And another shooting spree

VimFuego

an american friend was explaining to me one time that one of the reasons the founding fathers brought in the electoral system was to prevent a populist candidate being elected, it was a check on the electorate essentially, a chance for cooler heads to prevail.
Kinda ironic in a way.

Garthy

p90fool said:

ICBM said:

I was also surprised to find that gun ownership is far from as universal as is often assumed to be from over here - only about 40% of Americans own guns. 

If that's a percentage of the entire population rather than just adults that pretty much IS everyone...

15% of the population own a gun, but 3% own half of all the guns

ICBM

Garthy said:

15% of the population own a gun, but 3% own half of all the guns

Sounds a bit like guitars .

That 40% (I think it was actually 42% or something like that) must be of adults, then.

Chuffola

America is fucked, isn't it?

Garthy

ICBM said:

Garthy said:

15% of the population own a gun, but 3% own half of all the guns

Sounds a bit like guitars .

That 40% (I think it was actually 42% or something like that) must be of adults, then.

Lol, I wonder how close to the truth that would be?

wave100

My sister, who was born here, married a merkin and became a merkin citizen; when I asked her how many guns she had in her house, she lost count at about 20. It should be mentioned that her (now ex-) husband and son were into hunting big time and they had probably inherited a lot from his father and grandfather etc. as well as getting them for significant birthdays like we would give a watch. And then there's GAS.

On a side note (as it's a guitar forum) they (husband and son) went on a hunting trip organised by that nutter Ted Nugent.

Boromedic

I work with a few sensible Americans, after giving them the usual spiel from a UK perspective, I listened to them tell me why banning already legal guns in the US won't work I now agree with them. Do they need stricter controls with semi auto rifles, of course and stricter licensing and background checks too. Prohibition is never the answer though.

That being said, as a side note before this became a hot topic, in the UK if I could have a gun in the house then I would, (I mean handgun not rifles). Where I grew up fear of burglary was rife, not that we had much to steal like, so it would be nice protection. The cricket bat I had required being closer to whoever decided to bust in. I'm being serious before anyone starts, who knows what motivation the people breaking in your house have at 2am, I have kids and my wife to protect. I'm not there to ask questions. Get out or get hurt....... If you're holding a gun then they tend to take you more seriously.

underdog

Boromedic said:

I work with a few sensible Americans, after giving them the usual spiel from a UK perspective, I listened to them tell me why banning already legal guns in the US won't work I now agree with them. Do they need stricter controls with semi auto rifles, of course and stricter licensing and background checks too. Prohibition is never the answer though.

That being said, as a side note before this became a hot topic, in the UK if I could have a gun in the house then I would, (I mean handgun not rifles). Where I grew up fear of burglary was rife, not that we had much to steal like, so it would be nice protection. The cricket bat I had required being closer to whoever decided to bust in. I'm being serious before anyone starts, who knows what motivation the people breaking in your house have at 2am, I have kids and my wife to protect. I'm not there to ask questions. Get out or get hurt....... If you're holding a gun then they tend to take you more seriously.

Here's where the gun to protect your family thing doesn't work. If the chances were that most home owners would have a gun, then it would mean the guy breaking in would make sure he has one too.

Now the guy breaking in has gone from getting startled by the home owner and running to taking a shot back, or even breaking in and putting a gun to your kids head while he ties you up and terrorises you in his own time rather than sneak around with the fear of being discovered.

Then home owners buy bigger/more guns, so does the thief and the cycle continues.

Boromedic

Maybe, doesn't mean I wouldn't if they were legal....

ICBM

If you're holding a gun they will just shoot you first.

Almost all criminals in the US are armed, and they will be ready to use their guns, probably before you are.

If you do really want a gun to try to defend yourself, don't choose a handgun - that takes some skill and discipline to use under stress - you want a shotgun... harder to miss with.

randella

ICBM said:

If you do really want a gun to try to defend yourself, don't choose a handgun - that takes some skill and discipline to use under stress - you want a shotgun... harder to miss with.

Think we're seeing a darker side to @ICBM - note to self, never disagree with him about output transformer impedances

Boromedic

Hahaha, yeah take him seriously! I've fired quite a few handguns in the last few years and I'm not a bad shot these days. That being said it does take repetition and practice to be accurate. A shotgun gives more blast coverage I suppose!

ICBM

Exactly .

To be totally serious - I've seen semi-auto shotguns advertised for 'home defence' in the US, and I don't see a problem with that. They aren't just a better weapon for the purpose, they're more difficult (obviously not impossible) to use for criminality or mass shootings since they're harder to carry and conceal than a handgun and don't have the rate of fire, magazine capacity or range of an assault rifle.

Kilgore

I'm armed to the teeth. There are about ten Nerf guns in the house.

Snap

ICBM said:

Snap said:

ICBM said:

Not really. He actually lost the election,

Except he didn't though, he won, under their electoral system, and hence is the elected president.

Obviously, but if you hadn't deliberately shortened my post, the point is that he got almost three million *less* votes than Clinton, and the turnout was not much over 50%, so it's a mistake to say that he is popular or supported by a majority of Americans. He isn't even supported by a majority of those who voted.

 But he won the election, obviously, so no point saying he didn't. Popularity aside, he won. And tbh, the margin on the popular vote was narrow as well. Couple of percent wasn't it?

You could apply the same argument to every election where turn out is low, ish, like most of our general elections. Popularity is a separate argument: if a person doesn't vote, then its (IMO) churlish to complain about who's in power. So, again IMO, popularity polls are incidental, as they often don't really represent the electorate that could be arsed to turn out.

The harsh fact of the situation is that outside of the liberal west coast and N East coast, a large chunk of the US likes Trump and what he stands for.

JezWynd

The harsh fact of the situation is that outside of the liberal west coast and N East coast, a large chunk of the US likes Trump and what he stands for. 

Neatly sums up why the rest of the world is sick to the back teeth of america and everything it has come to represent.

ICBM

Snap said:

But he won the election, obviously, so no point saying he didn't. Popularity aside, he won. And tbh, the margin on the popular vote was narrow as well. Couple of percent wasn't it?

Yes, 2%. That's quite a large margin, in fact - about the same as between the Tories and Labour at our last election. If the electoral arithmetic had given Corbyn more seats than May and he'd become PM, would people here have been happy with that? (Putting personal beliefs aside, of course .) It can happen - Attlee lost the 1951 election in exactly that way, although by a smaller margin.

Snap said:

The harsh fact of the situation is that outside of the liberal west coast and N East coast, a large chunk of the US likes Trump and what he stands for.

No, not a large chunk - this is why I disagree with you. Simply the third largest minority - less than 26% of the electorate, both behind Clinton and (far) behind those who did not vote.

So it is wrong and unfair on them to say that a large chunk of Americans support what he stands for, whether it's on gun control or anything else - an aggressive minority do, and that's the problem.

Sassafras

ICBM said:

Snap said:

ICBM said:

Not really. He actually lost the election,

Except he didn't though, he won, under their electoral system, and hence is the elected president.

Obviously, but if you hadn't deliberately shortened my post, the point is that he got almost three million *less* fewer votes than Clinton, and the turnout was not much over 50%, so it's a mistake to say that he is popular or supported by a majority of Americans. He isn't even supported by a majority of those who voted.

Edited for pedantry.
  

Snap

@ICBM

the point I am trying to make, is that America has made its bed; lie in it. 2% of anything isn't big, but I agree, often this is the sort of margin that determines results, as most people sit in the middle of any debate tbh.

If a quarter isn't a large chunk, I don't know what is. We can argue the toss about what is this, that and the other, until we are blue in the face, and one of us feels he's won some pointless pedantic discussion about elections, turn outs, moral majorities, whatever.

The fact remains: he won the election.

The second fact remains: he's a div.

I never said he's popular, but he did win a majority in terms of how the election is set up. Whether that is flawed is another argument -  it is mental that you can win the election, but lose the popular vote.

Latest approval ratings are what, 48%? So, the slight minority think he's alright. DOn't know how that compares ot other presidents, and tbh, I don't care. I'm more interested in how our shower of berks are "managing" brexit!

ThePrettyDamned

ICBM said:

Exactly .

To be totally serious - I've seen semi-auto shotguns advertised for 'home defence' in the US, and I don't see a problem with that. They aren't just a better weapon for the purpose, they're more difficult (obviously not impossible) to use for criminality or mass shootings since they're harder to carry and conceal than a handgun and don't have the rate of fire, magazine capacity or range of an assault rifle.

Less likely to go through walls, too.