Oregon shooter was from UK
Posted by: Sneaky SNAIC on 02 October 2015
Brian, as an outsider I cannot get my head around the fact that many Americans feel they need to have weapons to protect themselves from their own government. They are your elected representatives so why the severe distrust? Just vote the bums out next election. I guess my views are the way they are because we have so little government corruption.
I live in a town where there are 14 different criminal gangs, all of whom deal in drugs, including methamphetamine. However there are relatively few murders and one reason may be the lack of ready access to handguns. God forbid we ever let that particular genie out of the bottle! The horse has well and truely bolted in the USA in that regard, and it is the blacks and hispanics who suffer the greatest harm.
I think it only fair to point out that a hefty portion of why Europe has a refugee crisis is because of a certain country who has been waging war in the Middle East for about 15 or so years now (largely under false pretenses, I might add), heavily engaging in regime change, and leaving a wake of chaos and destruction, with an estimated 1.4 million deaths in that time frame according to Physicians for Social Responsibility.
Can't recall who it is, but I think there's a hint in this graphic...
Dr Mark, thanks for the entirely predictable response. Most of the refugees are from Syria, and many more from Libya. I do not recall any Western (American) interventions in those countries. In fact the current administration has been criticized by our right wing for not intervening. So blaming that on a president who left office 7 years ago is shall we say less than helpful.
As for defense spending, European countries have been spending less than 2 percent of gdp (the NATO benchmark) for.decades now. As a result Europe is largely incapable of dealing with Russian intervention in eastern Europe or the constant crises around their borders. Maybe you think another country other than the usa should be posturing forces in eastern Europe to deter Russia. The United states still shoulders significant responsibility for the collective security of NATO as well as many other friends and allies around the world, south Korea and Japan coming to mind.
I think it only fair to point out that a hefty portion of why Europe has a refugee crisis is because of a certain country who has been waging war in the Middle East for about 15 or so years now (largely under false pretenses, I might add), heavily engaging in regime change, and leaving a wake of chaos and destruction, with an estimated 1.4 million deaths in that time frame according to Physicians for Social Responsibility.
Can't recall who it is, but I think there's a hint in this graphic...
I simply do not believe that the USA is responsible for 1.4 million deaths in the Middle East, never mind during the last 15 years.
If you are going to use these sorts of figures, please take into account the number of deaths that would have occurred had the USA NOT intervened. You might find the aggregate is a welcome relief to a great many people.
Well, if I do decide to emigrate from Great Britain, it will not be the USA.
The trouble for the USA is that it has an ossified "written" constitution, which does not allow for change, and change occurs.
ATB from George
I think it only fair to point out that a hefty portion of why Europe has a refugee crisis is because of a certain country who has been waging war in the Middle East for about 15 or so years now (largely under false pretenses, I might add), heavily engaging in regime change, and leaving a wake of chaos and destruction, with an estimated 1.4 million deaths in that time frame according to Physicians for Social Responsibility.
Can't recall who it is, but I think there's a hint in this graphic...
I simply do not believe that the USA is responsible for 1.4 million deaths in the Middle East, never mind during the last 15 years.
If you are going to use these sorts of figures, please take into account the number of deaths that would have occurred had the USA NOT intervened. You might find the aggregate is a welcome relief to a great many people.
Well then why don't you read the 100 page report report yourself, because "what you believe" is really of no import. And the "if the USA had NOT intervened" is about the biggest straw man argument there is. We're not preventing a nuclear WW III, we're egging it on.
While we all get very upset about the deaths of 10 people in Oregon (and indeed we should) the murderous foreign policy of the USA (and its vassals), undertaken for purely economic and hegemonic reasons (cloaked in 'democracy' and 'human rights') continues unabated with essentially no dissenting voices, with many hundreds of thousands of innocents dying. And I am tired of funding the carnage with my tax dollars, making me an unwilling accomplice.
"That's not the way the world really works anymore. We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do." - Karl Rove
Dear Brian,
Of course the perception I have of the USA is that of an Old World European.
The right to bear arms is something that would have been seen as normal enough in the fairly lawless early years of the the history of the USA.
It seems, to me at least, less appropriate today, but somehow it is apparently immovable. Perhaps attitudes will shift, and something may be done in respect of changing the US Constitution. Strangely it matters little to me as I can have [and would wish to have] no influence over how a foreign country is governed, but it would certainly affect my wish to visit or live there.
Best wishes from George
I think it only fair to point out that a hefty portion of why Europe has a refugee crisis is because of a certain country who has been waging war in the Middle East for about 15 or so years now (largely under false pretenses, I might add), heavily engaging in regime change, and leaving a wake of chaos and destruction, with an estimated 1.4 million deaths in that time frame according to Physicians for Social Responsibility.
Can't recall who it is, but I think there's a hint in this graphic...
I simply do not believe that the USA is responsible for 1.4 million deaths in the Middle East, never mind during the last 15 years.
If you are going to use these sorts of figures, please take into account the number of deaths that would have occurred had the USA NOT intervened. You might find the aggregate is a welcome relief to a great many people.
Well then why don't you read the 100 page report report yourself, because "what you believe" is really of no import. And the "if the USA had NOT intervened" is about the biggest straw man argument there is. We're not preventing a nuclear WW III, we're egging it on.
While we all get very upset about the deaths of 10 people in Oregon (and indeed we should) the murderous foreign policy of the USA (and its vassals), undertaken for purely economic and hegemonic reasons (cloaked in 'democracy' and 'human rights') continues unabated with essentially no dissenting voices, with many hundreds of thousands of innocents dying. And I am tired of funding the carnage with my tax dollars, making me an unwilling accomplice.
"That's not the way the world really works anymore. We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do." - Karl Rove
PSR is about as insignificant an organisation as CND was and is, so I'll stick with my own "beliefs" rather than follow its misguided propaganda.
Cheers
Don
Whenever these debates get going I am always amused by the assertions that those people who come from countries that don't suffer from regular mass-shootings can't possibly know what it would take to reduce them elsewhere.
It always puzzles me that the richest, most technologically advanced nation on Earth cannot solve two problems that are not issues in smaller, "poorer" and ostensibly less "advanced" countries: healthcare and a surfeit of guns, along with a surfeit of nutters wielding them.
Well that totally absolves American gun legislation from all responsibility then. Darned limeys.
As ''Newsthump" reported, almost all of these massacres could have been avoided if America took the brave-but-obvious step of banning schools.
Rod, no need for the Yanks to worry (or crow). There will be plenty of other crazed home-grown gunmen along before the year's out to even things up.
What I can never understand is why anyone would want to own a gun in the first place. The only purpose for a gun is to maim or kill (humans or animals). Why would you want to do that?
As for semi-automatic weapons, what the hell would a private citizen want with one of them???? They are military weapons for &%$' sake!
It seems to me that certain portions of the US have never grown up past the cowboy stage and still think they're in the Wild West. Get over it! It's 2015 now, not Dodge City 1860 or whatever.
steve
Well that totally absolves American gun legislation from all responsibility then. Darned limeys.
As ''Newsthump" reported, almost all of these massacres could have been avoided if America took the brave-but-obvious step of banning schools.
Rod, no need for the Yanks to worry (or crow). There will be plenty of other crazed home-grown gunmen along before the year's out to even things up.
'...the brave-but-obvious step of banning schools.' Made me laugh out loud.
Probably more chance of that though than loosening the stranglehold that the NRA has on both sides of US 'democratic representation'.
G
My position is gun ownership is built into the American constitution, for the primary reason of preventing a future government from taking away our right to own a gun--and secondarily to defend oneself, others and their property--and possibly the country itself in dire circumstances.
I want each batch of left-wing politicians to stop trying to take all the guns every time they get in office, to prevent all of the above. If it seems recursive, it is...because dire circumstances always happen, if you look at history.
Speaking to the UK fellows...you are the children and grandchildren of a society that was living underground and forces to send the children out of the cities. Bad stuff was happening, bad guys rolled through Europe, Russia, Africa faster than ever in history.
Given that the US Consititution (and the Second Amendment) was written long before the era of sophisticated guerilla warfare, IEDs, propaganda and the like, is that really a reason any more? And America in 2015 is a sophisticated, advanced capitalist nation, not a frontier territory any more.
Also, guns provide very little protection against terrorist atrocities, chemical and biological warfare and nuclear weapons. Your argument seems creakily archaic at best, disingenuous at worst. And your implication that the Second World War could have been prevented by everyone in Europe being armed with guns is, quite frankly, ridiculous.
Here in Blighty gun ownership is extremely restricted and regulated - and we haven't been fully conquered since 1066. Massacres of the kind that occur with depressing regularity in the US do happen here, but they are incredibly rare.
I think it only fair to point out that a hefty portion of why Europe has a refugee crisis is because of a certain country who has been waging war in the Middle East for about 15 or so years now (largely under false pretenses, I might add), heavily engaging in regime change, and leaving a wake of chaos and destruction, with an estimated 1.4 million deaths in that time frame according to Physicians for Social Responsibility.
Can't recall who it is, but I think there's a hint in this graphic...
I simply do not believe that the USA is responsible for 1.4 million deaths in the Middle East, never mind during the last 15 years.
If you are going to use these sorts of figures, please take into account the number of deaths that would have occurred had the USA NOT intervened. You might find the aggregate is a welcome relief to a great many people.
Well then why don't you read the 100 page report report yourself, because "what you believe" is really of no import. And the "if the USA had NOT intervened" is about the biggest straw man argument there is. We're not preventing a nuclear WW III, we're egging it on.
While we all get very upset about the deaths of 10 people in Oregon (and indeed we should) the murderous foreign policy of the USA (and its vassals), undertaken for purely economic and hegemonic reasons (cloaked in 'democracy' and 'human rights') continues unabated with essentially no dissenting voices, with many hundreds of thousands of innocents dying. And I am tired of funding the carnage with my tax dollars, making me an unwilling accomplice.
"That's not the way the world really works anymore. We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do." - Karl Rove
PSR is about as insignificant an organisation as CND was and is, so I'll stick with my own "beliefs" rather than follow its misguided propaganda.
Cheers
Don
Yeah, those insignificant people who advocate for nuclear disarmament - I mean, what ARE they thinking?
Why don't you read the report before dismissing it out of hand just because it doesn't jive with your own "propagandist" views?
There is no legitimate reason for the USA to be spending as much as they do on arms and the war machine. Well, unless you're an executive at Boeing, Lockheed, Raytheon, etc. Maintaining an empire is expensive...
What I can never understand is why anyone would want to own a gun in the first place. The only purpose for a gun is to maim or kill (humans or animals). Why would you want to do that?
As for semi-automatic weapons, what the hell would a private citizen want with one of them???? They are military weapons for &%$' sake!
It seems to me that certain portions of the US have never grown up past the cowboy stage and still think they're in the Wild West. Get over it! It's 2015 now, not Dodge City 1860 or whatever.
steve
+1
While it's cool to marvel at the technology, the finish etc. (just like naim) - it's the result that matters. When you realize that it's sole purpose is to kill - fascination with guns quickly ends.
Hi Mango
That is the best article I have read on this vexed subject. It is so sad the NRA is preventing common sense measures to reduce gun carnage. Every NRA member should read this article , but they seem to be a very defensive knee-jerk organisation that speaks in emotive sound bites when they feel threatened.
Hi Mango
That is the best article I have read on this vexed subject. It is so sad the NRA is preventing common sense measures to reduce gun carnage. Every NRA member should read this article , but they seem to be a very defensive knee-jerk organisation that speaks in emotive sound bites when they feel threatened.
Yep Mango, Kiwi, that's a good piece. It's very difficult to see the NRA as anything but obstructionist scum; and worse, extraordinarily powerful obstructionist scum.