Anti-gun blather in the local newspaper

Stop the insanity: Ban guns

Gerald Ensley, Tallahassee Democrat 11:42 a.m. EST November 23, 2014

It's the guns, stupid.

The shootings Thursday at the Florida State University library. The shootings Saturday in a northwest Tallahassee neighborhood. The shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut. The shooting of Arizona U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. The shootings at Virginia Tech. The 10,000 senseless shooting deaths that happen every year in this country.

Take away guns and they don't happen.

How is it that the supposed greatest nation on earth refuses to stop the unholy availability of guns?

I'm not talking about gun control. I'm not talking about waiting periods and background checks.

I'm talking about flat-out banning the possession of handguns and assault rifles by individual citizens. I'm talking about repealing or amending the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

The Second Amendment has been misinterpreted. It says guns are permitted to a "well-regulated militia." That means trained citizen soldiers called into action for emergencies — because in colonial times every able-bodied man was required to be a member of the militia. It does not mean everyone with $50 and a driver's license is entitled to own a gun.

That's what former Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger said in 1990, when he called claims of Second Amendment protection of individual gun ownership, "a fraud on the American public." Earlier this year, retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens called the Second Amendment one of the six great flaws with the U.S. Constitution. He called for it to be amended to say gun possession was only for state militias, not individuals.

Every legal opinion for 200 years denied individual gun ownership was a right — until the steady lobbying of the National Rifle Association created a climate that allowed a conservative U.S. Supreme Court in 2008 to strike down a handgun ban in the District of Columbia, and fuel the sense of entitlement of gun owners.

Gun supporters say, "It's not guns that cause gun violence, it's mentally ill people with guns; fix the mentally ill." Even if those same people did not oppose government spending on the mentally ill — which they have for decades — there is no predicting when mental illness will express itself in violence.

All of those who knew FSU library shooter Myron May called him the "last person" from whom they would have expected violence. They all knew he was mentally troubled. But they said he didn't even like guns.

You can't prevent mental illness. You can prevent humans from having easy access to tools they can use to harm other people.

Talk about mental illness: The United States is insane about guns. We lead the world in gun ownership, with almost one per capita. That's twice the percentage of the next closest country.

The United States doesn't lead the world in gun violence. Just the civilized world.

According to a United Nations survey, the United States annually averages 3 firearm homicides per 100,000 population. Fourteen countries topped that figure — but they were almost exclusively Third World countries.

Among the 24 most affluent nations of the world, the U.S. is the far and away leader in gun homicides. None of the other 23 affluent nations has a rate above 1 firearm death per 100,000 population.

Gun freaks insist we need to arm more people. They glibly say shooting sprees happen in "gun free zones," like schools and universities, where gunmen could be stopped if everyone had a gun. That theory is absurd.

Police and military train for years to use a gun competently in stressful situations – and even they don't always respond correctly. Think Ferguson, Mo. Think Charlotte, N.C. Think New York City in 2012 where two cops shot nine bystanders as they wildly tried to shoot a man who had gunned down a co-worker.

The idea of 500 students in a college library or a dozen teachers in an elementary school pulling out guns to shoot a gunman is ludicrous. They would wind up shooting each other.

Gun freaks say if you take away their guns only outlaws will have guns. That's a chance worth taking. Because if we ban guns, eventually the tide will turn. It might take 10 years or 20 years. Hell, it might take 50 years. But if we make it illegal to own a handgun, eventually there will be no handguns.

The same gun freaks believe in banning drugs. They believe in banning abortions. They recognize society bans certain things for the good of society. We should ban guns for the good of society.

People have romanticized guns. The Founding Fathers. The Old West. Self-defense — and never mind the average American has only a one in 250 chance of being the victim of a violent crime. It's all a delusion. Guns kill. They kill people from a distance. They kill strangers and children who have no relationship with the gunman.

Let the hunters keep their rifles and shotguns; those weapons are ineffective tools in a mass shooting. But we need to ban handguns and assault rifles for all but police and military.

This is an uphill battle. Despite daily front-page stories of shooting sprees and killings, Americans don't want to give up their guns. Over the past 10 years, the percentage of Americans who support stricter guns laws has dropped from 60 percent to 47 percent. In a recent survey, 73 percent of Americans oppose banning handguns.

But those of us who think widespread handgun ownership is insane need to keep speaking up. We need to teach our children handguns are wrong. We need to support any measure that limits their availability — and work to repeal the Second Amendment. We need to keep marching forward until someday this nation becomes civilized enough to ban guns.

One of the frequent refrains of gun freaks about President Obama is "He's coming for our guns." Obama never said such a thing. But I will:

We're coming for your guns. And someday, we'll take them.

Contact Gerald Ensley at 599-2310 or gensley@tallahassee.com.

Source: http://www.tallahassee.com/story/opi...guns/19426029/

Connie read this this morning and she showed it to me. She was already hinting about dropping our subscription to the Tallahassee Democrat (she was thinking that maybe the coupons made it worthwhile keeping), but this was the last straw. We just do not want to use our money to help pay the salaries for these people who write this sort of blather.

in a place where guns are outlawed, only outlaws have guns.

There have been 774 comments made on that article, of which about 99 percent are calling Gerald Ensley an idiot. And yet you will hear anti-gunners proclaiming time and time again that they represent a majority of the American public.

I emailed their parent company (Gannett) and told them I was cancelling my subscription to the Tallahassee Democrat because of their staff's obvious attempts at subverting my constitutional rights. I presume they got the message because we did not have the paper delivered this morning. Good riddance. I can't count the number of times I have fumed over the idiotic stuff they would write in that mullet wrapper they call a "news" paper. They would even quote articles from other publications all over the USA just to post some flaming liberal BS they evidently support.

I don't think it is a random article.
The gummint appointed an 'Ebola czar' who is a politician not a medical person. All of a sudden news about Ebola was nonexistent.
Here, this article is anti gun. I do not think either the timing or content are accidental, and I believe that instead of fighting inconvenient free speech, those who have a stake in information content are simply supplying what they want read and having what they don't want read removed by 'czars'.
I am encouraged by the 774 comments. I think that when there were more jobs, money, and opportunity, it might have been easier to sell the American people bs.
But now that people look around and see more expensive food, more laws, more control, less privacy, less money, fewer jobs, it isn't so easy for those who wish to do so, to paint their picture of the world and have us believe it.
Thank you, 774.

At least the writer was honest and admitted that the Second Amendment would have to be repealed before a gun ban could be passed. I don't forsee that happening any time soon.

In other news

Call for Knife Control

http://eaglerising.com/11653/liberal...FPdUit9BltR.99


It had to happen. We’ve been told for decades that gun control has curtailed violence in Great Britain. With no guns around, people who are intent on doing harm are using knives. So, of course, there is now the call for knife control.

“The new ‘Save a Life – Surrender Your Knife’ program is in full swing and police are telling us that they have joined forces with an already growing trend in the United Kingdom to ban ‘pointy’ knives.”

Why not go to the local prison and see how well knife control works.

At first, it thought the “Save a Life – Surrender Your Life” campaign (and it still may be), but as far as I can tell it’s the real deal. They even have a sign.

The Lancashire Police have “joined forces with the ground-breaking national anti-knife crime campaign ‘Save a Life, Surrender Your Knife’, as the force’s knife amnesty comes to an end.”

“Since the amnesty began at the end of August, more than 800 knives have been handed in across the county – including swords, machetes and commando knives. The amnesty was extended for a further week owing to its success.

“Lancashire officers have now given their backing to a national initiative designed to raise awareness of knife crime and encourage the surrender of dangerous weapons.

“The British Ironwork Centre, which is coordinating the project, intends to use the collected knives to create a 20 feet high guardian angel sculpture in memory of those whose lives have so tragically been lost.

“Despite the amnesty ending this week, police say people can continue to hand in any knife at any police station with a front counter as well being able to drop them into the designated bins."

I can see all the criminals heading straight for the bins to turn in their knives.

Doctors who contribute to the British Medical Journal are calling for the ban of “long pointed knives" after they published new research showing that with no guns around for use in violent crimes, kitchen knives are the go-to choice.

According to the BBC, “A team from West Middlesex University Hospital said violent crime is on the increase - and kitchen knives are used in as many as half of all stabbings.” The BBC added that “many assaults are committed impulsively, prompted by alcohol and drugs, and a kitchen knife often makes an all too available weapon.”

After consulting 10 of the top chefs in the UK who told them that “long pointed knives” have little value in a kitchen, researchers believe that there is no reason for those knives to be publicly available.

According to the Journal, while “short pointed knives” may cause superficial wounds, long knives would be able to penetrate deeper and hit vital organs. Because of this, the groups of doctors are suggesting “that banning the sale of long pointed knives is a sensible and practical measure that would have this effect."

While England does have knife laws that “prohibits the possession of offensive weapons in a public place, and the possession of knives in public without good reason or lawful authority, with the exception of a folding pocket knife with a blade not exceeding three inches,” a spokesperson for the Association of Chief Police Officers said, “ACPO supports any move to reduce the number of knife related incidents, however, it is important to consider the practicalities of enforcing such changes."

Sheesh.... Even a three inch knife slashed across someone's throat is going to deliver a fatal strike. And I'll tell you what, hit someone square in the throat with a forceful rap with your knuckles and they are going to go down for the count. Permanently without immediate medical aid. It doesn't take very much to crush a windpipe. So yeah, let's outlaw knuckles too, while we are at it.

And the scary thing is that these people don't have the slightest clue about how insane their rantings sound. You just cannot rubber baby buggy bumper the entire world.

You know, this is all leading up eventually to have it proposed to have it mandatory that everyone take their happy pill every day to try to eliminate violent tendencies. Basically chemically lobotomize everyone (of course, our "leaders" and designated enforcers of the law will be exempt), for our own good.

Originally Posted by bcr229

At least the writer was honest and admitted that the Second Amendment would have to be repealed before a gun ban could be passed. I don't forsee that happening any time soon.

With full control over the media, anything is possible.

Originally Posted by WebSlave

With full control over the media, anything is possible.

Case and point:

Now this is really funny. The Tallahassee Democrat deleted my comment I placed this morning about my subscription cancellation obviously having been accepted since I did not get a newspaper this morning.

So much about their professed stance concerning the First Amendment. I guess that only applies to people who are willing to align lock step with their own views.

Which, to be honest, is not at all a surprise.

Originally Posted by WebSlave

The Tallahassee Democrat deleted my comment I placed this morning about my subscription cancellation obviously having been accepted since I did not get a newspaper this morning.

So much about their professed stance concerning the First Amendment. I guess that only applies to people who are willing to align lock step with their own views.

Which, to be honest, is not at all a surprise.

The First Amendment is a restriction on the government, not on private parties. Their site, their rules. As a site owner you should appreciate the concept.