

Stone, I'm fine with teachers having guns. In fact, I think they should carry them. There's another statistic out there saying that one in ten teachers will be attacked by students in their career. Not cool. If they can't have guns, they should at least be allowed to carry tasers or mace. Not that I'm holding my breath for this to happen.

Mostly I just find all the reactionary stuff about this just... annoying. Of course I'm a future nuke worker so people blowing things out of proportion is just part of my day to day life. I had a friend who didn't realize there was steam in nuke plants... Basically, yeah. I'm sorry if I seem really irritated but ill informed debaters make me facepalm. I mean if US gun laws are "license to murder" but only about 15K die a year from guns, then are a doctor's license to practice a "license to genocide" because over 200K die a year from medical errors? Silly. Just silly.

For a start, the number you quote of 15,000 underestimates the number of gun deaths per year. The actual figure is more like 60,000 deaths per year, of which most are preventable.

Doctors don’t kill 200,000 people a year. That’s the figure quoted for the number of people that die from in-hospital medical errors. Perhaps that’s why President Barack Obama is trying to reform the U.S. healthcare system. Unfortunately, it seems that the people that advocate more and more gun rights are the same people that are trying to block medical reform. It’s also naïve to suggest that because less people die from guns compared to medical errors, then the number of gun deaths is somehow acceptable.

The bottom line is that a “civilised” society tries to reduce unnecessary death from all areas. This includes car accidents, medical errors and guns. And guns in school, are definitely not cool.

Interesting observation.

Ummm yea..guns in school. now that'd be a way for substitute teachers go gain instant respect. Walk into the classroom with a Desert Eagle strapped onto their hip.
Or better yet, a big honking shotgun to clip into the blackboard-side shotgun rack. Kind like this thing , but vertical.

Stout, I don’t know if I would call it an “interesting observation” perhaps “sad” is a better description. Anyhow, I picked up the observation while I was watching TV interviews with the gun slingers (open carry) that showed up when Obama was on the hustings.


White House Takes On Gun Lobby's Health Care Reform Attacks.

“You might not necessarily think that health care reform would end up in the crosshairs of the gun lobby. But you'd be wrong. Gun Owners of America have been raging against the Senate health care bill for all sorts of imagined threats to the Second Amendment, and now the White House has taken notice..”

Gun Lobby Mobilizes Against Health Reform By Claiming Obama Administration Will Issue ‘No Guns’ Decree.

The "armed-citizen" is the backbone of the country, don’t ya no?, u all!

Sad would fit nicely. Paranoid even better.

I've never heard of the GOA before I suppose they probably side with Kellerman on the idea that guns are a public health issue.

Really, it's self reliance that's the backbone of the country, that guy with the sign is just a gun industry shill and any step towards anything that even remotely resembles socialism instantly gets the panties of groups like GOA into one huge collective knot. First, it's health care for poor people, the next it'll be standing in line wearing a Chairman Mao jacket hoping for a ration of government issued gruel just like us commie hordes in Canada.


Pssst,,,that's Y'all

Stout, I’m not sure about the GOA guys siding with Kellerman. Though, you have to love the irony in the “wellness and prevention” program inserted the new Public Health Services Act. It allows the government to offer lower premiums to employers who live healthier lifestyles ie. lives with out guns. Y'all. Did I get it right? Cheers.

^^^^LOL. so the gun lobby is interpreting that to be another form of gun tax (ie if you carry a gun, you and the people around you will cost society more through health treatment therefore pay more if you are riskier).

smokers and old people already pay more health insurance = why shouldnt American gun slingers?

Quite often, in these discussions, swimming pool fatalities are held up the the number of gun related deaths in an attempt to prove that guns aren't all that dangerous. It got me to wondering...are there any other groups for instance the Swimming Pool Owners of America, up in arms ( ha ha ) about the potentially dangerous lifestyles their leading and how the may be economically discriminated against for that lifestyle choice?

Or is it just gun owners ?

The swimming-pool-owner is the “backbone” of the country. Don’t you know, it’s an infringement of second amendment rights to have to protect children by installing a safety fence around the pool. It's a socalist plot!

I heard there was this county that mandated that everyone in that county HAD to have a swimming pool. I think it was in Georgia.

Stout, I think you are right. Though, it must be difficult trying to carry a concealed swimming pool around all day just in case you might want a swim. It reminds me of that one liner by May West – “Is that a swimming pool in your pocket, or you just glad to see me?”

hehehe

one of my best friend has i think 12 guns-pistols, shotguns, rifles
some for fun, some inherited
he didn't even shoot anyone when he was deployed in iraq

guns are mishandled, guns are misused just like so much else in the world