... People -without-a-criminal-record-no-history-of-mental-illness-legally-able-to-buy-numerous-weapons-and-ammunition-line-and-tie-up-little-girls-who-lived-in-a-community-devoted-to-peace-and-forgiveness-and-easily-efficiently-quickly-execute-said-little-girls-in-the-head... KILL PEOPLE.
If you aren't safe in an one room school house in Amish country, to hell with everything.
Including this blog.
If your mind is too open, your brain will fall out. Warning: Names, identities, descriptions, and pictures have been changed and/or used to protect the innocent as well as the guilty. PollyPeoria should not be used or quoted as a source for your senior college thesis.
Friday, October 13
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24 comments:
It's great to see you back Polly.
Don't be such a stranger.
Pay attention to CJ. He's a smart guy.
My particular point is that a sick, twisted whackjob doesn't need a gun. He could just as easily intimidated those teachers and children with a knife. A determined whackjob (like he seemed to be) can get the job done, even without an FOID card.
And, please don't quit, Polly. You HAVE been missed.
Ms. Peoria- Pleased to see that you're still amongst the living, and welcome back... as for whether or not "Guns Kill People," well, yes they do, by gum.
And, a lot easier than a dude with a machete. Or with a balpeen hammer. Or with an electric drill.
Y'see, if someone SNAPS, it's much cleaner and easier to pick off your spouse or the neighbor's kid if you can do it from TWENTY FEET away, as opposed to running after your victim with the chainsaw.
That being said, there are far too many guns out there to ever truly consider taking guns away... a rebellion would ensue. And, as stated in an earlier posting, a well-armed citizenry makes it a mite harder for a government take-over (if any was ever in the offing... and if it was, it would have been under George W.).
The trade-off is a lot more accidental and intended deaths that would NOT have occurred if we didn't have so many guns amongst the people.
That's the way it is... and I must wing off.
Nope. Not buying it. I don't think this cruel, barbaric, twisted asswipe could have so easily and efficiently executed 6 little girls and critically would four other with a knife. He could have done some God awful damage, no doubt. He could have killed somebody, but he would not have been able to successfully slaughter so many innocent babes without a gun.
As for citizens without arms being at the whim of their government, what a total crock of crap. Even if you have an AK-47, or two, under your bed, you would still be ill equipped if your local national guard unit came calling and decided to take over.
You're right when you wrote that there are just too damn many guns in this country to ever get rid of them all. So, I'm thinking maybe in addition to flouride our water supply should be dosed with mass amounts of anti-depressants and all bottled water should also be dosed with Prozac or something like it. Yes, I know, some will have serious ill side effects, and the idea might be overboard to some.
Yet, shooting up and Amish classroom of little girls is about as overboard as it gets and with the plethora of these types of incidents occurring in this country, the idea has merit.
There is something very wrong with us- Americans, that is. There are other countries that have the right to own guns and yet they don't suffer the same ill effects. At least not with near the frequency.
Perhaps along with reading, writing and arithmetic we need to teach ethics, anger management, yoga, and meditation in the schools.
We need to do SOMETHING for God's sake!!! The response to this particular horror has been a the equivalent of a national shoulder shrug, followed by a U.S. nose pick, and a pathetic, "That's too bad" before we resumed the scratching our collective asses.
Pathetic.
Boy, Polly... you completely misunderstood my comment. I AGREE with you 100% that guns DO kill folks... make it EASIER for them to kill folks. All I said was that it would be damned difficult, if not impossible, to RID society of those guns. I'm all for making it harder than the bajeebies for ANYONE to get a gun... but, you're still never going to be anywhere near safe in that regard.
Gee whillikers... I bet you're just mad that I'm the one who posted that Aaron Schock looks like an older Mark Foley, and you didn't. Right? Yep... I thought so.
By the way, that was MOI who left that contorted message. It must have been a subliminal thing that made me go "anonymous."
Good to see you're back. You need two sets of whackjobs in this. Those people who think guns will stop violence, so they keep making them, and lobbying hard to keep them. Then you have those that buy the guns to commit the violence. You can't have one whackjob without the other. Can't have Laurel without Hardy
The day when every gangbanger, hoodlum, whackjob hands over every (most likely illegal) gun they possess, I'll hand over my legal ones. But that will never happen. Seriously, if you made the laws so that if you used a gun in a crime, the next time you saw the light of day, Haley's comet would be lighting sky and if you used an illegal or stolen gun, Kohoutek would make another appearance before you got out. Put those stupid enough to criminally use guns away forever and put the fear of God into those who are thinking about being stupid. Getting out in 10 years due to good behavior for killing someone isn't crap to a career criminal who has probably spent most of his\her life behind bars, anyway.
And if I walked into (insert liquor store name here) to hold it up with my grandfathers 1937 Winchester model 67 (single shot break open .22 short) I'd get laughed at and told to go away.
Ah Prego Baby, I didn't mean to come down on you. I understood that you agreed with me, and I agree with you that this country is too far saturated with guns to ever rid our country of them all.
Yes, C.J. horrific murders happen in other first world countries too. However, it would be much, much hard to mow down a dozen little kids with a paring knife, don't you think.
Granted, if one (and his backward buddies) is (are) possessed by the devil and devote enough time and energy to proper planning, it is possible to take out thousands with an airliner. You can also set your sights on becoming a dictator and holding the world hostage with a nuclear device.
In my arrogant opinion this is the difference: Not everyone who owns or wants a gun is an idiot or sicko. HOWEVER, EVERY SINGLE IDIOT AND SICKO SEEMS TO OWN A GUN IN THIS COUNTRY.
Also, Americans are, on average, strung waaaaaaay to tight these days. Just try driving in Chicago if you need proof. Add guns to the mix of a dysfunctional, abused, exhausted, pissed off population and nothing good can happen.
Again, Prego is right, it is too late to get rid of all the guns. (Damn!) So, as I see it, we have to take on a far more difficult task to correct the problem... retrain the general population as to what is proper behavior. When Uncle Sam doles out various "rights" and/or privlidges he should require more from citizens demanding them.
Want to become a citizen, take the bar exam, get a passport, fishing license, hunting license, or even Driver License? Prove you know the rules of the road, pass a minimum I.Q. test, and complete an anger management course.
Getting an education on the public's dime? Ethics, meditation, yoga, ethics, conflict resolution, ethics all required courses. Since public schools can't legally put the fear of God/Allah/Budda into students or teach them love and forgiveness via Christ (I understand the desire/need for the separation of church and state but I think we are paying a pretty high price for it) then we will have to resort to a whole lot of Cum-by-ya (sp?!) Michael-Row-Your-Boat-Ashore type teachings.
Anyone got a better idea? I still stand by the Prozac in the water supply suggestion...
What I'm trying to get at is that we need to be (re)educated in civility (which includes taking b.s. on the chin more than occasionally)
"But at the same time we would have had just as much herioism, without the same degree of tragedy had the teacher whipped a 45 from underneath her denim skirt and taken out the murderer."
Ah, another fine pearl of insanity from the Hall of Chase.
Given the fact that teachers in Harlem or Watts aren't armed (or atleast not supposed to be) I think the world would be flabbergasted if an Amish teacher had a weapon let alone a belief system that would allow her to blow anyone away.
As I understand it- peace, pacificm, and forgiveness are the primary hallmarks of the religion. The amish may, in fact, "have bulleyes on their backs" but victimizing them is akin to slaughtering defenseless puppies, shooting fish in a barrel, etc. Well, much, much, MUCH worse obviously. The point being that it is worse to victimize the knowlingly defenseless. My other point is that we have reached a whole new decreipted level of depraved indifference when an individual does something so brutal and American society doesn't react with measures to prevent it from ever happening again.
I'm gonna jump in here late to the game. Polly is right litteraly and that's about it. Guns do kill people. So do cars, boats, busses, helicopters and motorcycles. Also rope, knives, rat poison, plastic bags and swimming pools. What else is there? Coat hangers, alcohol, scissors, tall balconies, Draino, electricity, heat, cold, Carbon Monoxide and O.J. Simpson. Anyone can use just about anything as an instrument of death. This guy needed some serious mental help. He would have killed no matter what.......Welcome back PP.
bj,
I agree this nut case would like have killed no matter what. However, he wouldn't nearly been as "successful" with a car, boat, helicopter, coat hanger, rat poison, etc. To execute ten little kids in a such a horrid, quick and efficient manner, it required a gun.
What guns do, as opposed to the other "weapons" you mentioned, is that guns give nut cases an easy and readily accessible means of slaughter.
Polly,
All I can say is that we live in a fallen world where right now guys like this are the exception and not the rule. This is tragic but the fact that he was able to kill efficiently should not cloud our ability to judge accordingly. One girls death is enough. We can not capitulate our right to bear arms for the few nutjobs out there.
But if you think about it.... technically a car should be outlawed by Polly's logic. Because with enough speed he could have run right through the side of that school house potentially killing 10 or more instantaneously. That is a lot quicker than the minute or so that a gun could take.
OK, I'm going to jump in here with a few points as is my persistent and annoying nature.
First, owning a gun for self defense is a delusion. A gun in your house is MUCH MUCH MUCH more likely to kill a member of the household than it is to kill an intruder. You’re putting yourself and your family at INCREASED danger by owning a gun. If you want to protect your house, get a big loud dog. A gun is more likely to end up being used by your kid to blow away himself, a sibling or a friend – or by your significant other to blow you away when you come home late one night.
Many of the methods of death mentioned by B.J. and others require licensing. You can't drive a car, boat, truck, plane, etc without a license because they're dangerous machines. However, we don't seem to feel the need to provide the same level of licensing & training in order to handle a machine DESIGNED to kill people. A handgun's PURPOSE is to kill humans. An assault rifle’s PURPOSE is to kill humans. Cars kill people, but that's not what they're designed to do.
Regarding the 2nd Amendment – for one, it calls for a “well regulated militia.” The word REGULATED is in the amendment, people! The NRA just willfully neglects to mention that and spins it as “the right to bear arms.” Ahh well … my point actually is that EVERYONE believes in gun control. That’s right. You ALL do. You don’t think private citizens should have nuclear weapons, right? Artillery? Tanks? We ALL draw the line somewhere. The debate is over WHERE to draw the line, and I think that’s something that can be argued by reasonable people without having to be subjected to a witch hunt by the NRA for even mentioning the possibility. That group has FAR too much influence on the political process in this country.
Finally, none of the folks commenting out there have addressed the central point that Polly makes about guns making it EASIER to kill more efficiently. You just keep throwing up examples of the various methods evil &/or insane people use to kill. The POINT is that it's much easier and effective with a gun, and no one has countered that argument.
You win, Polly.
BJ ... usually when a car hits a building, the building wins. Cars are lot easier to dodge than bullets, and a lot easier to see & hear coming at you. I'm afraid the weapon of choice for mass murder in this country is the assault rifle. Easier to get than explosives and easy to convert to full auto carnage.
Knight,
No....the weapon(s) of choice for mass murder in this country are "jet fuel laden" 747's and bombs made from ferilizer.
Fine then lets just remove the wall scenario and and have a person drive into a crowd of school kids lining up outside. Now you could get maybe 20-30 pretty quickly. But I don't understand what point you are trying to make. Are you for gun control or not? In one instance you say it is dangerous for guns to be in the house. (which I personaly feel is nonsense) Then in the next breath you say that training and education is required. To which I agree. I feel if you are going to buy a weapon you need to have a certain number hours of training for that weapon. I think it is a little too simplistic to say guns are designed to kill people. Yes that is true, but they are also designed to be a deterent. I don't think a loud dog will be a match for somebodies 45. The only thing that would do would wake me up to confront the intruder with my sling shot. No thanks. So you can go on with your "Dogs not guns" argument, I will pass. I don't think you can raise Polly's arm in victory quite yet. What if I don't like dogs or am allergic to them? I guess I can scare off those nasties with my loud attacking ferret.
No .... 9/11 and Oklahoma City were exceptions to the rule, BJ. The 9/11 attacks killed ~3000 and the OKC bombing killed 168. Approximately thirty thousand Americans die EVERY year from gunshot wounds - that's 150,000 since 9/11 and 330,000 since OKC.
I wouldn’t recommend bring up the OKC bombing in an argument where you’re defending gun owner’s rights, BJ. The perpetrators of that terrorist attack were American 2nd amendment loving nut-job militia types … not the best thing to bring up when you’re arguing for permissive gun laws.
How many die from cars driven into crowds by murderous maniacs? No clue, but I'm sure it's not 30K per annum or even close.
You can "feel" that having a gun in the house makes you safer ... that's the problem. People think they're safer ... but the truth is that the gun is more of a danger to the members of that household than to any potential intruder. Armed home invasion just isn't that common of an occurrence, despite what the NRA would have you believe.
Depression, suicidal ideation, intimate partner violence ... all are very common, unfortunately. With guns in the house, heated arguments and suicidal impulses turn into obituaries that otherwise might not have happened. My personal nightmare as a pediatrician is the kid who finds the loaded gun at home and thinks it's a fine toy ... until he shoots himself, his sibling, a friend, etc. That doesn't happen all that often, but I'm sure it's more common than invading maniacs being shot as self defense.
The dog argument ... OK, don't be silly. If you're allergic to dogs, get an alarm system ... or simply don't have a gun in the house. Set a baseball bat by your bed. Unless you've had intensive firearms combat training (not just target practice and gun safety courses or even hunting experience), you and your family are safer with nothing.
I've fired guns before, and I appreciate the sense of power they can provide. You get this feeling like "nobody's gonna mess with me now." Yeah, well ... I'm not G.I. Joe and neither are most of the pro-gun advocates out there. Put away the toys and enter the grown up world we call civilization. Your toys are more likely to hurt those you love than those who might intend you harm.
I'm not making these points to advocate a ban on guns. I'm just shooting holes in the "my gun makes me safe" argument. It's a big nasty lie.
As far as gun control ... I don't think private citizens need automatic weapons or guns that can easily be converted to full auto. I think waiting periods and background checks are perfectly reasonable. I don't think concealed carry is a good idea because the training requirements are usually too lax.
The training required by the Missouri concealed carry law is an 8 hour gun safety course. Wow ... that proves you can clean & load your weapon and aren't likely to shoot yourself in the foot out on a practice range. Does that qualify you to participate in a gun duel with the "bad guys"??? Please. Even professional soldiers with months or even years of combat training and experience sometimes shoot their comrades or innocent bystanders. An untrained NRA gun junky with a concealed firearm is a menace to the public.
What's happened with violent crime in Missouri since concealed carry passed? Hmmm ... it's spiked UP. Gosh ... I guess it hasn't had time to take effect yet. All those criminals are just getting in their final licks before they're shot down but the gun wielding public. Yeah ... right. I've got a nice bridge to sell ya ...
Nothing personal... but I don't agree. People don't buy guns for home to "feel" safe. They want to protect themselves. A benefit of that is a "feeling" of security. How can that be a lie that people are "buying" into? And for those who own guns and have kids that end up killing themselves....although tragic...should that mean the rest of us have to be denied because they can not be responsible gun owners?
"An untrained NRA gun junky with a concealed firearm is a menace to the public."
I try to refrain from public use of swear words as much as possible, but, that is such bullshit. A real menace to the public is the schmoe who stumbles out of Crusens at 1:00 in the morning and kills somebody while driving home. Which brings us full circle to my original point. How many people die each year from drunk driving? In 2005 the number was 16,885. A little over half of gun related deaths. But that is not including the total vehicular homocides which I would wager far excedes your 30,000 deaths per year.
BJ,
Two wrongs don't make a right. Drunk driving is evil and deadly, no one is defending it.
In the case of gun ownership, no, it isn't fair to responsible gun owners to take away their guns because other gun owners keep committing these horrid acts of violence against innocent people.
However, as I'm sure your Mom told you, THE WORLD ISN'T FAIR. At all. Sucks but true. In my opinion we are at the saturation point. A "few" bad apples have spoiled the whole barrel, and the right to arms is more harmful than good.
I'm not there yet with cars and drunk driving, but I can see it from here.
Guns do not kill more people than other weapons. I can go to the hardware store and all the material I need to build a bomb large enough to destroy a building and kill 168 people. (Oklahoma City Bombing. Or how about a subway arson in South Korea which killed 120 people? It is much easier to kill a large number of people with explosives than it ever was with a gun. Has one man with a gun ever killed 168 people in one incident? If there is a man with a gun killing people who are unarmed and defenseless he may get to 168. The VT killer only stopped because he thought he ran out of victims. Guns do not kill people anymore than baseball bats, knives, cars, rocks, or hairbrushes. People kill people with guns, knives, hairbrushes, ropes, etc. People are accountable for their own actions they make their own choices and if they choice to kill they will kill. Murder was not invented with the gun. Murder was invented with man and will continue until every last human being is dead.
Reading through the comments I see that there are a lot of mixed feelings about guns. for those who think outlawing guns is the solution, it is not, outlaws will still have guns. so being, the unarmed will have no means of self protection. I agree with Anonymous about simplicity of being able to build bombs and murder being invented with man, so true. also, what is wrong with the ten commandments??? thou shalt not kill, Steal, etc... the nation would be better off if they were displayed in every school room, every court, everywhere for the public to see.
The problem is not with guns, the problem is with the people, and gun owners need to be held to some level of acountability for their actions.
I would just like to say first that cj you should not talk about the Carl David Kelly stabbing if you know nothing about. You were not at the trial all you know is what the media told you. I on the other hand do know beacause i am his cousin. As for this whole thing about guns it is possible to have a gun in your house and still be safe about it. While i was visiting a friend in texas he had a shotgun but to ensure safety he had a lock on it and it was not loaded. I think if everyone is safe about it then guns are fine with me. Last off all i would like to say guns dont kill people, people kill people.
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