I'm afraid of guns

(and hope this comment won't be censored).

I have yet to see on the news, a good guy with a gun interrupting a mass shooting. Except for when the police finally arrive. For what ever reason, the bad guy has the only gun in the house.

@ThomHartman It sounds to me like you're engaging in the kind of reasoning that gives ammunition (pardon the pun) to the gun lobby. Let's start with your figure of 10.1/100,000. If the ballistics registration & micro-engraving reduce that by 84% that would reduce it to 1.6/100,000.

Ammo background checks account for 82% so that takes it down to .29/100,000 and the mandatory background check makes it .1044/100,000. The problem with this is those percentages, by your own admissions are possibilities, not definite, and not even probabilities. Besides that, anyone with a basic understanding of math knows those percentages would not act linearly, one on the next. In other words, if you enacted law that required micro-engraving and it worked as promised, the gun-death rate would go down to the rate mentioned above. By enacting the second measure you wouldtn't reduce it by another 82% and here's why.

Let's say the study found three more things you could do to reduce it by a mere 50% each. The 1st would reduce it to .052/100,000, the 2nd .0261, and the 3rd to .013. If this actually worked you would reduce death by firearms to less than 400/year in the U.S. That's 8 for every state in the union. What's at work here is the law of diminishing returns.

The one thing that needs to happen is one federal law that calls for all three of these things and replaces or supplants all state laws. As long as Republicans insist on having a republic as opposed to a representative democracy, this will never happen. Just as the founding fathers we hear so often trotted out by regressive politicians never foresaw that gun control would become an issue, they also didn't forsee the AK-47 & M-4.

As long as we keep putting the autonomy of individual states above the general welfare of the people, things won't change, Lest we forget, that's how the civil war started, and the rebels keep reminding us that, "The South shall rise again!"

So, you see, I am on your side, but please don't use false statistics in an attempt to make a point. If all three of those things together only decreased gun related deaths by 50% they would still be well worth doing, and not evenone of them requires any kind of registration,

2nd Amendment

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

2nd Amendment explained

A well regulated Militia- civilians who band together in times of emergency to form an Army of irregulars.

Being necessary to the security of a free state- not as in the 'fifty states,' but as in the state of Being Free.

The right of the people- law-abiding citizens.

To bear and keep arms- arguably any unclassified weapon which can be wielded by an individual soldier.

Shall not be infringed- shall suffer no dilution upon which civilian capability to thwart tyranny may hinge.

I noticed that during 2011 there were 11,000 homocides involving firearms in America but only 158 gun deaths in Canada. How did Americans get so fearful?

Going back to my own history-I grew up in a town where hunting was very much part of the culture. My boyhood ambition was to get a summer job so I could buy a 12 gauge shotgun to hunt doves, quail and ducks. September 1st, the first day of hunting season saw multiple restaurants opening at 3am in the morning to feed the hunting population the traditional ham and eggs breakfeast. The line of car tail lights was miles long leaving Bakersfield, CA to the northern dove hunting grounds. We'd sometimes have large social gatherings at the local dance hall to cook and eat our game. Those of us that hunted wanted only to have a good quality hunting firearm and never wanted anything to do with anti-personnel weapons.

As time went on and the hunting grounds shrunk due to urbanization and corporate farming and there was less demand for hunting guns. The gun manufacturers felt the pinch and starting building hunting firearms in foreign countries but even the cheap labor was not enough to support the industry. So just after the Vietnam war Colt Industries released the AR-15 to the open market as a kind of war surplus "good deal". It certainly was not a hunting weapon and even the one time poster child for the NRA, P.O. Ackley, a firearms, ballistics and ammunition expert said that the AR-15 was not a legitimate sporting arm and "could only interest those grown up sportsmen with adolescent tendencies". Thus began the era of the anti-personnel gun.

The years that followed saw a marked reduction in hunting and the availablilty of hunting arms and the upswing of anti-personnel weaponry. Advertising propaganda switch from killing deer with a such and such model gun to using guns, especially pistols and assault weapons for personal protection. The propaganda worked. It convinced people that they needed a gun for protection from other people. People became fearful of "bad guys", the firearms manufacturers stayed in business, and as guns multiplied as did the poorer class of people, more people were killed.

Legislatures started making gun laws designed carefully to continue to allow gun manufacturers to stay in business and which emphasized technological changes to weapons(supposedly to make them safer or capable of being used by the owner only) and various forms of registration. I believe there is even a law in California which requires the owner of a high velocity compressed air, pellet gun to register the air tanks used to fuel the air rifle. Does not make much sense does it? It's kind of legislating around the real problem while protecting the sacred cow of capitalism.

It appears that the combination of firearms sales propaganda coupled with this era of economic stress has left more people with tendencies toward depression to think that life is no longer worth living. They don't identify social problems with the real corporate villains but strike out at those close at hand or perhaps those that represent a certain symbolism or metaphor that pushes their buttons.

Many social science authors (Leonard Doob, Karen Horney, Jacques Ellul) have stated that the continued escalation of propaganda has serious side effects. Few in our society take them seriously. Max Weber said that the continued bureaucratization of society would lead to what we have been witnessing. "A polar night of icy darkness for human kind".

When people start believing their own propanganda like the republican party has-more serious problems erupt. They attempt to run on their own ideology and in a population that has gotten used to propaganda as the gospel, they have been "successful".

Tou can't keep guns out of the hands of criminals and/or nut cases
Sadly, the 2nd amendment gives them the right to bear arms also.

LOL! This post by "Davidj" has to be a joke. Nobody can be this dumb, well, maybe a Donald Trump supporter can be this dumb. This guy's a grammar clueless fool that thinks Thom Hartmann's last name has three letter "N's."

"Fewer people die when fewer criminals and nut cases can buy guns."

I used to be a big fan of Thom Hartmannn. And, in the last few years he has gotten further and further from reality. I will no longer go to ANY GunFree Zone becuase of the risk. Life is risky, Life is less risky when we all know that most people present have guns.

Just a fact.

Fewer people die when a a good person with a gun is present, when a bad person with a gun shows up,

NONE of your WISHING it was was otherwise will change that. Gun laws can only make good people more dead.

If any actually want gun control, first step would be banning manufacturing guns...and the greedy will not let that happen

Bernie or Bust? Why are Bernie supporters being forced to live in the future? The power is in the present. I refuse to commit to something that may not happen.

American Spring?

Bernie called for an American Revolution. Change the framing of the message. In the news recently Obama is criticizing Britain for the problems in Libya. Bullshit, it was America that overthrew Ghadafi. I just saw that they have confirmed a list of terrorists? I saw one on another web site. Financial Times had a list of the Fortune 500 companies. They had names but they didn't have the blood types. Or maybe it should have been mixed blood, since they are sucking the blood out of everybody. I think I know how to have peace in the Middle East! STOP SELLING THEM WEAPONS, FUCKING IDIOTS! Joe Biden just went to Israel to sell them billions of weapons. And nobody has said anything about Israel building illegal suburbs out of Palestinian bodies. Do you think they are angry? Maybe Trump was right, there is an anger in the Muslim world. Gee, does the fact that we have been at war for 15 years (no pun intended) have anything to do with this anger? Didn't we embrace the courage of a Tunisian who set himself on fire? Maybe he wasn't the brave one, maybe it was the millions that decided to do something to support the idea.
Bernie is calling for a revolution, but he should embrace his idea, otherwise he's just another politician. I have heard that he supported Martin Luther King. Does he remember his history? MLK was going to a rally in Memphis to raise the wages for the sanitary workers. He was also speaking out on the Viet Nam War. He was talking about the military using minorities and the poor as cannon fodder for the Military-Industrial Complex (MIC). This got him killed. It is time for Bernie to go over the top. He needs to renounce the MIC. He might be killed. Get real, the MIC and Wall Street have no scruples. Aren't you prepared for this possibility? Start talking about it because you should know your history. If this does happen, what will happen? Will the revolution stop? Or will it take off like the Arab Spring. They can kill 1, or 5, or 10 people. But are they ready to stop millions? Who is ready to help. Climate Activists? Black Lives Matters? The Democratic Party? (just kidding, ha ha!). Why not all of them. But there needs to be people in every office to take over the government from the corporatists. But I would like the revolution to start without an act of violence. SO START THE REOLUTION!
We are heading into March Madness. These are all schools that are trying to divest from fossil fuels. Why don't the basketball players tell their supporters to NOT travel to the games. If they decide that they do not want to travel unless they have electric vehicles for travel. It worked for a losing football team who had courage. Why not a winning basketball team? Start the revolution.
BLM should start their American Spring. They should embrace the philosophy of a Transition Village to rebuild their communities. We are heading into the springtime, so now is the perfect time to start. Have them demand help for urban gardens, for help with putting in wind turbines and solar panels, as well as help in insulating their habitats. They need to start now, I don't see the world surviving another year in the present system.
Jill Stein is right, we need to say stop the MIC and start a war for renewable energy. stop making weapons and build solar panels, windmills and batteries for storage. Quit blaming Exxon for the problem, start acting. People need to buy electric vehicles. Anyone that has bought a fossil fuel vehicle in the last 10 years is part of the problem. We need to repair our past mistakes and go forward.

Tell Bernie to start to embrace the words of King. He will have the support of millions, maybe billions of people. They can stop one or two individuals. But a movement?

Richinfolsom

Racism is alive and well in the halls of Congress where the Senate is hosting the political humiliation of the twice elected President of the United States. In fact, it appears the President has appeared to surrendered to the republican racially motivated coup de tat in violation of their oath to defend and protect the Constitution (and their duties set forth therein.)

Where is the outrage?

Elections have been turned into 'Survivor' reality TV shows and sanctioned by the complicit moderators unwilling to call out the racist, hateful, speech and calls by the billionaire that violence is a sign of strength.

Where is the outrage?

Cruz and Rubio hate the United States. Cruz says he will abolish the IRS. Rubio says he will do away with the EPA, who needs clean drinking water? They hate the black man in the White House. They hate government though they seek the most powerful job.

Where is the outrage?

An estimated 90 people die each day because of gun violence in a time when the NRA and the paranoid supremacists are busy buying millions more weapons in anticipation of their delusional belief that the black man is coming to take their rights and their guns.

Where is the outrage?

Fascism has raised its snake head in our politics of lies and deception by the media estate and the religion of internal war. Black America has long predicted these days of oppression in our economic, educational, criminal justice, and political injustice.

Where is the outrage?