Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
You don't need to change it.
The lefty trick is to get activist judges to wilfully misinterpret the Constitution to further their own partisan agenda with utter contempt for it's original meaning.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
You don't need to change it.
The lefty trick is to get activist judges to wilfully misinterpret the Constitution to further their own partisan agenda with utter contempt for it's original meaning.
That trick gave the US the horror of Roe v Wade
No kidding - I never saw a photo of Roe, but Henry Wade is not exactly good looking.
Had quite a long discussion with an anti-fox hunting Lefty about eating deer a couple of days ago. He thought eating venison was *posh* but had been almost run off the road by errant ones on his local A road.
I think the penny dropped that eating Bambi or his Mum wasn't automatically a bad thing or posh.
I don't know what its like down your way but around here deer are a bloody menace on the roads at night, aside from all the other damage they cause. There are just too many of them and too many new landowners who have replaced proper farmers and who do not actually look after their land.
On the bright side our village butcher has teamed up with a couple of chaps who have persuaded several landowners to give them shooting rights, so local venison is quite cheap at the moment.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
I wrote that article after the Newtown massacre two years ago. He doesn't care all that much and even if he did, he doesn't have the guts for the fight.
From Sainsbury it is probably farmed venison. Nothing wrong with that, but it doesn't help solve the deer problem can be more expensive than that taken from the wild (just think of the number of people in the chain)
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
You don't need to change it.
The lefty trick is to get activist judges to wilfully misinterpret the Constitution to further their own partisan agenda with utter contempt for it's original meaning.
That trick gave the US the horror of Roe v Wade
Lefties are far from the only offenders, nor the worst. I give you Dred Scott.
In any case, as I said in my 2012 article:
It is of course possible to interpret that [the Second Amendment] in such a way that the right to keep and bear arms is only protected for the purposes of membership (or potential membership) of a militia. It’s even possible to argue that the right is only protected while the opening assertion [of the Amendment i.e. "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state"] remains valid and that if it’s not, then neither is the right to keep and bear arms. However, the Supreme Court doesn’t even come close to the former interpretation, never mind the latter, and justices who might favour such an interpretation are unlikely to be appointed any time soon.
From Sainsbury it is probably farmed venison. Nothing wrong with that, but it doesn't help solve the deer problem can be more expensive than that taken from the wild (just think of the number of people in the chain)
Farmed venison is fine so long as you don't plant them too far apart....
From Sainsbury it is probably farmed venison. Nothing wrong with that, but it doesn't help solve the deer problem can be more expensive than that taken from the wild (just think of the number of people in the chain)
Oh definitely farmed vension, but it was about the same price as the farmed cattle !
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
Although on this fight there is clearly not enough appetite in the USA to do that, as an outsider it does sometimes feel strange the way people talk about the Constitution as if it can never be changed, that the idea of diverging from early amendments and original intents is something that not only should never be done, but the very idea of attempting it is suspect, even though clearly it had been changed in some ways many times. I guess it's just a typical reaction against people wanting to change the bit you want never to change.
From Sainsbury it is probably farmed venison. Nothing wrong with that, but it doesn't help solve the deer problem can be more expensive than that taken from the wild (just think of the number of people in the chain)
Farmed venison is fine so long as you don't plant them too far apart....
Never took you for a Gilbert and Sullivan fan, Mr. B.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
I'm not sure how well you understand US politics, or the US constitution, but I get the feeling you're missing something here. If presidents could change the consitution "just like that", then what would the point of the constitution be?
Though I sympathise about the gun thing; sometimes it turns out that two countries speaking the same language and whose inhabitants look and dress vaguely similar to each other, can turn out to have very different cultures - who knew such a thing was possible? No doubt there are a million and one ways in which Americans point at us and think "how crazy are those guys?" just as I despair at how daft they are over the gun thing.
I sometimes think the best way to understand America is to forget how superficially similar they are to us. In your mind's eye, glimpse that they are all actually bright green, and in your mind's ear, that they speak a lilting gobbledegook which is appearing on your TV screens only after it has been dubbed into English by translators who haven't yet mastered the British accent. Accept their culture and political economy on its own terms. There's something Whiggish about transposing our own values onto them and then wondering why they don't live up to them.
Mike BARKER (Independent) Christoper JustQCharley CHALIS (Independent) Hairy Knorm DAVIDSON (OMRLP) Jayda Fransen (Britain First) [Will appear on the ballot as "Vote British!" Stephen GOLDSBROUGH (Independent) Clive GREGORY (Green) [Will appear on the ballot as "Green Party - Say No To Racism"] Geoff JUBY (Liberal Democrat) Naushabah Parveen KHAN (Labour Party) Nick LONG (People Before Profit) Dave OSBORN (Patriotic Socialist Party) Mark RECKLESS (UK Independence Party (UKIP)) Charlotte ROSE (Independent) Kelly TOLHURST (The Conservative Party Candidate)
That's a good haul. Who gets the money from all the lost deposits?
Will Charlotte Rose get more than the 56 votes she received in Clacton? Will the Patriotic Socialist Party beat the 18 votes they received in Newark, or the 25 votes that their forerunner party - the United People's Party - received in Corby? Are there any odds on the Lib Dems finishing lower than their record low of 8th in a by-election?
Well if the Patriotic Socialist Candidate is basing his campaign on being anti-israel, unfortunately that market is covered by the conservative candidate.
Who knows, the Tories might be really desperate for left wing votes.
At least, on this her position is commendable and she has shown form. If close, Labour voters should consider tactically voting for her. What I think about Saqib Javed is another matter. I might break a few laws if I wrote that.
1.7 billion quid could fund a lot of soldiers, nurses, police, teachers, or tons of other good stuff. Hell, we could have a fleet of diamond encrusted fire engines. Cameron needs to be really careful about this EU budget increase.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
I'm not sure how well you understand US politics, or the US constitution, but I get the feeling you're missing something here. If presidents could change the consitution "just like that", then what would the point of the constitution be?
Though I sympathise about the gun thing; sometimes it turns out that two countries speaking the same language and whose inhabitants look and dress vaguely similar to each other, can turn out to have very different cultures - who knew such a thing was possible? No doubt there are a million and one ways in which Americans point at us and think "how crazy are those guys?" just as I despair at how daft they are over the gun thing.
I sometimes think the best way to understand America is to forget how superficially similar they are to us. In your mind's eye, glimpse that they are all actually bright green, and in your mind's ear, that they speak a lilting gobbledegook which is appearing on your TV screens only after it has been dubbed into English by translators who haven't yet mastered the British accent. Accept their culture and political economy on its own terms. There's something Whiggish about transposing our own values onto them and then wondering why they don't live up to them.
I understand and love the States. Great country. But the constitution is not the movement of the planets. It can be changed.
I gave dinner to a couple of old lefty friends, last night, at Nobu (well someone has to feed them decent food)
Their animosity towards Ed Miliband was intense. It went beyond disappointment at his general crapness (which they have expressed before) into actual contempt. Not quite personal dislike, but very close, with an extra dose of derision.
They were convinced he was gonna lose in 15 and I had to reassure them that FPTP still made him favourite, and that Labour would probably form the next government, a prospect which did not exactly fill them with glee, either.
Conclusion: if Labour are headed for victory they are the most unenthusiastic potential victors in political history. They expect Ed to be a crap PM and his government to be rubbish, and buffeted by painful economic truths.
In a way it will be very interesting to see a distinctly unenthusiastic and ill prepared Labour party deal with winning in 2015, if hardly encouraging.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
There's something Whiggish about transposing our own values onto them and then wondering why they don't live up to them.
Doesn't that logic essentially say, unintentionally, that we shouldn't ever criticise another culture, or they us, for any reason, even if horrible? There are many cultures with social norms and aspects that perhaps we might feel should be criticised, or even condemned, but we should not because that would be us transporting our own values on them and wondering why they don't live up to them.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Care to explain how they are going to impound the tens of millions of, currently, legally owned firearms?
Round them up. Amnesty. Until they are all gone.
You remind me of an old monty python sketch. Children's tv program, how do we stop sickness in the world? Study, become a doctor and jolly well discover a cure for all illness.
How do you play the piano? Open the lid and press the black and white keys.
That's the level of your answer. If amnesty worked nobody would be stabbed to death because we currently have a knife amnesty running nationally.
Yes. That's right. Monty Pythonesque, that's me. Only the fact that most developed world countries have successfully effected a complete and binding ban on guns troubles your unnecessarily elaborate riposte.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
I'm not sure how well you understand US politics, or the US constitution, but I get the feeling you're missing something here. If presidents could change the consitution "just like that", then what would the point of the constitution be?
Though I sympathise about the gun thing; sometimes it turns out that two countries speaking the same language and whose inhabitants look and dress vaguely similar to each other, can turn out to have very different cultures - who knew such a thing was possible? No doubt there are a million and one ways in which Americans point at us and think "how crazy are those guys?" just as I despair at how daft they are over the gun thing.
I sometimes think the best way to understand America is to forget how superficially similar they are to us. In your mind's eye, glimpse that they are all actually bright green, and in your mind's ear, that they speak a lilting gobbledegook which is appearing on your TV screens only after it has been dubbed into English by translators who haven't yet mastered the British accent. Accept their culture and political economy on its own terms. There's something Whiggish about transposing our own values onto them and then wondering why they don't live up to them.
If anything is going to change, someone needs to plant a flag to rally support to. It will not happen overnight and indeed needs a significant cultural shift in mindset and priorities but it has been done before. The anti-slavery movement, the prohibition movement and the Civil Rights movement to name but three. The independence movement was a fourth but I'd rather not mention that in polite company.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
Mike BARKER (Independent) Christoper JustQCharley CHALIS (Independent) Hairy Knorm DAVIDSON (OMRLP) Jayda Fransen (Britain First) [Will appear on the ballot as "Vote British!" Stephen GOLDSBROUGH (Independent) Clive GREGORY (Green) [Will appear on the ballot as "Green Party - Say No To Racism"] Geoff JUBY (Liberal Democrat) Naushabah Parveen KHAN (Labour Party) Nick LONG (People Before Profit) Dave OSBORN (Patriotic Socialist Party) Mark RECKLESS (UK Independence Party (UKIP)) Charlotte ROSE (Independent) Kelly TOLHURST (The Conservative Party Candidate)
That's a good haul. Who gets the money from all the lost deposits?
Will Charlotte Rose get more than the 56 votes she received in Clacton? Will the Patriotic Socialist Party beat the 18 votes they received in Newark, or the 25 votes that their forerunner party - the United People's Party - received in Corby? Are there any odds on the Lib Dems finishing lower than their record low of 8th in a by-election?
Well if the Patriotic Socialist Candidate is basing his campaign on being anti-israel, unfortunately that market is covered by the conservative candidate.
Who knows, the Tories might be really desperate for left wing votes.
At least, on this her position is commendable and she has shown form. If close, Labour voters should consider tactically voting for her. What I think about Saqib Javed is another matter. I might break a few laws if I wrote that.
My initial reaction to that was mild despair at the "student politics" element of it. I thought the Tories could do with a heavier hitter. Maybe Twitter just dumbs everyone down, but I hope not. I appreciate her Palestine activism has not just consisted of being a social media warioress, which on one hand is commendable since she puts her energy where her mouth is, but I have another hand palming my face after memories of student union "campaigners" of years gone by came back to me.
My gut instinct is that a thorough journalistic social media dredging of that kind of candidate is likely to throw up all kinds of statements that are, shall we say, no longer convenient. I might be wrong here, but mouthing off over one topic is often correlated with mouthing off over others.
Pissed off that Galloway didn't talk to him about standing in Rochester and Strood. Apparently has an MBE? Says this:
I am forming a new party called the United World Government Party to contest the seat of Mark Reckless who has defected to the UKIP Party and if successful, will be on this debate as should Caroline Lucas of the Green Party.
He also appears to like cats.
Mike Barker probably has the most interesting back-story of all the candidates - if you accept that Ms Rose is unlikely to tell too many tales about her clients.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
Pleased to hear it. A vg good friend almost died when his bike hit a deer round here. It smashed his Arai helmet in two and totaled his machine [a gorgeous blue black Kwasaski].
I've narrowly avoided a dozen deer on the Balcombe Road.
They're a menace and their weight is huge as an RTA hazard.
Had quite a long discussion with an anti-fox hunting Lefty about eating deer a couple of days ago. He thought eating venison was *posh* but had been almost run off the road by errant ones on his local A road.
I think the penny dropped that eating Bambi or his Mum wasn't automatically a bad thing or posh.
I don't know what its like down your way but around here deer are a bloody menace on the roads at night, aside from all the other damage they cause. There are just too many of them and too many new landowners who have replaced proper farmers and who do not actually look after their land.
On the bright side our village butcher has teamed up with a couple of chaps who have persuaded several landowners to give them shooting rights, so local venison is quite cheap at the moment.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
At some point, Labour is going to have to ask themselves whether they're just so unfortunate to be constantly electing fundamentally bad leaders (Brown, Miliband, and in Scotland Gray and Lamont), or if the reason they're widely seen as bad leaders is because of the political choices all of their leaders make - namely, that they're always terrified as being seen as "ideological", and as a result always come across as just pointless and boring.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
There's something Whiggish about transposing our own values onto them and then wondering why they don't live up to them.
Doesn't that logic essentially say, unintentionally, that we shouldn't ever criticise another culture, or they us, for any reason, even if horrible? There are many cultures with social norms and aspects that perhaps we might feel should be criticised, or even condemned, but we should not because that would be us transporting our own values on them and wondering why they don't live up to them.
Some people will take the logic that far, though that wasn't my point, which was simply that critique of another culture generally benefits (perhaps by carrying more weight, or being more probing, or more likely to convince someone from that culture, or just more mature and self-aware) if taken from a position of understanding that culture in its own terms.
I find plenty arguments about many issues which vary across cultures basically boil down to variations on one of the following theme:
PERSON1: "YOUR CULTURE IS STUPID BECAUSE YOU DO NOT OBEY MY CULTURAL NORM WHICH IS CLEARLY SUPERIOR!" PERSON2: "NO, YOUR CULTURE IS STUPID BECAUSE YOU DO NOT OBEY MY CULTURAL NORM AND THAT IS OBVIOUSLY SUPERIOR!"
or
PERSON1: "YOUR CULTURE IS STUPID BECAUSE YOU DO NOT OBEY MY CULTURAL NORM WHICH IS CLEARLY SUPERIOR!" PERSON2: "BUTT OUT AND STOP TELLING ME WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU DO NOT EVEN UNDERSTAND MY CULTURE!"
Both of these are frankly tiresome and exhausting to listen to. They seem to serve no purpose other than as a release of hot air and maybe some people feel better after a good old vent on the internet. The signal-noise ratio is absolutely crap.
For an example of how to discuss American gun control properly, see David Herdson's old piece which I think shows excellent judgment and retains the power of its original insight.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
You don't need to change it.
The lefty trick is to get activist judges to wilfully misinterpret the Constitution to further their own partisan agenda with utter contempt for it's original meaning.
That trick gave the US the horror of Roe v Wade
Lefties are far from the only offenders, nor the worst. I give you Dred Scott.
In any case, as I said in my 2012 article:
It is of course possible to interpret that [the Second Amendment] in such a way that the right to keep and bear arms is only protected for the purposes of membership (or potential membership) of a militia. It’s even possible to argue that the right is only protected while the opening assertion [of the Amendment i.e. "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state"] remains valid and that if it’s not, then neither is the right to keep and bear arms. However, the Supreme Court doesn’t even come close to the former interpretation, never mind the latter, and justices who might favour such an interpretation are unlikely to be appointed any time soon.
Or limit the arms to be borne to those in existence at the time of the amendment's drafting, i.e. ones with a fire rate of one round per 30 seconds instead of 30 rounds per second.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
Because Britain is a small island with few wildernesses so its much easier to control Guns coming in and there is no need for vast numbers of the population to have handguns to protect themselves from things like Bears and Alligators?
Its also worth noting that Canada is pretty well just as liberal when it comes to guns and murder there is pretty well as rare as in the UK.
The issue is perhaps why the citizens of the USA are so keen to murder each other rather than the means they use to do it?
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
I think this is a very weak analogy. One is about technological improvement the whole country was behind, the other is about a nationwide government program which would face a lot of heavy resistance among 30% of the public.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
We don't. Do you think the US should retain its firearms laws? Or are you simply saying it can't be changed?
At some point, Labour is going to have to ask themselves whether they're just so unfortunate to be constantly electing fundamentally bad leaders (Brown, Miliband, and in Scotland Gray and Lamont), or if the reason they're widely seen as bad leaders is because of the political choices all of their leaders make - namely, that they're always terrified as being seen as "ideological", and as a result always come across as just pointless and boring.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
There's something Whiggish about transposing our own values onto them and then wondering why they don't live up to them.
Doesn't that logic essentially say, unintentionally, that we shouldn't ever criticise another culture, or they us, for any reason, even if horrible? There are many cultures with social norms and aspects that perhaps we might feel should be criticised, or even condemned, but we should not because that would be us transporting our own values on them and wondering why they don't live up to them.
Some people will take the logic that far, though that wasn't my point, which was simply that critique of another culture generally benefits (perhaps by carrying more weight, or being more probing, or more likely to convince someone from that culture, or just more mature and self-aware) if taken from a position of understanding that culture in its own terms.
.
Fair enough, and it's an important point to consider.
TBH, I'm a very outspoken sort - but tend to shrink from saying so when it comes to other cultures after oodles of PC-thinking indoctrination.
I want to say X, then my Y says 'Oh, no'.
It's insidious and if anything, I now deliberately short-circuit to Step Three and think Eff-Em, and feel much better! This is why I think I get the Kipper vibe.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
There's something Whiggish about transposing our own values onto them and then wondering why they don't live up to them.
Doesn't that logic essentially say, unintentionally, that we shouldn't ever criticise another culture, or they us, for any reason, even if horrible? There are many cultures with social norms and aspects that perhaps we might feel should be criticised, or even condemned, but we should not because that would be us transporting our own values on them and wondering why they don't live up to them.
At some point, Labour is going to have to ask themselves whether they're just so unfortunate to be constantly electing fundamentally bad leaders (Brown, Miliband, and in Scotland Gray and Lamont), or if the reason they're widely seen as bad leaders is because of the political choices all of their leaders make - namely, that they're always terrified as being seen as "ideological", and as a result always come across as just pointless and boring.
With a win in 2015 still very much in the frame, that necessary self analysis - undertaken as a serious operation - will probably be some way off. Although I think they can pretty much ignore all their issues and still eke out a win in the current situation, it would be hugely silly of them to do so, but there are still some Labour supporters out there who seem unconcerned.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
We do?
Yes we do. If you think its difficult to get hold of firearms you need to get out more. The last two police officers, killed in England were killed with hand grenades.
Hah. Cameron is rather good at frothy europhobia. Banging the lectern.
Excellent TV TEN for him. This could pan out well for Tories
Awful for europhiles.
Agreed. His stance on the EU is his best selling point for the public I think. As the recent polls have been showing, most people stop short of getting out of the EU, but they like having someone who isn't a total doormat and agrees to anything the "Eurocrats" say at the same time. It's one of the few issues where Cameron truly is in the "centre ground" (whereas on economics he and his government are on the extreme right).
I understand and love the States. Great country. But the constitution is not the movement of the planets. It can be changed.
But they really AREN'T gonna change the gun laws. It is almost inconceivable. I said this on pb after Sandy Hook and was roundly derided; I said nothing would change, and I was right.
Guns are in America's DNA: part of its self image, as a nation of individuals, prepared, willing and able to defend themselves against nasty immigrants and an overweening state. The image may be ludicrous, but there it is. Many foreigners find Britain's monarchism ludicrous, but the monarchy is part of how WE see ourselves: an ancient nation fond of its quirks, which (we like to think) set us apart.
Indeed I'd say the chances of signficant gun law reform in America (i.e. repealing the relevant Constitutional Amendments) are about the same as the UK becoming a republic: not quite zero, but negligible for the far and foreseeable future.
Is it true that Americans love the Monarchy but would balk at the notion of actually being a Monarchy?
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
We don't. Do you think the US should retain its firearms laws? Or are you simply saying it can't be changed?
I think you are incredibly naive, you think that because, the government says no more guns, it means no more guns. I hate to break it to you, but it's not true.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Unfortunately the constitution doesn't allow for that.
As for his legacy, we're already suffering it - debt, lack of leadship, government over reach, and almost destroying the healthcare system
Change the effing constitution.
You don't need to change it.
The lefty trick is to get activist judges to wilfully misinterpret the Constitution to further their own partisan agenda with utter contempt for it's original meaning.
That trick gave the US the horror of Roe v Wade
Lefties are far from the only offenders, nor the worst. I give you Dred Scott.
In any case, as I said in my 2012 article:
It is of course possible to interpret that [the Second Amendment] in such a way that the right to keep and bear arms is only protected for the purposes of membership (or potential membership) of a militia. It’s even possible to argue that the right is only protected while the opening assertion [of the Amendment i.e. "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state"] remains valid and that if it’s not, then neither is the right to keep and bear arms. However, the Supreme Court doesn’t even come close to the former interpretation, never mind the latter, and justices who might favour such an interpretation are unlikely to be appointed any time soon.
Or limit the arms to be borne to those in existence at the time of the amendment's drafting, i.e. ones with a fire rate of one round per 30 seconds instead of 30 rounds per second.
Same issue though. It's difficult to square such a proposal with "... the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed". A law that had that degree of restriction would probably be ruled unconstitutional. The only sure solution is to change the constitution; all else is tinkering. But to change the constitution, first you have to change the country.
Hah. Cameron is rather good at frothy europhobia. Banging the lectern.
Excellent TV TEN for him. This could pan out well for Tories
Awful for europhiles.
Agreed. His stance on the EU is his best selling point for the public I think. As the recent polls have been showing, most people stop short of getting out of the EU, but they like having someone who isn't a total doormat and agrees to anything the "Eurocrats" say at the same time. It's one of the few issues where Cameron truly is in the "centre ground" (whereas on economics he and his government are on the extreme right).
That was a perfect opportunity to be the first politician to say "stick it up your arse" and have the whole country onside. He missed it.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
We don't. Do you think the US should retain its firearms laws? Or are you simply saying it can't be changed?
I think you are incredibly naive, you think that because, the government says no more guns, it means no more guns. I hate to break it to you, but it's not true.
There will always be some guns out there, just as there are some guns in the UK. But you could massively restrict access to them. It would help, a lot.
I ask again: Do you support the status quo in the US? A simple yes or no answer will suffice.
Hah. Cameron is rather good at frothy europhobia. Banging the lectern.
Excellent TV TEN for him. This could pan out well for Tories
Awful for europhiles.
Agreed. His stance on the EU is his best selling point for the public I think. As the recent polls have been showing, most people stop short of getting out of the EU, but they like having someone who isn't a total doormat and agrees to anything the "Eurocrats" say at the same time. It's one of the few issues where Cameron truly is in the "centre ground" (whereas on economics he and his government are on the extreme right).
There's a limit to what people can take though, and they could well end up wanting to stay in but still voting UKIP consistently as the most likely to ensure we do not give in before time. This 1.7 billion which we will no doubt end up paying at least the bulk of, and the snippet in the reports of the same that the EP is still banging on about more money, has pretty much just worn me down, and while I have no intention of voting UKIP, I'm a hair's breadth from voting Out in the event of a referendum.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
We don't. Do you think the US should retain its firearms laws? Or are you simply saying it can't be changed?
I think you are incredibly naive, you think that because, the government says no more guns, it means no more guns. I hate to break it to you, but it's not true.
There will always be some guns out there, just as there are some guns in the UK. But you could massively restrict access to them. It would help, a lot.
I ask again: Do you support the status quo in the US? A simple yes or no answer will suffice.
Have you stopped beating your wife? A simple yes or no will suffice.
It's a massively complex problem and your last statement just goes to show you are too dim to understand it.
If anything is going to change, someone needs to plant a flag to rally support to. It will not happen overnight and indeed needs a significant cultural shift in mindset and priorities but it has been done before. The anti-slavery movement, the prohibition movement and the Civil Rights movement to name but three. The independence movement was a fourth but I'd rather not mention that in polite company.
I think it's possible. If I was living in the USA, and if my own personal opinions had not been swayed by my hypothetical exposure to American culture, I think I'd most likely take part in anti-gun activism. There might be other things I'd vent my views on at the ballot box - against the death penalty, pro immigration reform - but the gun thing in particular would drive me nuts. Unlike the environment and immigration, I'm not convinced that the demographics alone are going to push America in the "right" direction on gun control, and in terms of human importance the gun issue has a far higher body count than capital punishment. There are plenty of groups, including victims groups, who take a stand on this issue.
You're right it needs a flag planter. I'm convinced it can't be Obama because I can't see how he can form a rallying point for the people who are actually required to rally (executive summary: not metropolitan liberal types). I don't see much sign that he's intending to be - as you've said before, he'd be sticking a lot of political capital in one basket. A basket with few prospects for short-term success, and pretty orthogonal to the most pressing daily concerns of the machinery of federal government.
He may prove me wrong, but if he does then he'll have to be his own hardest taskmaster. My original comment was essentially one of frustration at the expression (frequent enough in British conversation) that "the Americans" or "Obama" should change their constitution and join the civilised world, in a way that always wants me to add: "yeah, just like that". I liked saddened's analogy to the Monty Python "how to do it" sketch, it captures just how facile and pointless such "debate" is.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
We do?
Yes we do. If you think its difficult to get hold of firearms you need to get out more. The last two police officers, killed in England were killed with hand grenades.
Anyone determined enough can get hold an illegal firearm easily enough I am quite sure, though I don't really see the issue - if it was a lot easier to get hold of legal firearms, it would be even easier for someone to get hold of one to commit a crime if they wanted to than the easy but still trickier process of having to commit a crime just to get hold of the weapon to commit a further crime.
Labour are doomed because of their record in power in charge of northern councils and in Welsh hospitals (as well as their record in power up to 2010).
And the growing perception that Labour seem to think that things like bad songs in fake carribean accents are worse than things like industrial scale child abuse and poor treatment of NHS patients.
Essentially that Labour care first for the public servants and equality ideology, and only a poor second for those that they are supposed to serve and those who end up on the losing side of equality ideology.
Hah. Cameron is rather good at frothy europhobia. Banging the lectern.
Excellent TV TEN for him. This could pan out well for Tories
Awful for europhiles.
Agreed. His stance on the EU is his best selling point for the public I think. As the recent polls have been showing, most people stop short of getting out of the EU, but they like having someone who isn't a total doormat and agrees to anything the "Eurocrats" say at the same time. It's one of the few issues where Cameron truly is in the "centre ground" (whereas on economics he and his government are on the extreme right).
That was a perfect opportunity to be the first politician to say "stick it up your arse" and have the whole country onside. He missed it.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
We do?
Yes we do. If you think its difficult to get hold of firearms you need to get out more. The last two police officers, killed in England were killed with hand grenades.
Anyone determined enough can get hold an illegal firearm easily enough I am quite sure, though I don't really see the issue - if it was a lot easier to get hold of legal firearms, it would be even easier for someone to get hold of one to commit a crime if they wanted to than the easy but still trickier process of having to commit a crime just to get hold of the weapon to commit a further crime.
Look up the state for crimes committed using legally held firearms. It will stop you looking silly.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
We don't. Do you think the US should retain its firearms laws? Or are you simply saying it can't be changed?
I think you are incredibly naive, you think that because, the government says no more guns, it means no more guns. I hate to break it to you, but it's not true.
There will always be some guns out there, just as there are some guns in the UK. But you could massively restrict access to them. It would help, a lot.
I ask again: Do you support the status quo in the US? A simple yes or no answer will suffice.
Have you stopped beating your wife? A simple yes or no will suffice.
It's a massively complex problem and your last statement just goes to show you are too dim to understand it.
Oh dear. Touchy. It really isn't like asking that question is it? I think you need to have a lie down now and work out why 99% of people feel able to say whether they support the right to bear arms or not, except you, and why you choose an irrelevant hackneyed question to defend your absurd equivocation.
I don't think Jim Murphy would go down that well as Scottish Labour leader, he's largely seen as being a Blairite and the SNP's shift left could see the Conservatives and Labour looking too similar.
Brown would be a good short term leader with a view to next years election. Dugdale to succeed him after that.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
So why does the UK starting from a point that is considerably easier than the USA have such easy access to illegal firearms?
We don't. Do you think the US should retain its firearms laws? Or are you simply saying it can't be changed?
I think you are incredibly naive, you think that because, the government says no more guns, it means no more guns. I hate to break it to you, but it's not true.
Yes, but there aren't as many to get hold of, even for criminals. I think you are pretty naiive to think that people are assuming that if the government says no more guns that means there are no more guns around. I think you are quibbling over what 'easy access' to guns means, as you seem to think it means 'if someone can manage to get hold of a gun somehow through clandestine means' then that equals easy access to a gun, whereas others are interpreting easy as more 'anyone can just walk down the street and buy one anytime they want, probably while picking up their groceries as well' which is an intentionally extreme example, but I think shows the range of how 'easy' it is is fluid.
What have Clegg and Miliband got to say about the mammoth overcharging? C'est la fucking vie! Merde happens!. Their view need airing. And how are we gonna pay? Borrow off of China? We are run by clowns.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
Because Britain is a small island with few wildernesses so its much easier to control Guns coming in and there is no need for vast numbers of the population to have handguns to protect themselves from things like Bears and Alligators?
Its also worth noting that Canada is pretty well just as liberal when it comes to guns and murder there is pretty well as rare as in the UK.
The issue is perhaps why the citizens of the USA are so keen to murder each other rather than the means they use to do it?
True. Plenty of guns in Switzerland too and that's very safe as well.
Again we fall into the stupid NHS trap of thinking that there are only two ways of doing things in the entire world; our way that nobody else copies and the US way that nobody else copies.
Authoritarian regimes ban guns to keep their population docile.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
Because Britain is a small island with few wildernesses so its much easier to control Guns coming in and there is no need for vast numbers of the population to have handguns to protect themselves from things like Bears and Alligators?
Its also worth noting that Canada is pretty well just as liberal when it comes to guns and murder there is pretty well as rare as in the UK.
The issue is perhaps why the citizens of the USA are so keen to murder each other rather than the means they use to do it?
True. Plenty of guns in Switzerland too and that's very safe as well.
Again we fall into the stupid NHS trap of thinking that there are only two ways of doing things in the entire world; our way that nobody else copies and the US way that nobody else copies.
Authoritarian regimes ban guns to keep their population docile.
Not many guns in the Uk, and we're pretty safe. So I guess our way is pretty good.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
rms?
We do?
Yes we do. If youwo police officers, killed in England were killed with hand grenades.
till trickier process of having to commit a crime just to get hold of the weapon to commit a further crime.
Look up the state for crimes committed using legally held firearms. It will stop you looking silly.
Oh to hell with you (edit: well not hell, it's just an expression, before you take that response to your mild insult too much to heart). You've successfully frustrated me and I give up, congratulations on your victory. Only a couple of Scots Nats and the master himself SeanT have managed to make me rage quit like this, and on those occasions obscenities were generally involved, so your civility is well done. I will clearly steer clear of gun debates in future, it's too godsdamned depressing and I will leave it to the americans to have the debate (or rather not to have it, that's their right of course), happy that since it is not a problem over here to anywhere like the same degree, I don't have to get worked up about it, you can be safe in a country with guns or a country without guns (or rather fewer guns), and we're doing pretty ok. I should be saving my energies for disputes of gay marriage or deficit spending, things that actually affect me.
... His stance on the EU is his best selling point for the public I think. As the recent polls have been showing, most people stop short of getting out of the EU, but they like having someone who isn't a total doormat and agrees to anything the "Eurocrats" say at the same time. It's one of the few issues where Cameron truly is in the "centre ground" (whereas on economics he and his government are on the extreme right).
Can't agree that the Cameroons can be described as being on the "extreme right" on economics, unless you think Labour are on the almost-extreme right. If you were trying to mark out an approximate spectrum on economic views, and are going to discount fringe libertarian types outside parliament, then you might stick your "extreme right" post (if you didn't think the word "extreme" unduly perjorative) down roundabout where John Redwood stands on significantly cutting the size of the state. Proper communists have been basically expunged from mainstream British politics, but you could set down an "extreme left" marker with some Labour back-benchers. You could probably find support for renationalisation of some industries, perhaps as far as telecoms, and maintaining a stake in the banks.
The Labour and Tory leadership are far closer to each other, than either are to their party fringes. One the big picture of tax and spend, and the size of the state, there is very little between them. For all the anti-austerity rhetoric, Ed Balls is making all kinds of fiscally conservative noises. And while it's true that some policies could be described as "anti-business" or "interventionist" or "left-wing" (energy price-freezing) those are sprinkled across a policy which is broadly similar to that of the Coalition, and indeed to the previous Labour government. I wouldn't expect to see the tendering of NHS contracts to come to a halt, for instance, any more than it did when Labour were last in power.
For all the arguments about economics, and the personal animosity between Balls and Osborne, there's an awful lot of consensus. I'm not sure we're very far from Butskellism.
Another high school shooting - this one in Marysville Washington.
Shooter dead and about 6 injured
Federal ban on guns. Obama should make this his legacy. But won't.
Ban no-gun zones. They are what's causing the problem here.
Killers who want to rampage will naturally head for places that don't allow guns. Schools, cinemas, etc. No chance of an armed civilian there to stop them.
Personally I try not eat in a gun-free restaurant when I go to the US ... I don't feel safe in one.
The first step to sort this nonsense out is Concealed Carry for teachers.
I'm going to have to disagree. Civilised human beings have no need to carry guns. The US is its own worst enemy with this right to bear arms malarky.
The problem is we are where we are. There are literally millions of firearms in the hands of the public in America. To get back to the state of no-one owning a fire arm is like getting tooth paste back in the tube.
Everyone with an idea is a crank until the idea works. If the US can put a man on the Moon, it can mop up the guns.
Because Britain is a small island with few wildernesses so its much easier to control Guns coming in and there is no need for vast numbers of the population to have handguns to protect themselves from things like Bears and Alligators?
Its also worth noting that Canada is pretty well just as liberal when it comes to guns and murder there is pretty well as rare as in the UK.
The issue is perhaps why the citizens of the USA are so keen to murder each other rather than the means they use to do it?
True. Plenty of guns in Switzerland too and that's very safe as well.
Again we fall into the stupid NHS trap of thinking that there are only two ways of doing things in the entire world; our way that nobody else copies and the US way that nobody else copies.
Authoritarian regimes ban guns to keep their population docile.
Not many guns in the Uk, and we're pretty safe. So I guess our way is pretty good.
The UK was pretty safe before we regulated gun ownership too. I believe the crime stats were lower than now.
But use of the word "problem" is a misprision, as well. Why is American gun law a "problem"? It's like saying Islam is a "problem" for Muslims, whereas the vast majority of Muslims are perfectly happy to be Muslim. It's what they are. It's not a "problem" for them, though their attitudes might be problematic to others.
Most Americans revere their constitution (with some reason, and some irrationality), many of them are very attached to the "right to bear arms". In this light, the large number of American deaths by firearms are seen as an acceptable price to pay, or simply irrelevant, by hundreds of millions of American voters. And that's not going to change soon.
If Sandy Hook couldn't change American gun law, it's hard to see what will.
I don't think the US will ever have a total gun ban in the forseeable future, but I think some sensible gun law reform will come with time. The population is becoming less rural and more urban, less frontier culture and more internationalist, and, perhaps most importantly, less from white farmer stock and more from black and Hispanic people who have seen to damage caused by inner city gun violence. There will be a tipping point at some point. Stuff like the gun show loop hole really isn't sustainable as a sensible position.
Also, there isn't much appetite for new laws when a right-wing SCOTUS will just strike it down. That might change when there's a liberal majority, part-way through Clinton's second term.
Hah. Cameron is rather good at frothy europhobia. Banging the lectern.
Excellent TV TEN for him. This could pan out well for Tories
Awful for europhiles.
Agreed. His stance on the EU is his best selling point for the public I think. As the recent polls have been showing, most people stop short of getting out of the EU, but they like having someone who isn't a total doormat and agrees to anything the "Eurocrats" say at the same time. It's one of the few issues where Cameron truly is in the "centre ground" (whereas on economics he and his government are on the extreme right).
That was a perfect opportunity to be the first politician to say "stick it up your arse" and have the whole country onside. He missed it.
To be totally honest, I'm not sure I trust any of them... what I mean is that I wouldn't be surprise if they set up the ludicrous bill just so that Cameron could be seen in the UK to knock it back... It wouldn't surprise me at all if the leaders played out silly games in front of electorates to give each other the appearance of having won fakes battles... I guess that's a consequence of spin - you just don't know what to believe.
What have Clegg and Miliband got to say about the mammoth overcharging? C'est la fucking vie! Merde happens!. Their view need airing. And how are we gonna pay? Borrow off of China? We are run by clowns.
I think the Labour view was Cameron should have done something about this a week ago when he found out and so he has majorly screwed up, but that of course Labour agreed it was an unacceptable way of doing things?
Comments
The lefty trick is to get activist judges to wilfully misinterpret the Constitution to further their own partisan agenda with utter contempt for it's original meaning.
That trick gave the US the horror of Roe v Wade
On the bright side our village butcher has teamed up with a couple of chaps who have persuaded several landowners to give them shooting rights, so local venison is quite cheap at the moment.
http://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2012/12/22/test-11/
In any case, as I said in my 2012 article:
It is of course possible to interpret that [the Second Amendment] in such a way that the right to keep and bear arms is only protected for the purposes of membership (or potential membership) of a militia. It’s even possible to argue that the right is only protected while the opening assertion [of the Amendment i.e. "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state"] remains valid and that if it’s not, then neither is the right to keep and bear arms. However, the Supreme Court doesn’t even come close to the former interpretation, never mind the latter, and justices who might favour such an interpretation are unlikely to be appointed any time soon.
Though I sympathise about the gun thing; sometimes it turns out that two countries speaking the same language and whose inhabitants look and dress vaguely similar to each other, can turn out to have very different cultures - who knew such a thing was possible? No doubt there are a million and one ways in which Americans point at us and think "how crazy are those guys?" just as I despair at how daft they are over the gun thing.
I sometimes think the best way to understand America is to forget how superficially similar they are to us. In your mind's eye, glimpse that they are all actually bright green, and in your mind's ear, that they speak a lilting gobbledegook which is appearing on your TV screens only after it has been dubbed into English by translators who haven't yet mastered the British accent. Accept their culture and political economy on its own terms. There's something Whiggish about transposing our own values onto them and then wondering why they don't live up to them.
nah can't be.
My gut instinct is that a thorough journalistic social media dredging of that kind of candidate is likely to throw up all kinds of statements that are, shall we say, no longer convenient. I might be wrong here, but mouthing off over one topic is often correlated with mouthing off over others.
So he something well should be. Potential disaster for N Kent & SE Essex.
I've narrowly avoided a dozen deer on the Balcombe Road.
They're a menace and their weight is huge as an RTA hazard.
Bye Mrs Rab C Nesbit.
At some point, Labour is going to have to ask themselves whether they're just so unfortunate to be constantly electing fundamentally bad leaders (Brown, Miliband, and in Scotland Gray and Lamont), or if the reason they're widely seen as bad leaders is because of the political choices all of their leaders make - namely, that they're always terrified as being seen as "ideological", and as a result always come across as just pointless and boring.
I find plenty arguments about many issues which vary across cultures basically boil down to variations on one of the following theme:
PERSON1: "YOUR CULTURE IS STUPID BECAUSE YOU DO NOT OBEY MY CULTURAL NORM WHICH IS CLEARLY SUPERIOR!"
PERSON2: "NO, YOUR CULTURE IS STUPID BECAUSE YOU DO NOT OBEY MY CULTURAL NORM AND THAT IS OBVIOUSLY SUPERIOR!"
or
PERSON1: "YOUR CULTURE IS STUPID BECAUSE YOU DO NOT OBEY MY CULTURAL NORM WHICH IS CLEARLY SUPERIOR!"
PERSON2: "BUTT OUT AND STOP TELLING ME WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU DO NOT EVEN UNDERSTAND MY CULTURE!"
Both of these are frankly tiresome and exhausting to listen to. They seem to serve no purpose other than as a release of hot air and maybe some people feel better after a good old vent on the internet. The signal-noise ratio is absolutely crap.
For an example of how to discuss American gun control properly, see David Herdson's old piece which I think shows excellent judgment and retains the power of its original insight.
Gaby Hinsliff @gabyhinsliff
Lamont says some in London labour 'do not understand the politics they are facing' (in Scotland) http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/exclusive-scottish-labour-leader-johann-4502273 … via @torcuil
Kevin Schofield @schofieldkevin
Johann Lamont: "The Labour Party is a family. It is my family. It should be
led by someone who knows how to treat family members." Ouch.
Sadly, I agree.
Its also worth noting that Canada is pretty well just as liberal when it comes to guns and murder there is pretty well as rare as in the UK.
The issue is perhaps why the citizens of the USA are so keen to murder each other rather than the means they use to do it?
Kevin Schofield @schofieldkevin
Final straw for Johann Lamont was the sacking of Scottish Labour General Secretary by London - hence her parting shot at Ed Miliband
TBH, I'm a very outspoken sort - but tend to shrink from saying so when it comes to other cultures after oodles of PC-thinking indoctrination.
I want to say X, then my Y says 'Oh, no'.
It's insidious and if anything, I now deliberately short-circuit to Step Three and think Eff-Em, and feel much better! This is why I think I get the Kipper vibe.
Sun Politics @Sun_Politics
Jose Manuel Barroso uses taxpayers' cash to produce book... about himself! http://bit.ly/1rv5PAS
He wouldn't last long has a british politician ;-)
(only kidding!)
Jon Laurence @jonlaurence
Tony Blair: Miliband has failed to connect and is doomed to defeat. Great exclusive by @jameskirkup. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/ed-miliband/11187285/Tony-Blair-Miliband-has-failed-to-connect-with-voters-and-is-doomed-to-election-defeat.html … via @Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/ed-miliband/11187285/Tony-Blair-Miliband-has-failed-to-connect-with-voters-and-is-doomed-to-election-defeat.html
James Chapman (Mail) @jameschappers
Blair spokesman: "He wants and hopes to see a Labour victory and believes Labour can indeed win under Ed's leadership.” (NB not "will win")
Chris Deerin @chrisdeerin
If Johann Lamont uses her resignation to have a go at the ludicrous Labour devo position she's done Scotland and Labour a favour
"We are not going to pay this £1.7 billion - ever.
They will claim we are acting illegally, we don't care. Parliament is sovereign
They will then try and fine us. We won't pay.
They will then be obstructive. We will stop paying our membership fees until they stop being obstructive
They will threaten us with sanctions. This is an empty threat we import far more from them than we export them.
We also have the most powerful armed forces in Europe. They are a toothless tiger and need to be taught a lesson.
If we leave, we leave. They have far more to lose than us.
The tories would walk the next election
I ask again: Do you support the status quo in the US? A simple yes or no answer will suffice.
"We also have the most powerful armed forces in Europe. They are a toothless tiger and need to be taught a lesson"
Even on slow nights PB still produces gems.
BBC Scotland News ✔ @BBCScotlandNews
UPDATE: Johann Lamont accuses some Labour colleagues of trying to run Scotland "like a branch office of London" http://bbc.in/1zpvGTN
It's a massively complex problem and your last statement just goes to show you are too dim to understand it.
You're right it needs a flag planter. I'm convinced it can't be Obama because I can't see how he can form a rallying point for the people who are actually required to rally (executive summary: not metropolitan liberal types). I don't see much sign that he's intending to be - as you've said before, he'd be sticking a lot of political capital in one basket. A basket with few prospects for short-term success, and pretty orthogonal to the most pressing daily concerns of the machinery of federal government.
He may prove me wrong, but if he does then he'll have to be his own hardest taskmaster. My original comment was essentially one of frustration at the expression (frequent enough in British conversation) that "the Americans" or "Obama" should change their constitution and join the civilised world, in a way that always wants me to add: "yeah, just like that". I liked saddened's analogy to the Monty Python "how to do it" sketch, it captures just how facile and pointless such "debate" is.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNfGyIW7aHM
I predicted it when it was a 6% chance and now it is 55%
Camborne and Redruth was 2.5% and now is 22%
Labour are doomed because of their record in power in charge of northern councils and in Welsh hospitals (as well as their record in power up to 2010).
And the growing perception that Labour seem to think that things like bad songs in fake carribean accents are worse than things like industrial scale child abuse and poor treatment of NHS patients.
Essentially that Labour care first for the public servants and equality ideology, and only a poor second for those that they are supposed to serve and those who end up on the losing side of equality ideology.
Brown would be a good short term leader with a view to next years election. Dugdale to succeed him after that.
I meant "they" as in "The EU"
Although given all the recent cuts to the armed forces perhaps I had it right the first time :-)
A party rapidly sinking into irrelevance.
Again we fall into the stupid NHS trap of thinking that there are only two ways of doing things in the entire world; our way that nobody else copies and the US way that nobody else copies.
Authoritarian regimes ban guns to keep their population docile.
Today a Polish gypsy kid got a day in the PAK room (naughty step) for telling a Somalian girl "get out of our country you horrible black muslim"
So vibrant and diverse!
-----------------
Lord Ashcroft tweeted the odds of UKIP getting 20-25% in the General election earlier this evening.
twitter.com/LordAshcroft/status/525737334097326080
(I've bet on UKIP >15%)
Lo, and behold: he's from the Islamic Republic of Tower Hamlets.
Well at least there are no "thick white racists" there anymore... and the schools are really good
EDIT: Oh he went out there for "aid work" they say... but this "aid work" can sometimes be used as a "cover"
The Labour and Tory leadership are far closer to each other, than either are to their party fringes. One the big picture of tax and spend, and the size of the state, there is very little between them. For all the anti-austerity rhetoric, Ed Balls is making all kinds of fiscally conservative noises. And while it's true that some policies could be described as "anti-business" or "interventionist" or "left-wing" (energy price-freezing) those are sprinkled across a policy which is broadly similar to that of the Coalition, and indeed to the previous Labour government. I wouldn't expect to see the tendering of NHS contracts to come to a halt, for instance, any more than it did when Labour were last in power.
For all the arguments about economics, and the personal animosity between Balls and Osborne, there's an awful lot of consensus. I'm not sure we're very far from Butskellism.
Also, there isn't much appetite for new laws when a right-wing SCOTUS will just strike it down. That might change when there's a liberal majority, part-way through Clinton's second term.