Fun , but not highly practical

[Plane]

http://www.vpc.org/ccwkillers.htm

That is disputed .

This site seems to be claiming that almost four hundred murders have been committed by CCW permittees in the last twenty years.

I guess this demonstrates that the people with permits committ crime at a lower rate.

Providing you accept their accuracy.

Oh ho!

Using publicly available media reports, the Violence Policy Center claims that from May 2007 through the end of 2009, concealed carry permit holders in the U.S. have killed at least 117 individuals, including 9 law enforcement officers (excluding cases where individuals were acquitted, but including pending cases). There were about 25,000 murders by firearm that period,[97][98] meaning that concealed carry permit holders committed less than 1% of the murders by firearm. Furthermore, a large number of the victims were killed in extended suicides, most of which took place in the home of the shooter, where arms can be possessed without special permits. VPC also includes in its numbers several homicides using only long guns and several instances of accidental discharge.[99]
 
According to FBI Uniform Crime Reports (UCR), in 2008 there were 14,180 murders and 616 justifiable homicides (of which 371 were performed by law enforcement) in the United States. The UCR states that the justifiable homicide statistic does not represent eventual adjudication by medical examiner, coroner, district attorney, grand jury, trial jury or appellate court.[100] Few US jurisdictions allow a police crime report to adjudicate a homicide as justifiable and in any given year fifteen to twenty states do not report such statistics to FBI UCR, resulting in an undercount in the UCR table. The vast majority of defensive gun uses (DGUs) do not involve killing or even wounding an attacker, with government surveys showing 108,000 (NCVS) to 23 million (raw NSPOF) DGUs per year,[101] with ten private national surveys showing 764,000 to 3.6 million DGU per year.[102]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concealed_carry_in_the_United_States

[Xavier_Onassis]

Would a gun ban of any type reduce suicide?

=====================================
In countries where gun ownership is less than in the US, there are many fewer gun suicides.

Guns are more effective at killing than sticking your head in the oven, taking poison, overdosing and other ways people use to end their lives. A lot of suicides are committed by people who are drunk.

There are statistics that will answer your question.

[Plane]

So a gun ban would frustrate some suicide attempts?

This seems like a reasonable opinion , but I think evidence for it will be difficult .

Would a ban on alkahol prevent some suicide attempts?



I just read this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics

Even though it is very concice it is very long.

Almost everything that you could possibly assert vs gun regulation is disputable.

In both directions.

[Xavier_Onassis]

This Second Amendment Debate, like the Abortion Rights debate is very much like the 70 years of slavery debate, with both sides quoting the Bible and the Constitution interminably. It got to be so bad that the topic was banned from Congress for several years.

There were those that argued that slavery was not only God's Plan, it was actually good for the slaves, since they were taught all about Jesus and could go to heaven, whereas, had they been left to romp through the jungles in Africa, they would have all gone to Hell as heathens.

[Plane]

This Second Amendment Debate, like the Abortion Rights debate is very much like the 70 years of slavery debate, with both sides quoting the Bible and the Constitution interminably. It got to be so bad that the topic was banned from Congress for several years.

There were those that argued that slavery was not only God's Plan, it was actually good for the slaves, since they were taught all about Jesus and could go to heaven, whereas, had they been left to romp through the jungles in Africa, they would have all gone to Hell as heathens.

I know you are right, and even worse, there was a southern faction that asserted that the direction of progress was for more and more ordinary farmers to own slaves untill it would practicly become universal, I bet that sounded good to a tired workingman , but it was probly a plan with no potential to work. At the same time Denmark Vessy and Nat Turner scared the pants off all the white people of every station and made John Browns unlikely plan seem terrorfying.

It is also like the abolition on alcahol , fought hard untill it wasn't worth the fight anymore.

I agree with Winston Chirchill that "Jaw jaw is better than War war" I consider debate worthy exercise even if it isn't making "progress", it is circleing about while time passes and perhaps improving over time.

[Xavier_Onassis]

PBS has been airing a three part series on Abolition, with the third and final episode to run tonight. I had read about nearly everything covered (and a lot more),but they have organized it very well and it is very well done. Like all PBS documentaries, it will be shown over and over, and is available online as well.

No one does history better than PBS, especially Ken Burns. The History Channel has done some good stuff, but also does a lot of stupid schlock that adds nothing new and with unconvincing "dramatizations" that basically suck. Around Easter they always claim to find something new about Jesus, and of course, they have nothing new, because there IS nothing new. Someone finds a tomb in Jerusalem with an apostles' name on it, and of course there is no proof that it was THAT John or James or whoever, and all it is is some guy clambering around underground in a safari suit interviewing goofy priests.

Being as Jews have been burying their dead for a thousand years, there are many thousands of dead Jameses, Johns, Matthews and such buried all over the place.