2027

What in God’s name

Biden, doing a Google+ “hangout” to promote President Barack Obama’s proposals for battling gun violence, had been asked whether a new assault weapons ban might infringe on the Second Amendment rights of those who want one “as a last line of defense” to fend off looters after “some terrible natural disaster.”

“Guess what? A shotgun will keep you a lot safer, a double-barrelled shotgun, than the assault weapon in somebody’s hands [who] doesn’t know how to use it, even one who does know how to use it,” the outspoken vice president, a shotgun owner himself, replied. “It’s harder to use an assault weapon to hit something than it is a shotgun. You want to keep people away in an earthquake? Buy some shotgun shells.”
Joe Biden talking home defense tactics like he’s on a gun nut forum. Hahaha! This is genuinely adorable. (I’ll take the AR though.)

He later used that tired line of logic about people buying tanks and F-15s. So he still has a little more homework to do. But I have to give him credit.

2028

Gandalf, please re-read my post.

Malcolm, umm, err, generally the overreaction joke is a little less violent…

2029

This one?

Loughner allegedly proceeded to fire apparently randomly at other members of the crowd. He reportedly used a 9mm Glock 19 semi-automatic pistol with a 33-round magazine. A nearby store employee said he heard “15 to 20 gunshots”. Loughner stopped to reload, but dropped the loaded magazine from his pocket to the sidewalk, from where bystander Patricia Maisch grabbed it. Another bystander clubbed the back of the assailant’s head with a folding chair, injuring his elbow in the process, representing the 14th injury. The gunman was tackled to the ground by 74-year-old retired US Army Colonel Bill Badger,who had been shot himself, and was further subdued by Maisch and bystanders Roger Sulzgeber and Joseph Zamudio.

2030

Right. So one guy? Gandalf said “probably untrained and unpracticed” and I’m asking which spree killers had no training and no practice.

Also, Loughner dropping a magazine while in the grip of his insanity-fueled euphoria isn’t really evidence to me that he didn’t practice. I mean, I get the point. “Hey if some amateur shooter is fumbling with his weapon more often, maybe I’ll have time to tackle him.” I just don’t think “military training” has much to do with that. I saw soldiers with tons of range time fumble with magazines when the crap hit the fan.

2031

So where are you headed? that the spree killers would handle it fast and efficiently?
I kindof took it that they all were untrained and spur-of-the-moment unless stated otherwise.

And yeah I agree that even the training doesnt mean all that much. Consider how many police shootouts with gang members are many shots fired and few real hits.

2032

What you have to do is simultaneously cartwheel with your four limbs and toss three weapons counterclockwise around your circle of hands and feet, so that you’re supporting yourself with one while two are firing and one is reloading. I of course also use my Johnson, which I have chained to half a nunchuk. I go pretty much everywhere like this, just in case I’m attacked. Try it!

2033

Gecko45, is that you?

2034

So, does Biden favor a Purdey or a Westley Richards?

*for the record double barreled shotguns start at 2,000 USD and only get more expensive from there. They are the most expensive type of gun on the market, ether in side by side or an over/under configuration. By contrast a Remington 870 costs just 300 USD.

2035

Well, not necessarily, you just have to get out of the fowling pieces and into the cowboy action pieces:

http://www.stoegerindustries.com/firearms/stoeger-uplander.php

The embarrassing thing is that Biden is a shotgunner himself, yet is spouting what he has to know to be a complete lie, that somehow shotguns can’t miss at personal defense ranges.

2036

Why in the hell are double-barrelled shotguns $2,000?

2037

Shotguns are a traditional firearm that carry a lot of craftsmanship (and upper-class bragging) over from England. While in the US we’ve developed many brands of affordable hunting shotguns, the over-under and side-by-side shotguns are typically reserved for presentation models and have complicated lockwork, scrolling, magic super walnut, etc. $2,000 is actually the bottom end for what clay shooters consider a “real” shotgun, and the actual art pieces jump quickly past $100,000. And yes, a child with a $300 Remington who practices can beat the shit out of a rich guy with a fancy shotgun any day of the week. It’s a fucking shotgun, after all.

2038

Oh, so they’re a show piece rather than a practical firearm. I feel lied to by westerns and Doom 2.

2039

Generally, yes. They were practical back then, but after the invention of the pump and semiauto they became anachronisms that were only useful for sporting pursuits. And video games.

Meanwhile, Diane Feinstein hilariously admits in her own press release that assault weapons are responsible for a whopping 40 deaths per year! That puts them on par with diseases of the appendix.

The 1994 Assault Weapons Ban was effective at reducing crime and getting these military-style weapons off our streets. Since the ban expired, more than 350 people have been killed and more than 450 injured by these weapons.

Just think, it will only take a century for this great evil to catch up to 9/11’s body count. That is, of course, assuming that murders suddenly level off for 100 years instead of continuing to decrease as they’ve done since the AWB expired.

http://www.feinstein.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/assault-weapons-ban-summary

2040

People use them but yes, they’re more art than gun.

2041

The best way to have a ‘chance’ is to be armed yourself.

2042

On the one hand I agree.
On the other hand I dont agree that armed means a gun. In some cases (which I see more and more of lately) that is actually a step backward.

2043

The best chance would be if we took guns away from everyone to make sure it never happened in the first place.

See what you get when you make absurd absolute statements based only on the situation at hand?

2044

I agree with you. If you could wave your magic democrat wand that made all guns go to heaven, we would all be safer. From guns. But not from evil. Or crazy. You would still be at risk from people with knives or bats or bombs or any other kind of weapon.

Gun control in the US, a country founded with guns, is not the answer. It will not work. It does not work. Places with restrictive gun laws still have gun crimes!

So yeah the best way to ensure you ‘have a chance’ when some evil/crazy fuck decides to murder people, is to be armed. Failing that, if you dont want to go out on a limb and get out of your comfort zone, having the populace armed actually helps you in those situations where a bad guy does bad things.

2045

Common refrain in this thread, one that I first noticed during the Jovan Belcher story: bad people may be bad due to circumstances – economic inequality, parenting, genetics, whatever – but once they decide to do that bad thing the circumstances cease to matter. Availability of a gun is irrelevant, they will use some other weapon.

Do you believe that? Of all gun deaths, what percentage would not happen if the gun did not exist? Would 99% of these gun deaths become knife/bomb/bat deaths?

2046

Nobody could say, but obviously there would be fewer actual deaths; it’s not the gun crowd’s contention that firearms aren’t very good at killing, that’s reserved for anti-CCW hyperbole. But yes, there would be a replacement effect of some level of murders, much like how the UK didn’t suddenly become murder-free after they passed the law:

The downside to removing all firearms is that you elevate the young, male criminal even higher on the food chain than he already is. Perhaps an emboldened criminal class would lead to fewer deaths but an even higher violent crime rate, once they assimilated the fact that there was no chance of retribution, again a la the UK.