Obama's Town Hall - Gun Control

Oh, I would say they are unquestionably winning. Obama has essentially proposed more background checks which of course sounds good to the average citizen but not really a significant shift from the status quo. He has failed to get any legislative momentum even with his own party on this issue. Don't forget that the Dems had a filibuster proof majority in the Congress for 2 years and failed to pass any significant gun control legislation.

 

All I know is that after watching the Revenant, I'm not carrying my .45 1911 while fly fishing any longer.

From here on out, no less than:
Bear spray
.44 magnum
Kabar

Go see that movie. Every shot looks like a Hudson River painting or Ansel Adams photograph. Best movie I've seen in a long time.

 

It was excellent.

 

[URL='https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/01/08/obama-said-gun-owners-would-support-his-new-restrictions-he-was-right/'][URL='https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/01/08/obama-said-gun-owners-would-support-his-new-restrictions-he-was-right/'][URL='https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/01/08/obama-said-gun-owners-would-support-his-new-restrictions-he-was-right/'][URL='https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/01/08/obama-said-gun-owners-would-support-his-new-restrictions-he-was-right/'][URL='https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/01/08/obama-said-gun-owners-would-support-his-new-restrictions-he-was-right/'][URL='https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/01/08/obama-said-gun-owners-would-support-his-new-restrictions-he-was-right/'][URL='https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/01/08/obama-said-gun-owners-would-support-his-new-restrictions-he-was-right/']

We agree then. The NRA dominates the legislative process, not just in D.C. but at the state level too. So, even in the face of apparent support for common sense solutions no legislation will move forward.[/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL][/URL]

 

JJ Watt with a bear spear/claymore/Bowie knife vs mama bear in Revenant...

Who wins?

 

Mama bear, hands down.

 

Husker
Help me understand what was proposed that would halt the murders in Chicago. Baltimore Washington DC etc?
I missed that suggestion from BO.
Also how was the "definition of licensed gun dealers" changed?

 

I know you know the answers to your questions or at least the conservative response to them.

Over 60% of guns right now are purchased without any sort of background check. 2.4M background checks have denied would-be purchasers guns. That's 2.4M buyers that were denied because they have a felony or mental health issue. Clearly some "bad" people do try to get guns legally.

 

60 %??? Is that true Husker?

 

To be clear Husker not calling you a liar, that is just a hard stat for me to accept at face value.

 

My bad, it's actually 40% that's the often quoted figure but that appears to be a dubious number. Sorry for the inaccurate statement. Anything more than zero is a bad number though if you agree with Bill O'Rielly and I. (Sidebar: that may be the first time I've ever agreed with him.)

As an aside, the Wikipedia site on the "gun show loophole" has a lot of great links presented in a fair manner. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_show_loophole

It looks like Obama took some of his ideas from here:

The highlights are mine as they seem prevalent in Obama's most recent Executive Orders.

 

How many hundreds if not thousands of guns were "trafficked to Mexico by the BO gov't?


can you cite a source for the 60%, excuse me 40% of guns purchased without any background check? If there is no background check then how would anyone know?
If it is a dubious number why post it?

 

Non-sequitir?

I corrected my original statement as well as recognized that 40% is dubious as it was based on a single study of 300 individuals in 1997. It's as dubious as the oft-cited .2% of crimes are committed with legally purchased firearms the NRA often cites.

That's the problem. Research on gun violence is very sparse and recent data is biased based on whether it's funded by pro or anti gun supporters. The Dickey amendment in 1993 that all but forbid the CDC from doing any public health studies around gun violence virtually froze any chance at remotely unbiased research. Even former Sen. Dickey admits it was a serious mistake to add in that amendment in hindsight.

 

The only part I saw was the exchange between Obama and the sheriff who recommended that people arm themselves. And that exchange showed the good and the bad about those forums.

On the one hand, I thought both were civil and somewhat respectful (albeit Obama had to toss in a couple of digs like "I'm sure it's in a republican district..." but that was pretty mild and not a big deal.) I thought both of them spoke respectfully and to that extent it was nice to not have the rock-throwing.

I listened to the president's response and thought that it was thoughtful, reasonable and respectful. And then I went back and thought about what he said and realized that he hadn't really said ANYTHING. It was all just detached platitudes about who were are, what we want society to be and what we can all agree on. That's great, but it doesn't answer the actual questions, which is "what are we going to do about it that satisfies the people's rights and targets the people who ought to be targeted." And in a town hall, there's no real chance to redirect and say "Thanks Mr. President, and while I agree with the principles you're putting out there, that doesn't really answer my question."

 

Anthony Hopkins respectfully disagrees.

I'm gonna kill the bear!!!
And then he does.

 

non sequitor?
No actually From your post
"In 2009 the U.S. Government Accountability Office published a report citing that many firearms trafficked to Mexico may be purchased through these types of private transactions, by individuals who may want to avoid background checks and records of their firearms"

So the GAO cited "many" MAY be purchased through private sales, the GAO doesn't know of any but thinks some MAY.
OTOH we do KNOW BO's admin sent hundreds if not thousands and we KNOW of deaths of American citizens from murderers using these guns BO sent.

 

I posted that bit for the latter part of the report. Check out the bullet items. Fast and Furious is very tangential to the original topic.

 

I had the same impression. Obama's answers had zero substance and often was incoherent rambling. He has completely failed to demonstrate how the stricter gun control laws that he champions would have prevented some of the recent shootings.

 

Are you setting up an argument for something he's not advancing? He stated plainly that these measures wouldn't have prevented those recent shootings. To me, Obama is attacking "gun violence" (crime and suicide) whereas some seem to think he's trying to solve mass shootings. Nothing will stop a committed killer from killing which Obama admitted. The argument he advanced was that if you put a few more roadblocks to them getting a gun then you may be able to move the needle on 33,000 gun related deaths and 85,000 gun related injuries a year.

With that said, there are an estimate 340M guns in the US. You can't put that genie back in the bottle.

Public Broadcasting's On The Media did a show on the gun issue last week. There were some very insightful stories, some of which were slanted towards gun control. The evolution of the NRA is interesting to me. Particularly, that the period in which the NRA was in favor of gun control. In fact, Ronald Reagan advocated for gun control as Governor of California. The 2nd Amendment was largely redefined in the 70's from emphasizing militias towards the individuals right to bear arms. Many of these hard shifts to the right occurred within the last 30 years.

Here is the link to the podcasts if anyone is interested: http://www.onthemedia.org/story/on-the-media-2016-01-08/

 

To be honest, I have no idea what argument Obama is advancing because he has been largely incoherent on this issue. If he admits that his gun control proposals will not prevent mass shootings then why does he always bring up gun control after a mass shooting? And lumping in suicide with crime is an instant loss of credibility for anyone on this topic. Two completely unrelated issues with completely different root causes that only the most intellectually dishonest individual would ever lump together.

 

Gun control or "gun violence" is the lefts' version of the "war on terror". Both require multi-faceted responses and will never truly be eliminated. They are also ambiguous terms that are easily attacked by the opposition.

There's the disconnect. The left doesn't divorce the gun from the person whereas the right does. It's the presence of the gun that makes the killing or suicide much more successful. The success rate of guns vs. other options is off the charts different. Separating the implement for the act from the person is equally intellectually dishonest.

 

Husker, I usually provide links to stats, but since I'm at work right now I'll qualify this as data that's out there. Japan has one of the highest, if not the highest, suicide rate in the world. Guns are prohibited in Japan. Suicide by guns has no correlation to per capita gun ownership. It has direct correlation to the general suicide rate.

A tall structure is more accessible and much more effective tool for suicidal people...100% guaranteed above a certain height.

 

Japan is outlier though as suicide is ingrained in their culture for more than depression but rather for to save family pride and other larger cultural influences. Like the criminals statement above, a person committed to suicide will be successful. Research shows those are the minority and that if the person simply waits a day or two the suicidal notions will often subside.

 

So what you're saying is that, fundamentally, it's not really the gun. Got it.

Japan was one example, the statistical correlation generally applies to all countries regardless of availability of guns. I'll provide a link tonight.

And the suicide reduction reason is still weak. You can't dilute the rights of citizens because some people want to commit suicide. The public health argument is a reach. We already have restrictions for clinically diagnosed depressed people.

 

In addition to ex2000's excellent points, how will any of the proposed gun control laws reduce suicides? Will a background check identify whether someone is currently suicidal or will become suicidal in the future or furthermore if their children will be suicidal? Will banning assault weapons or reducing magazine capacity keep folks from committing suicide with handguns? There is simply no logical connection to be made to reducing suicides unless the proposed laws are to confiscate all guns which so far no one has proposed. And as ex2000 points out, there is no clear evidence that eliminating guns would reduce suicide rates anyways.

 

I'd love to see those statistics. Reducing suicides is not a worthy consideration? Do you apply that same logic to driver safety? Child toy safety? You do realize that your argument in favor of carrying a gun for your own safety due to the relative response times of law enforcement has an inverse relationship in your last sentence. The proximity of a gun at the moment a person is in the trough of their depression has a direct relation to the success of the suicidal attempt.

 

Are you purposely trying to cross use cases? Clearly any ban on assault rifles would be justified to limit mass murders. The background check process queries data for designated mentally ill and the gun technology safety measures (e.g. finger print technology) could have could have an impact on suicides (can't use my father's gun) or crime (can't use a stolen gun).

We know the data of suicide success rate. Below is a Harvard study from 2001.

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matter/means-matter/case-fatality/

Guns were lethal 89% of the time compared with suffocation (i.e. drowning, carbon monoxide) 69% and falling 31%.

 

Which specific gun control laws have been proposed that would reduce suicides?

 

Background check expansions.

Not laws but funding proposals: $500M towards mental health and ??? towards gun safety technology development.

 

I am all for focusing on mental health, but I do not understand how expanding background checks will identify someone who is suicidal. Do you want peoples personal health records to be available for query by the government? What about if their kids are suicidal? Will that be part of the background check also?