The question becomes ... how come we don't see this stuff on the news? Does the news agencies have an alternative agenda?

That's a good question.
I watch the news almost every night. There is a shooting once or twice a week, but I can't ever recall a shooting in self defense.
I can maybe see people in a survey saying they ran someone off with a gun, but actually shooting somebody??? Can't remember one.
Could they be counting gang shootouts and the like?

 

............The real numbers are very hard to pin down because a huge fraction of cases (estimated at between 70% and 95%) do not involve the discharge of the weapon, but merely its brandishment. In a very large fraction of those cases, no police report is ever filed.....................

If you are an anti gun politician, does it help your cause to fund collection of data where a concealed gun stopped a crime from happening? No, this would be counter productive to your ultimate goal. You want the statistics to be in your favor.

If you are an anti gun politician, does it help your cause to pass laws that actually reduce gun violence crimes? No, this also would be counter productive to your ultimate goal. You want gun violence to grow.

If you are an anti gun politician, would you pass a law that has no statistical merit of protecting peoples lives while ignoring legislation that does. Yes, this gives the appearance that you are doing something good for society, but allowing the real problem to grow and fester.

If you are an anti gun politician, do you seize the opportunity to ramrod your anti gun laws through congress while the emotions from a horrible mass killing are still fresh in the countries heart? Absolutely! The more emotional the public is, the dumber they are.

Welcome to America

 

Who knows which one is correct.
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/opinion-la/la-ol-guns-self-defense-charleston-20150619-story.html

Right, the idiot doesn't know what "well-regulated" means in the 2nd Amendment. Why should we spend one second listening to his opinion on the stats from the bogus Violence Policy Center?
http://crimeresearch.org/2015/06/ne...s-old-claims-using-justifiable-homicide-data/

Law enforcement is generally very pro-gun because they see crime up front and personal unlike some politico sitting on their fat behind.

http://ddq74coujkv1i.cloudfront.net/p1_gunsurveysummary_2013.pdf

19. Do you support the concealed carry of firearms by civilians who have not been convicted of a felony and/or not been deemed psychologically/medically incapable?
Response Percent Response Count Yes, without question and without further restrictions 91.3% 12,968
No, only law enforcement officers should carry firearms 4.1% 586
Unsure/Neutral 4.5% 646
answered question 14,200

 

Who knows which one is correct.
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/opinion-la/la-ol-guns-self-defense-charleston-20150619-story.html

I'm not even going to bother reading it. The very first sentence makes clear the strong bias that the writer of the story is bringing to the table.

 

Law enforcement is generally very pro-gun because they see crime up front and personal unlike some politico sitting on their fat behind.

http://ddq74coujkv1i.cloudfront.net/p1_gunsurveysummary_2013.pdf

I agree with this survey. My son in-law is a metro officer in Las Vegas. I often go to the dunes with a two other police officers, one rides a dirt bike and the other rides a side by side.

 

That's a good question.
I watch the news almost every night. There is a shooting once or twice a week, but I can't ever recall a shooting in self defense.
I can maybe see people in a survey saying they ran someone off with a gun, but actually shooting somebody??? Can't remember one.
Could they be counting gang shootouts and the like?

I can recall several such stories over the years right here in the Colorado Springs area, including people that not only discharged their weapon, but actually killed the attacker. I believe only one person was ever charged and I think the charges were dropped. But even for such local events I will hear it mentioned on just a couple of the radio stations (I don't watch TV except on extremely rare occasions) and then only for a day or two. But anytime someone OTHER than an intruder is shot, even if non-life-threatening, it will be mentioned on nearly every station for at least several days. I recall one day several years ago when I was driving around all day and the previous night there was a gang-related drive-by shooting (injury only) and there was also a gal that shot and killed a drug-head that was breaking into her home. I tend to flip through stations a lot and I heard the defensive use mentioned three times all day (and all on the same station), but I heard the drive-by mentioned several times on several different stations before I noticed the difference and started counting and I heard that story 14 or 15 times more that day and on at least five different stations.

 

Law enforcement is generally very pro-gun because they see crime up front and personal unlike some politico sitting on their fat behind.

http://ddq74coujkv1i.cloudfront.net/p1_gunsurveysummary_2013.pdf

I do firmly believe that the results of this survey happen to be well in the ballpark, based on interaction with law enforcement folks over the years and also other surveys as well as direct observation of their public stances (for instance, when Colorado passed significantly more restrictive gun laws a couple years ago virtually every county sheriff in the state joined a lawsuit challenging their constitutionality).

However, I can't rely on the results (even though I like them) because this was a HIGHLY self-selective survey. They sent out 400,000 invitations to participate and fewer than 16,000 did. That's a participation rate of only 4%, which invites HUGE self-selection bias. Namely, the 4% that actually answered are those that have very strong opinions (one way or the other) and there is no basis upon which to claim that those highly motivated 4% are representative. The representative view is clearly held by the 96% that chose NOT to participate. Now, the representative view may well match that of the 4%, but there is no defensible way to make that claim (except in noting that the results correspond to other indicators, but if you have to rely on that to validate your results, why take the data in the first place).

One interesting thing that has been noted repeatedly over the years is that rank-and-file officers are generally very pro-gun as well as an overwhelming fraction of sheriffs (most whom are popularly elected). But chiefs-of-police (most of whom are politically appointed) are pretty strongly anti-gun.

 

Every gun control legislation should have a provision in that that say that every member of the congress, the executive branch and their direct family members should not own guns and should not have security details carrying guns.

If the politicians want to stripe the people's right to protect their families with guns, they should explain to us why they should be protected by guns.

We have a corrupt political system where there is no representation for anyone who pays taxes and follows the law. Thus the revolt you see behind Trump and Sanders.

 

everytime there is a gun crime, their focus is always on gun control, not crime control.

and everytime, the republicans walk right into that trap. Unbelievable.

 

I can recall several such stories over the years right here in the Colorado Springs area, including people that not only discharged their weapon, but actually killed the attacker. I believe only one person was ever charged and I think the charges were dropped. But even for such local events I will hear it mentioned on just a couple of the radio stations (I don't watch TV except on extremely rare occasions) and then only for a day or two. But anytime someone OTHER than an intruder is shot, even if non-life-threatening, it will be mentioned on nearly every station for at least several days. I recall one day several years ago when I was driving around all day and the previous night there was a gang-related drive-by shooting (injury only) and there was also a gal that shot and killed a drug-head that was breaking into her home. I tend to flip through stations a lot and I heard the defensive use mentioned three times all day (and all on the same station), but I heard the drive-by mentioned several times on several different stations before I noticed the difference and started counting and I heard that story 14 or 15 times more that day and on at least five different stations.

Well, lets look at the numbers. How about your high estimate.7.1 million a year, I think it was. That is one every day in every city in the US. The good estimate - lets say 210,000 or 10 a year in every city in the US. Perhaps your right and it is a vast conspiracy. In which case the drive by is probably the same thing by the fear mongers.

 

If you are an anti gun politician, does it help your cause to fund collection of data where a concealed gun stopped a crime from happening? No, this would be counter productive to your ultimate goal. You want the statistics to be in your favor.

If you are an anti gun politician, does it help your cause to pass laws that actually reduce gun violence crimes? No, this also would be counter productive to your ultimate goal. You want gun violence to grow.

This is not the way it is in reality though. It has been the pro-gun politicians and the NRA that have stopped the reporting. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...ence-research-ban_us_56606201e4b072e9d1c4eaaa

And no I'm not anti gun, have more guns than probably most people on this forum. And have made my own guns.

 

This is not the way it is in reality though. It has been the pro-gun politicians and the NRA that have stopped the reporting.........................

There are two sides to any story. The CDC collected and filtered gun violence data to support the anti gun position. They lied and the American people paid for it. As a result, congress cut the CDC's budget by the amount they sent to collect and generate biased gun violence data.

The NRA stopped the recording ......of biased data that supported the anti gun agenda.

 

Well, lets look at the numbers. How about your high estimate.7.1 million a year, I think it was. That is one every day in every city in the US. The good estimate - lets say 210,000 or 10 a year in every city in the US. Perhaps your right and it is a vast conspiracy. In which case the drive by is probably the same thing by the fear mongers.

Where on earth did I use an estimate of 7.1 million?!?!?!

I don't know how many cities there are in the U.S., it sounds like you're saying that there are 21,000. That sounds reasonable. But don't forget all of the areas outside of incorporated towns and cities. Even if we ignore them, that's an average of less than one per month per city. Of course, large cities (providing the government hasn't done too good a job of disarming the law abiding citizens) would have a lot more than that and many of the small towns and cities would have none in a given year.

Going back to another item that you (?) raised about people being more in danger from their friends (due to accidental shootings) than from the terrorists, what about being in danger from falling out of a window? There seems to be an epidemic of that. We just had another two-year old killed last night by falling out of a sixth-story window and there have been several this year.

 

This is not the way it is in reality though. It has been the pro-gun politicians and the NRA that have stopped the reporting. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...ence-research-ban_us_56606201e4b072e9d1c4eaaa

And no I'm not anti gun, have more guns than probably most people on this forum. And have made my own guns.

I agree with you. I'm not antigun either, but I'm not naive enough to think more guns would have solved something like the Pulse shooting or drink the pro gun cool-aid. If you have a look at the Pulse videos you can see a person in about every 5 square feet. I have this vision of the shooter starting. He hits about 10 or 20 before anyone figures out what's going on. Somebody sees him and has a gun so he pops off a few. But alas he is not John Wayne and he's 30 feet away so he hits some chick next to the shooter and she screams like she's been shot. Alas the guy 10 feet away sees him shoot the chick so he shots the good guy and the beat goes on.
Going back to @WBahn s numbers.

Most surveys peg the annual frequency of defensive gun use at between 750,000 and 3 million (with one showing 4.7 million)

Sorry, I should have gone back and looked at it again. Colorado Springs has a population of a little over 400,000 so if it is typical there should be between 280 and 6000 shootings a year prevented by the good citizens. I think you would hear about that more than a couple of times over the years.
What I'm trying to say is it ain't as easy as it sounds. Think about the Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood shooting where WBahn's neighbor spent 5 hours holding off the police. WBahn, Did you know this guy? I know there are only a couple hundred people in Larkspur. He doesn't look safe.

 

Going back to another item that you (?) raised about people being more in danger from their friends (due to accidental shootings) than from the terrorists, what about being in danger from falling out of a window? There seems to be an epidemic of that. We just had another two-year old killed last night by falling out of a sixth-story window and there have been several this year.

Yea, I feel your pain. Here we get them with swimming pools.
We also have a low light policy for the astronomers so we run over a few pedestrians a week.

 

I agree with you. I'm not antigun either, but I'm not naive enough to think more guns would have solved something like the Pulse shooting or drink the pro gun cool-aid. If you have a look at the Pulse videos you can see a person in about every 5 square feet. I have this vision of the shooter starting. He hits about 10 or 20 before anyone figures out what's going on. Somebody sees him and has a gun so he pops off a few. But alas he is not John Wayne and he's 30 feet away so he hits some chick next to the shooter and she screams like she's been shot. Alas the guy 10 feet away sees him shoot the chick so he shots the good guy and the beat goes on.

I think you've watched too many movies about how dumb criminals (and sometimes cops) fire their weapons and have never had any formal training in defensive fire control. Even if that happened there is still a good guy with a gun left and there's a chance 30 more people won't die. I don't think CCW is a crime reducing magic solution either but it does give a possible victim a fighting chance. I'm pro-choice when it comes to staying alive by having a gun.

 

I think you've watched too many movies about how dumb criminals (and sometimes cops) fire their weapons and have never had any formal training in defensive fire control. Even if that happened there is still a good guy with a gun left and there's a chance 30 more people won't die. I don't think CCW is a crime reducing magic solution either but it does give a possible victim a fighting chance. I'm pro-choice when it comes to staying alive by having a gun.

We should try to reduce it to numbers.
I think the only "good" numbers are people killed. The rest are suspect and even the killed probably have suicide mixed in.
So we would have something like how many bad guys killed buy good guys. Not cops or guards but citizens with a carry permit.
How many kids killed by accidentally finding home guns.
How many accidental deaths.
What did I miss?

 

What spins me up is that they are ignoring the common symptom in most all of the mass killings; mental illness. Instead, they (the politicians) are pushing their favorite anti gun agenda. What does this say about the politicians? Are they weak, feeble minded, incompetent fools or do they have a hidden agenda? Don't you find it strange when a politician says, "The common thread in the mass killings is mental illness, so lets ban ten round magazines." The anti gun politicians have a hidden agenda and public safety is not a factor in it.

 

Looks like they need gun & knife control in the UK.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/jo-cox-dead-live-updates-8207676

Beginning to look like he was inspired by a US white nationalist group. Maybe where he got the plans for a zip gun as well.

 

Over a 24 hour period this past weekend, 7 people were gunned down in the gun-free city of angels, 5 more injured.

You never heard that?

Those incidents took place in Carson, Compton, Huntington paark, etc. Areas of the city, aka poor neighborhood.

Why is that no one talked about the uquival protection provision of the Constitution? Why is that no one talked about the irony where so many people died of so many gun crimes in a gun free city?

"Inconvenient truth", as a hero of mine would say.