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United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

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Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#311

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> SBRs (real pia to get for non-leo) It's not that bad. The easy way is to find an SBR you want to buy, file Form 4 for $200, wait for a few months, then take receipt of your NFA item. Or if you want to do a conversion from an existing rifle, file Form 1 (also $200) and get short barrel. The disadvantage is that you've then created an NFA weapon, so you'd have to be more careful how you handle transfer and sale. If y…

> If you have a forward grip but don't have the tax stamp, you'll go to prison. Incidentally, I'm pretty sure this applies even if the grip isn't attached, or is attached to another gun. All depends on how friendly the ATF is feeling...

Yeah, sometimes. There's an ATF concept called "constructive possession" which means if you have all the parts, you're in a legal grey area. If the ATF thinks you have the intent to assemble an unlawful weapon, and you have constructive possession, then you might be a criminal.

I think it's unlikely (but possible) a case would be brought against you for just having the grip, and I'm not sure if that's ever actually happened. As opposed to if you had all the parts to make a machine gun, where there could only be one use for those parts.

Also interesting, drilling the extra hole in your AR-15 lower so that it could some day accept an auto-sear is a serious felony, even if you don't own the auto-sear.

I'm fascinated by how insane these rules are after I learned that I can't legally own or operate a firearm because I'm a medical marijuana user. If cannabis ever gets unscheduled, I'd like to build a little arsenal.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#312
post #305

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On paper or in reality, because the deaths by rifles total is When you access risk, likelihood is a factor, you mitigate for risks that have a higher likelihood. If I'm worried about protection from being killed I'm more worried about a drunk driver than a meteorite even tho the meteor has a higher lethality. Handguns are lethal enough you get shot by one, the survival rate isn't significantly higher than a rifle esp…

You're repeating yourself. I addressed that argument already as well. If you want to rebut what I said, that's fine, but you can't just repeat the same point as if there hadn't been a response to it. Be specific about what your issue with my argument is. Or rest your case; it's fine if we just disagree.

[deleted]

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#314

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> Frankly if the grandma next door needs to use a weapon, I would hope that she is not limited by regulations such as that - I would like her to have as good of a grip and sighting options as absolutely possible. I'd rather her have an easily controllable SBR type of weapon, expandable stock and maybe 30 rounds of 22 winmag - this would be much safer for her and for the neighbors I think if something went down... JB'…

a mag full of 22 win mag is not really 'serious firepower' - I mean it is, but I think people would consider like a SCAR or M60 to be serious - and lots of people chuckle at someone using '22'... I think it depends on where you live, and how valuable you are in terms of theft and attractiveness. For examples - the super rich in Miami probably need more security than the richer in Beverly Hills. If you are attractive…

An "M16" shoots a 22 caliber bullet. Its called a 223, but its a 22 caliber diameter bullet.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#315
post #222

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I mentioned large capacity magazines, forward grips, and a red dot sight. Not 'scopes' - which could mean many things, but I believe are more often referring to 4x,10, 16, etc magnified scopes that are more often used for long range hunting.. My point was that some of the 'assault rifle bans' are trying to stop simple things like a grip addon, a collapsible stock, an over 10rd magazine - any one of those things could…

I personally would want my Grandma to live in a safe neighbourhood, one that doesn't require her to have a weapon to defend herself. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/18/gun-ownership-... Their findings, published Wednesday in the prestigious American Journal of Medicine, debunk the historic belief among many people in the United States that guns make a country safer, they say. On the contrary, the US, with…

I think we all personally want safety for grandmas in that way.

Unfortunately we can't all control that. When my neighbors moved here they chose safe neighborhoods that had little violence / crime. Over the years the demographics have changed immensely, and crime has soared. Many people here are stuck, they want to get out but housing from here to an hour outside of town has gotten so expensive it doesn't make sense.

No journal of anything that compares the USA to Japan and crime or shootings debunks anything.

No other country in the world has the same challenges that America does. I'd love to live in a place that has real social safety nets and does not have the Latin American countries a hop skip and train away ( https://www.businessinsider.com/latin-america-is-the-worlds-... )

but sometimes it's best for you and grandma to have a condom and not need it than to need one and not have it. Even if you want grandma to never have to worry about stds.. they actually happen a lot, want it or not.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#316

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> "we taught people to fear risk X, the way to alleviate the fear is to reduce the likelihood of X" is the most asinine bullshit in the world. The US was a scary place after 9/11. I'm sure a lot of money was wasted in domestic security that didn't do anything, but I'm glad we made an effort to reduce the likelihood of future terrorist attacks rather than just reinforcing how incredibly rare they are. We can't stop te…

The Post 9/11 security theater is not a good model to follow, and to compare your plans for gun control to that in any sort of positive association is a good reason for any person who has the slightest of care toward civil liberties to just flat out ignore you.

I'm not using it as a model of perfection, but rather saying at least we did something. Sure, it wasn't perfect and we could have done way better, but imagine if we had done nothing but told people how rare terrorist attacks are each time they happened. There's a ton of room in between those two extremes to try to make a positive change.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#317
post #260

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> Luckily for gun control advocates the rate of firearm injuries also sharply increases for households that own guns, too. Uh, ... wow. "Luckily?" > you can significantly reduce deaths and injuries by removing guns - which people often have because they think having a gun will reduce those. There may be better ways to reduce these than trying to remove the guns, though-- ways that mitigate and reduce harm and that do…

> Uh, ... wow. "Luckily?" That is what one would say if they were grateful for the deaths, isn't it? Isn't it just a bonus that it happens to The Other?

Considering my argument has been about attempting to reduce gun deaths you might want to reconsider that assumption. However, lucky for you, I'm pretty sure that assumption would make it easier for you to dismiss my argument. I say lucky for you, but what I really mean to say is it'd be bad if you did that. Its a little turn of phrase that isn't literal and which is probably lost via text.

Lets reduce gun deaths. They are tragic and often unnecessary.

Also, fear of The Other, seems to be what drives some of the people in this thread to defend gun ownership. One responder here justified gun ownership by saying other people were "animals" that given the chance would exact violence upon them.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#318

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Our track record of defeating armed insurgencies is miserable. You’re also overlooking the nature of waging war on your own people. The military will follow a tyrannical dictator, until it doesn’t. In Bangladesh, for example, Pakistan killed hundreds of thousands of disarmed Bangladeshis. Thanks to smuggled arms from India, Bangladesh was able to put up some sort of resistance. Eventually, Bangladeshi members of the…

I'm not only hearing you say "maybe" a lot about the effectiveness of gun ownership, but also that wars against internal foes are wildly unpopular, and that the military may decide to stop supporting the government. Agreed on all counts. Consider this though, we have repeatedly conducted studies that show bringing a gun into your house increases the chance of gun death. Maybe, perhaps, given the chance, gun ownership…

Oh boy, wait until you see the stats about what car ownership does to you and your families chances of dying in an automobile accident!

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine if you bought a strawman into your comment. Or maybe we don't have to imagine. How many people do you know who brought a gun into their house solely for protection against someone with a gun?

How many people do you know that would be pleased to learn owning a gun actually makes their family more prone to dying of gunshot wounds? It is not possible to have liberty when you are dead.

You've made that claim several times on this thread alone but have yet to provide any supporting reference.

Re: United States to fund gun-violence research after 20-year freeze

#320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gun advocates should clear up confusion by lobbying for an amendment that redefines militia to encompass a wider age range. Or we can acknowledge that passing constitutional amendments in the 21st century requires amount of political capital that it is no longer possible to attain in our system. Insisting that we interpret the status quo as favoring one's preferred ideology, and that one's ideological opponents must…

Your second point is backward. The Constitution is a compromise between various ideological preferences. If it’s impossible to achieve sufficient consensus to change the bargain by amending the Constitution, that means you can’t change the bargain. You can’t subvert the requirement of a strong consensus for amendment by way of mechanisms (legislation, judicial interpretation) that require lower levels of consensus.

That artificially constrains the entirety of gun control to the question of constitutional amendments, and confusedly insists that other constitutionally valid reforms (e.g. congressional and state legislation, court rulings) would be 'subverting' that process. Which is deeply confused for reasons I certainly hope I don't have to explain out loud in a serious conversation.

Congress has drifted from the institutional norm of resorting to constitutional amendments for reasons that have nothing to do with the merits of gun control. Insisting that an extremely difficult channel for reform is the only valid way to seek reform begs the question in favor of a deeply disputed interpretation of the second amendment, and disingenuously insists that other channels of reform aren't on the table, for reasons that have yet to be explained.

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