Our current gun culture simply ensures that more and more domestic disputes will end in the ultimate tragedy, and that more convenience-store confrontations over loud music coming from a car will leave more teenage boys bloodied and dead.
In the coming days, Belcher’s actions will be analyzed through the lens of concussions and head injuries. Who knows? Maybe brain damage triggered his violent overreaction to a fight with his girlfriend. What I believe is, if he didn’t possess/own a gun, he and Kasandra Perkins would both be alive today.
That is the message I wish Chiefs players, professional athletes and all of us would focus on Sunday and moving forward. Handguns do not enhance our safety. They exacerbate our flaws, tempt us to escalate arguments, and bait us into embracing confrontation rather than avoiding it.
But we won’t. We’ll watch Sunday’s game and comfort ourselves with the false belief we’re incapable of the wickedness that exploded inside Jovan Belcher Saturday morning.
Bob Costas ran with it at halftime on Sunday Night Football:
Whoa, thought I. And as I expected, unhappy campers are complaining about Costas today.
What a complete moron. Is he so conceded that he actually believes anyone would or should give a sh#t what he thinks?
Does anyone really think taking guns out of the hands of your average responsible citizen is going to make the world a safer place?
"But we only want to ensure that we take guns off the streets and out of the hands of gangs and other irresponsible violent people."
Well, we already have tons of laws that are supposed to do that. See how well that worked?
Still haven't seen any arguments for allowing everybody to possess guns that couldn't be applied equally to possessing sarin (and it's got such a purdy mouf).
Still haven't seen any arguments for allowing everybody to possess guns that couldn't be applied equally to possessing sarin
Sarin is not a very effective means of self defense. Sarin is not very good for hunting game. Sarin is inherently unsafe even in the hands of law abiding citizens. Even the military will not use sarin. Need I go on?
Sarin is not a very effective means of self defense. Sarin is not very good for hunting game. Sarin is inherently unsafe even in the hands of law abiding citizens. Even the military will not use sarin. Need I go on?
Have you tried it in self-defense or hunting game?
Guns are inherently unsafe even it the hands of law-abiding citizens.
Military will use it, just haven't yet.
Feel free to go on, but I doubt that you will ever get anywhere, since you don't seem to get it.
Just back from an all day shooting trip on the Arizona Strip.
Sunny, 60 degrees, little wind, flat ground for miles. Totally bitchin'.
We stopped off at the WalMart coming back to see about my partner getting her boss some ammo for his new AR, but the shelves are bare!
Looks like history is repeating itself again.
Glad I'm well stocked.
Maybe soon I'll sell off some .45s in Vegas.
Having a gun makes everyone safer dontcha know. Just ask this guy.
Police: Boy, 7, shot to death at Pa. gun store
(AP) – 1 day ago
MERCER, Pa. (AP) — A man's handgun went off while he was holding it as he got into his truck in the parking lot of a western Pennsylvania gun store Saturday, and the shot killed his 7-year-old son, authorities said.
Joseph V. Loughrey, 44, of Sharpsville, was getting into the truck when the 9 mm handgun discharged, wounding Craig Allen Loughrey in the chest, according to state police. The boy died at the scene at Twigs Reloading Den in East Lackawannock Township, 60 miles north of Pittsburgh.
Investigators said Loughrey told them he didn't realize there was a bullet still in the chamber. "This happens all too often where people think the gun was empty," Lt. Eric Hermick told The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
Loughrey was trying to sell two guns at the store — one a scope rifle and the other, the handgun, state police said. The owners told Loughrey the store doesn't buy guns so Loughrey and his son returned to the truck with them. Loughrey put the boy in the passenger seat and loaded the rifle into the truck, state police said. He was attempting to get inside and reached to put the handgun in the center storage console when it fired, they said.
Loughrey was questioned by state police, who said he was cooperative and distraught. The shooting is being investigated as an accident, although Loughrey could face charges, including manslaughter and negligence, Hermick told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
"I know that little kid was everything to him," Mark McLaughlin of Fredonia, a friend and co-worker of Loughrey's at Superior Well Services in Fredonia, told the Tribune-Review.
Messages left for the coroner's office and at a listing in Loughrey's name were not immediately returned.
I read the article about the 7yr old a few days ago. So sad. It really hammers home the point that no matter who you are eventually you will have an AD. The only thing that keeps that AD from being a tradgedy is constant muzzel control dicipline and luck. Even Navy Seals have AD's.
The average gun owner is far more at risk of some sort of tradgedy than they are likly to use the gun to be a hero and save the day..
Speaking of heros. Sam Eliot kicks Clint's arse any day of the week as a western actor.
I watched the game last night, and I don't remember Bob Costas saying anything about the fact that if Dallas dude didn't have such easy access to an automobile, his buddy would still be alive.
I saw a frightening stat recently: 100% of NFL players own cars!
Can't speak to all the bullshit in the news. They want to shock and scare you otherwise their ratings go down. I believe that the reason for citizens to own weapons is at it's root to help enforce and support the other amendments and parts of the constitution. Bottom line for me, I trust all of my friends and relatives, hell, I'd extend that to almost all of you, much more than any politician of suspect motives. They are generally sucked into wanting more power, even when they start out with pure motives.
Since I just got a new VEPR-12, I'm feeling pretty good about gun ownership at this time.
Let us know!