posted on January 30, 2003 10:08:15 PM new
Perhaps Mercedes should be sued...there is a woman on trial who used her Mercedes to run over her husband...three times. Censorship, like charity, should begin at home; but unlike charity, it should end there --Clare Booth Luce
posted on January 30, 2003 10:33:52 PM new
You're confusing the intended use of the product with a product defect.
Product liability can stem from both. Using a gun for its intended purpose (shooting a human) is grounds for product liability just as using tobacco as it was intended is grounds for product liability. In either case, using the product as intended causes harm. The intended use of a car is not to run over humans.
Holding only the purchser liable for a dangerous product is nonsense. Anyone that can afford dynamite and read the warnings and directions should be allowed to have it ? Ridiculous.
The firearm product stream should be just as regulated and rife with liability as high explosives receive.
posted on January 30, 2003 11:16:06 PM new
"Using a gun for its intended purpose (shooting a human) is grounds for product liability just as using tobacco as it was intended is grounds for product liability. In either case, using the product as intended causes harm."
No, the consumer accepts the risks for the product when purchased. Consumers need to understand that they are liable for the use of the item when they buy it. People know what guns do and CHOOSE to buy them anyway. The gun companies can't be responsible if someone uses their free will to purchase a gun. They do their part to promote SAFE storage and handling, education courses, and firing practice. Once a gun is purchased, it is up to the consumer to follow (or not) these recommendations.
Guns are also used to "scare" people. This is a widely known use of a gun that doesn't involve the killing of a human and proves that guns have other intended uses.
Anyone who smokes today is inundated with the message that smoking kills. If you CHOOSE to smoke, you accept responsibility for YOURSELF. Likewise for guns. If you CHOOSE to own a gun, YOU are responsible for what the gun does.
posted on January 31, 2003 12:38:25 AM newHolding only the purchser liable for a dangerous product is nonsense. Anyone that can afford dynamite and read the warnings and directions should be allowed to have it ? Ridiculous.
People are--and should be held--responsible for their own actions. One of the major problems with our society today is the idea--which you seem to share--that people aren't accountable for what they do. A person robs, embezzles, murders, whatever...and it is because they weren't loved enough as a child, or were loved too much & spoiled, or they have one of an ever-growing number of "conditions," or they were drunk, or on drugs, or they lost their job, or they made a "mistake"...or someone made a gun, a knife, whatever... ANYTHING rather than admit that a person is, in the end, responsible for their own actions & decisions. Talk about ridiculous! Censorship, like charity, should begin at home; but unlike charity, it should end there --Clare Booth Luce
posted on January 31, 2003 07:42:01 AM newthere is a woman on trial who used her Mercedes to run over her husband...three times.
OMG yes, I saw the tape...she was just a mite pissed. Hell has no fury like a woman scorned...[think that's how it goes]
And I agree 100% with what bunni's saying about the major problem in our society today...because it's so true and people are getting fed up.
Click on "Testimony" on right side of article to read from day 1.
There will always be pro gunners & anti gunners. There will always be deaths caused by people misusing firearms, HATCHETS, cars, tobacco, alcohol, DRUGS, knives & "etc".
All the talk in the world will never convert a pro gunner into a anti gunner & vice versa.
Still for all you ANTI GUNNERS, try defending your self against an intruder with a telephone. A:I'm calling the cops! or with your personal firearm,B:Stop or else.
Which do you think will get their attention?
1.) Handguns are small, portable and concealable, thus represent a threat to those who have a right to fear them.
2.) Handguns represent a minority of overall firearms, thus getting them banned would be the first step in the trip to "disarmament."
3.) Overall in the global community, the U.S. has the largest armed populace in the world. If the U.S. is disarmed, so goes the rest of the world.
4.) The private citizens that are in favor of taking guns away are simple minded, mealy mouthed, feel good Utopians.
5.) A government that wants to disarm its citizens, if successful, can do pretty much whatever it chooses because the citizens are powerless to resist. In other words, Communism 101.
6.) Anti gunners are waiting in reserve since our current leadership is more pro gun. But there are more movement afoot to use gun control as a substitute for crime control
7.) Handguns are used for protection more often than they are used to commit violent crimes, and two of every three defensive uses of firearms are carried out with handguns.
8.) Survey research shows that people who use firearms for protection are less likely to be injured during a criminal attack than people who use other means of protection or no protection.
9.) Handguns are used for protection against criminals nearly two million times per year, up to five times more often than to commit crimes.
10.) In America, efforts to ban handguns -- especially those to ban so-called "Saturday Night Specials" -- have historically been aimed at minorities.
11.) Washington, D.C.'s homicide rate more than tripled after the city banned handguns. D.C. consistently has the highest homicide rate among major U.S. cities.
12.) Chicago banned handguns in 1982 and in a decade homicides with handguns more than doubled. Chicago has the fourth highest homicide rate among major U.S. cities.
13.) In a landmark survey, criminologist Gary Kleck found that handguns are used in about 2/3 of 2.5 million annual defensive firearm uses. Analyzing Nat'l Crime Victimization Surveys, Kleck found that people who use firearms to defend themselves are less likely to be attacked or injured than people who use other or no protective methods. Protection method and percents of individuals injured included: gun, 17.4%; knife, 40.3%; other weapon, 22.0%; physical force, 50.8%; tried to get help, frighten offender, 48.9%; threatened/reasoned with offender, 30.7%; nonviolent resistance, including evasion, 34.9%; other, 26.5%; any self-protection, 38.2%; no self-protection, 24.7%. Kleck also found that "at most, 1% of defensive gun uses resulted in the offender taking a gun away from the victim," including instances in which burglars stealing guns from homes are confronted by homeowners armed with other guns.
14.) Handgun ban advocates argue that handguns are the type of firearm more likely to be used in crimes, for example, 51% of homicides in 1999. (FBI, Crime in the United States 1997, pp. 68, 207.) However, guns are used for defense against criminals three to four times more often than they are used to commit crimes. Studies by researchers with a record of anti-gun biases have alleged that handguns (and other firearms) kept for protection against criminals are more likely to be used against family members, but experts have faulted those researchers' methodology. Gary Kleck explains the most serious of the studies' flaws: "(T)he benefit of defensive gun ownership that would be parallel to innocent lives lost to guns would be innocent lives saved by defensive use of guns. As previously noted, less than one in a thousand defensive gun uses involves a criminal being killed." (Kleck, p. 178.) Addressing handgun prohibitionist literature produced by public health activists, civil rights attorney Don B. Kates writes, "(A)nti-gun health advocacy literature is a 'sagecraft' literature in which partisan academic 'sages' prostitute scholarship, systematically inventing, misinterpreting, selecting, or otherwise manipulating data to validate preordained political conclusions.
15.) During the last several decades, most anti-gun groups in the U.S. have generally sought a complete prohibition on handguns only, calling for merely more severe regulation of long guns (rifles and shotguns). Fewer people own handguns than long guns, thus there is a smaller base of opposition to a handgun ban, and handguns are easier to portray negatively, based upon their greater likelihood to be used in crimes, compared to long guns.
16.) In 1989, anti-gun groups placed most of their efforts to ban handguns on hold, temporarily, to pursue a new legislative target of opportunity. The previous year, Josh Sugarmann, leader of a fringe group now called the Violence Policy Center (VPC), known and often rebuked for its irrational positions on firearm issues (see www.nraila.org/research/19990729-RighttoCarry-001.html), had argued to fellow activists that "(T)he issue of handgun restriction consistently remains a non-issue with the vast majority of legislators, the press and public" and that anti-gun groups needed "a new topic in what has become to the press and public an 'old debate.'" Sugarmann then suggested that "Efforts to restrict assault weapons are more likely to succeed than those to restrict handguns" because of the appearance. "The weapons' menacing looks, coupled with the public's confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi automatic assault weapons -- anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun -- can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons." (Emphasis in the original, "Assault Weapons in America," A Joint Project of the Educational Fund to End Handgun Violence and The New Right Watch, pp. 26-27.)
17.) Following the federal "assault weapons" law (Sept. 13, 1994), however, anti-gun efforts refocused on handguns. In the 104th Congress, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) introduced her "Junk Gun Violence Protection Act," modified and reintroduced in the 105th Congress as the "American Handgun Standards Act," and again introduced in the 106th Congress as S. 193. The bills proposed to prohibit the manufacture, in the U.S. of any handgun that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms considers ineligible for importation under 18 U.S.C. sec. 925(d)(3). (The bill in the 104th Congress would have also affected rifles and shotguns.) By regulations adopted by the BATF, a handgun is ineligible for importation if it fails requirements related to length, weight, caliber and other features. (See NRA-ILA "S.
193: Senator Barbara Boxer's 'Junk Guns' Bill" fact sheet.) While Sen. Boxer claimed her bill would prohibit "Junk Guns--also called Saturday Night Specials," the bill would have prohibited many expensive handguns on the basis of the size alone. Testament to the fact that anti-gun groups apply labels to guns arbitrarily, other bills or laws have defined "Saturday Night Specials" on the basis of the melting point of the metals used in a handgun's construction, or on the basis of a variety of a handgun's attributes. During the late 1990s, several California municipalities defied the state's local ordinance preemption law by imposing their own "Saturday Night Special" laws. Concurrently, anti-gun groups and politicians launched campaigns for mandatory inclusion of trigger locks with all handguns sold, or for a ban on the sale of any handgun not possessing an integral "personalized" safety mechanism, and for lawsuits against manufacturers of handguns, alleging them liable for injuries inflicted by criminals using handguns.
posted on January 31, 2003 01:17:43 PM new
Why do think that if you hold the industry responsible that the individual then holds no responsibility ? I never said that nor has anyone else.
But to hold harmless the industry that produces the product is not only ethically wrong, but is improper utilization of the abilities of the actors.
Holding the industry responsible allows the spreading of risk and concentrates the expertise and regulation within the actor most able and likely to carry it out.
posted on January 31, 2003 07:06:09 PM new
No, the industries are not "responsible." Is Jack Daniels responsible for the things people do while they're drunk? Is a car make responsible for fools who drive recklessly or go into road rage and then hurt or kill others?
It's thinking like this that leads to suits like the one against McDonald's--someone gorges themselves until they resemble a bacon hog on fast food, and then has the nerve to blame it on the fast food place. Give me a break!
The "risk" doesn't need to be spread. It should rest squarely on the shoulders of the people who misuse something. By your thinking, if I was to use my Bic lighter to set an arson fire, Bic should then shoulder somne of the responsibility for my actions. Codswallop. Censorship, like charity, should begin at home; but unlike charity, it should end there --Clare Booth Luce
posted on January 31, 2003 07:53:45 PM new
If such were the case then there can be no rationale for making heroin or Extacy illegal. Those who take the drugs must realize the risks.
posted on February 4, 2003 01:19:42 PM new
This is an ageless debate, but the two cases cited in the Wall Street Journal article (original post) are not as on-point as the writer would have it.
The Reinhardt decision is absolutely meaningless. That verdict stands (pending an appeal by a higher court.) What the judge did was edit out references to one work whose credibility had since been questioned, but since judicial opinions are based on case law and statute, not interesting quotes from non-legal literature, the whole thing was simply window dressing.
The South Florida decision is complicated, from a legal standpoint, but it didn't surprise me at all. The trial judge had to resolve a conflict between the jury's earlier decision (that the gun was not defective) and the finding of damages. Florida's law does not provide for a specific cause of action against gun manufacturers, and so the judge had to proceed on the basis of general "gross" negligence, which is a very high standard to meet for a third party.
(For those who don't remember this case, it's the 13-year-old student who shot his teacher and ended up being tried as an adult. This was the civil suit filed by his widow. The jury found the Palm Beach County School Board 45 percent liable for letting the boy onto school grounds after he'd been sent home, assigned 50 percent of the liability to the man who owned the gun and kept it where the boy could find it, and 5 percent of the liability to the gun manufacturer.)
As for the underlying issue ... which really isn't the underlying issue, but it's the one the Journal writer tried to play. I have mixed feelings. I'm pretty strongly in favor of the kind of gun control profe51 talks about, with required education and restrictions on ownership. But I have a bit of a problem using the civil-justice system to get there, and the Grunow case is really troubling. It seems to me that if one jury can send a 13-year-old boy to prison for life for killing a man, another can't refuse to acknowledge that he's at least partially responsible for the death.
At the same time, I have a real problem with current attempts to block off any attempt at litigation by giving gun companies special protection. (which is being considered.)
edited to add: On the third incident posted: According to this story in the New York Daily News, there is NO record that Ronald Dixon was in the process of registering his gun in NYC. And New York's tough gun laws are well-known. Take the exact same facts, and make it his wife or child that he shot ... would you be so willing to defend his illegal gun possession then?
[ edited by msincognito on Feb 4, 2003 01:46 PM ]
posted on February 4, 2003 02:33:52 PM new
Until the courts can reach a strict liability ruling couched in product liability on guns, there is little hope for negligence theory.
The gun industry, including dealers and owners should be held to a strict liability thoery. Then there is no excuses. This would not take any liability away from any criminal actors, but it would make da*mn sure that anyone possessing a gun would be very careful how it was stored and who had access to it, and who it is sold to.
posted on February 4, 2003 04:53:54 PM newREAMOND I'm intrigued by strict liability because it would put the gun industry on the hook to keep their products out of dangerous hands. But you could never enforce it without also having strict, uniform gun-registration laws or an "out" for companies (like being free from liability if they put specific safety devices on their guns.) And it couldn't apply to guns already in circulation .... there are already at least 192 million guns in the United States, enough to shoot every American at least once without reloading. That doesn't mean it wouldn't be worth trying especially if it got more guns registered.
At any rate, I'd be perfectly happy with anything that reduces the ease with which anyone obtains guns in this society. People keep bringing up Washington D.C.'s murder rate - as if there's no other factor besides the strictness of the gun laws - but the truth is that overall, areas with tighter gun control laws tend to have a lower rate of gun violence.
posted on February 4, 2003 05:06:32 PM new
There was offered a national database for guns through the computer check system, but the NRA killed a national database. It would be easy to do.
The caveat would be that anytime time a gun changed hands it would have to be reported, even if sold by a private owner. Failure to properly register and report transfer of possession/ownership would be a crime. We do it with cars already and there are national databases for car serial numbers tracing ownership, collison/flood damage etc. We do it for cars we can do it for guns. It is harder to get fireworks than a firearm in this country.
Once it is established who owns a gun, responsibility for them getting into the wrong hands can be established and strict liability applied. Once a firearm is properly sold and registered through a dealer, the gun producer/importer is off the hook.
If the dealer improperly transfers the gun, the dealer and producer are liable. If the dealer fails to report a gun missing/stolen within 72 hours, they are liable. It is little different than users of dynamite are held to.
You would be surprised what can be done when financial assets are on the line.
Edited to add: Every firearm was once legally produced and possessed. At some point in the stream of commerce firearm are diverted from a legal possessor to a criminal or nut case. New York found its criminal firearms were streaming in from Virginia due to lax gun controls and Virginia being flooded with cheap handguns.
It would also be possible to register all ammunition through "tagants" in the powder, and being in the powder would also allow tracing of those that load their own ammo. The tagants actually can identify down to the bullet if we want it too. However, those involved in some highly suspect shootings do not want tagants used, including some police forces. For some reason many groups do not want law enforcement to know to a person who bought the ammunition.
[ edited by REAMOND on Feb 4, 2003 05:15 PM ]
posted on February 4, 2003 05:18:13 PM new
"There was offered a national database for guns through the computer check system, but the NRA killed a national database. It would be easy to do."
So what your saying is your pro Fascist Government? There is no way a nation database for guns will ever be a reality. It would be the biggest step to "Big Brother" our country ever made.
Hold the gun user responsible. That's it.
You've heard all the "guns don't kill people kill" stuff I'm sure. People have to be held responsible for what they do. Using a product in a way it wasn't intended isn't an excuse. If someone is that stupid they should be put in an institute.
We've become a nation that not only forgives but rewards stupidity.
posted on February 4, 2003 05:28:02 PM newSo what your saying is your pro Fascist Government
Registering personal property with the government isn't Fascist. We do it with cars and realestate and have for over a century. It is more likely that you can trace a car used in a drive by shooting,even if it is stolen, than you can the gun used in the shooting.
People have to be held responsible for what they do
Absolutely right, and that responsibilty also includes the firearm industry, including dealers and private sellers.
We would be up in arms if anyone sold dynamite to a nut case or criminal and there would be criminal and civil liability too, yet firearms are sold to criminals and nut cases everyday and we refuse to demand proper records be kept and to civiliiy or criminally punish those who facilitated the transfers to the nuts and criminals.
posted on February 4, 2003 05:29:09 PM new There was offered a national database for guns through the computer check system, but the NRA killed a national database. It would be easy to do. The caveat would be that anytime time a gun changed hands it would have to be reported, even if sold by a private owner. Failure to properly register and report transfer of possession/ownership would be a crime. We do it with cars already and there are national databases for car serial numbers tracing ownership, collison/flood damage etc. We do it for cars we can do it for guns. It is harder to get fireworks than a firearm in this country.
Why not just declare the U.S. a communist state & take away the rest of our rights.
Ask any Canadian, Brit or Australian about their gun control.
Any form of gun registration is the beginning of the demise of free Americans.
posted on February 4, 2003 06:33:49 PM new
REAMOND, YOUR ANALOGIES FOR MAKING THE SELLER AND/OR THE MANUFATURER RESPONSIBLE JUST DON'T HOLD WATER.
CAR MANUFACTURERS ARE NOT HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR HIT AND RUNS... KNIFE MANUFACUTRERS ARE NOT HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR STABBINGS...CHEMICAL MANUFACTURERS ARE NOT HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR POISONINGS... AND SO ON...
YES GUNS WERE ORIGINALLY PRODUCED TO KILL HUMANS, WELL HANDGUNS, LONG GUNS ARE FOR HUNTING, BUT THIS COUNTRY WAS BUILT ON THE OWNERSHIP OF FIREARMS OF ALL TYPES AND JUST BECAUSE SOME PERSON KILLS ANOTHER WITH A GUN, IT IS NOT THE MANUFACTURERS RESPONSIBILITY...
NO WAY NO HOW...
MY HANDGUNS ARE NOT REGISTERED WITH ANYONE, NOR DO I INTEND THEM TO EVER BE, IF THAT MAKES ME A CRIMINAL, THEN SO BE IT, BUT THAT IS MY CHOICE...
...AND THAT ARTICLE IS A PERFECT EXAMPLE WHY GUNS ARE IMPORTANT, IT MAY NOT HAVE A BEEN A LOST NEIGHBOR BANGING ON THE DOOR, HE SHOULD NOT HAVE OPENED IT, BUT CURIOSITY GETS THE BEST OF PEOPLE SOMETIMES.
I AM CURIOUS AS TO THE FOLLOW UP, WHAT WERE THE FINDINGS ON THE BLOOD? WAS THE INTRUDER HIGH ON SOMETHING?
AIN'T LIFE GRAND...
[ edited by Twelvepole on Feb 4, 2003 06:34 PM ]
posted on February 4, 2003 06:57:00 PM new
Chemical manufacturers are held strictly liable for some of the chemical they make.
I don't know why you keep mentioning car makers. Cars were not made to kill people. BUT cars are more regulated and registered than firearms. Cars were first licensed and registered due to crime being committed with them. Fully automatic firearms are also registered and heavily monitored. All guns should be as heavily monitored as fully automatic weapons.
My analogies do hold water. The problem with your side of the argument is that you are inconsistent. You wish to hold criminal responsible but not the aiders an abetors that placed the criminal instrument into their hands.
Irresponsible gun owners, sellers, and manufacturers should be held accountable, just as their criminal or negligent counter parts are. Unregistered guns should be regarded the same as criminal tools and confiscated and criminal charges launched against the possessor.
If I gave the keys to my car to a drunk, or nut, or minor, and they harmed someone, I would be civily liable just as the operator would be, and more so for the minor.
Applying liability to the gun industry including private owners is not a new concept of tort, but one that has been neglected until recently.
It is just a matter of time. People are fed up with the death and mayhem that the gun industry has unleashed on our cities.
posted on February 4, 2003 07:39:01 PM newOh to live the idealogical life where all firearms are registered. Hell while your at it why not regulate the distribution & use of toilet paper. You need a licence to flush.
The solution isn't in more regulations & laws, but the common sense enforcement of the current laws.
posted on February 4, 2003 07:56:21 PM new
Guns are not made to kill people. They are made for hunting and protection.
Your the one that's raving about the killer gun.
How about everything else. Especially automobiles and trucks? More deaths each and every year than guns. They, by the way are made for transportation, not for killing.
I agree that if someone is caught with a fire arm in the commission of a crime he or she should be shot or given the Maximum sentence.
I was a Federal gun dealer years ago. It cost me a whole $20., filed out a form and got my license in the mail. Oh by the way. I could buy and sell fully automatic weapons right here in New York State.
If you think for a moment a fully automatic weapon is hard to come by. Your greatly mistaken. Still a ton of semi auto (AK's and the likes) being manufacture. Most are imported from China. For each one that's around, every make and model, someone is making selector switch kits that will make them fully automatic. Usually the only machine work that's needs to be done, can be done with a common file.
I hope that makes you sleep better.
Oh yes, while you worry about that, think of those poor misunderstood Muslim radicals that are planning your demise anyway.
Amen,
Reverend Colin
posted on February 4, 2003 09:45:02 PM new
"Common sense" tells us that firearms should be more regulated than automobiles. I have to wonder what the motivation is of a law abiding gun owner that is against registering and taking responsibility for their firearms. It almost seems that they all have in the back of their mind using their weapons to showhow commit a crime such as murder, and because their firearm isn't registered, they'll get away with it.
Cars have been heavily regulated for nearly a century and the government hasn't tried to cofiscate them. Same with telephones. In fact, cars and telephones are used in a lot of crimes and the government has yet to confiscate cars and telephones.
This constant whinning against gun registration and responsibile ownership and sales lacks sound reason and rings empty to even the most irrational mind.
[ edited by reamond on Feb 4, 2003 09:46 PM ]
posted on February 5, 2003 05:47:07 AM new
EVER WATCH RED DAWN REAMOND?
HOW DID THE INVADERS FIND WHO HAD WEAPONS.... BY GOING DOWN AND LOOKING THROUGH THE REGISTRATION PAPERS... THAT IS MY MOTIVATION... THE GOVERNMENT DOES NOT NEED TO KNOW EVERYTHING I OWN...
MATTER OF FACT YOU DON'T NEED TO KNOW EVERYTHING I OWN AND THAT IS WHAT REGISTRATION DOES.
CARS ARE REGISTERED FOR TAX AND FEE PURPOSES AND THAT IS THE ONLY REASON, THERE IS NO FEES OR TAXES ON MOST GUNS, JUST THE MACHINE GUN TYPES.
BUT WITH PEOPLE LIKE YOU AROUND, ONE DAY MOST OF AMERICA WILL ONCE AGAIN BE CRIMMINALS, JUST LIKE IN THE PROHIBITION DAYS... NOW WON'T THAT BE GRAND
posted on February 5, 2003 07:28:47 AM new
Once you start registration of firearms, what comes next, steak knives, baseball bats, I know, lets go for the weed eaters, they have been known to whack people. Or have a special registration for liberal anti gunners, they pose a danger to law abiding gun owners.
Automobles are registered for the primary purpose of taxation, that is all.
posted on February 5, 2003 07:31:15 AM newI have to wonder what the motivation is of a law abiding gun owner that is against registering and take responsibility for their firearms. My motivation is because I believe it's only a first step towards gun control. I don't want that to happen. And, as usual, it's 'get a foot in the door...then advance' the objective. Take away all guns.
When incidents happen the gun owners are already held responsible...more and more recently. If I loan my gun to a neighbor and he kills someone I CAN [and should] be held responsible legally. If I leave my gun availabe so a child can use it...I CAN [and should be] be held responsible legally. It is NOT the gun makers fault that I acted in a stupid manner.
You can't really believe that criminals are going to register their guns. So..there's no need to force any gun owner to register them. I agree with those who state the mantra....the person who uses the gun, not the gun, kills and that person should be held responsible for their actions/decisions.
It is just a matter of time. People are fed up with the death and mayhem that the gun industry has unleashed on our cities. This statement is the one I see as most troubling to you. Regulation will NOT stop the mayhem. Look to DC for that proof. Criminals are not going to register their guns...nor stop using them. IMO, we're returning those who use guns in law breaking ways, back out too soon. So, again, forcing those who aren't using their guns in illegal ways, to register them, makes no sense.
The URL you gave shows how a homeowner, defending his family and his home, who killed an intruder. That's why most people want to own a gun...others want them for sport. [hunting, target practice, skeet shooting, etc.] Yes, it appears the intruder barged into the wrong home. Was he drunk? He had a keg in his truck. To me, even if the guy thought it was his house, he would have known it wasn't when the homeowner opened the door and he saw a stranger standing there. [Rather than someone else who might live in his own home] The homeowner is scared and protecting his family from an intruder. The intruder was the one at fault, albeit by mistake, not the homeowner, imo.
posted on February 5, 2003 11:26:19 AM newREAMOND, thanks for the explanation on strict liability. I can see how it would work.
I don't see how guns became such a flashpoint for personal freedom in this country. The intent of the 2nd Amendment is not at all clear as it applies to personal weapons use ... the entire amendment says: "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." (Apparently the founding fathers were not that big on grammar.) The intent of the amendment was to preserve states' rights by allowing them to maintain militias, potentially to counter the "threat" of a standing federal army.
It's also ironic that the people who are foaming at the mouth about their "gun rights" and how this is becoming a Communist country utter nary a peep when Microsoft hard-wires their computer drives to allow remote monitoring, and Attorney General Ashcroft and President Bush hand over the ability to spy on U.S. citizens without any warrant, notice or justification to a convicted felon (Gen. Poindexter.)
Finally, on the issue of guns as a valid means of self-defense: They ain't. Any informed expert on self-defense will tell you you're far better off with a few baseball bats scattered around the house than with any type of firearm, and/or even the most basic home-defense training. In the hands of somebody who knows what they're doing, anything can be an effective defensive weapon. And a gun is one of the few "home defense" weapons that's more likely to be used against a resident of the home where the gun is located than against an intruder - 22 times more likely, according to a 1998 study in the Journal of Trauma. (Admittedly, that includes domestic-violence shootings, but arguably many of those deaths would not have occured had there not been a gun in the house.) As for accidental shootings ... has anyone ever heard of a baseball bat "accidentally going off while it was being cleaned?"
posted on February 5, 2003 12:13:18 PM newMy motivation is because I believe it's only a first step towards gun control
That is exactly what I am advocating- the control of firearms. It is the lack of control of firearms that is allowing them to fall into the wrong hands.
I don't expect criminals to register their guns, but with universal strict registration and sales tracking we will find out the point where legally possessed weapons are falling into the hands of criminals. As I said before, a firearm that is leagally produced and owned at some point falls into the hands of criminals and nuts. Why do you think gun dealers and some private gun owners do not want this information known ? because it would implicate them !
Cars were not registered for tax purposes. They were initially registered due to crimes being committed with them. Cars were around and registered and licensed before there was an income tax or a tax on autos.
Have I ever seen Red Dawn ? Sure have. But why on earth would a thinking adult base a national policy on a fictional movie ? Have you ever seen a Three Stooges movie ? Did you know that you can hit people with hammers and wrenches and it really doesn't harm them and it makes neat noises? I hope you're not serious.
Hell has no fury like a woman scorned...[think that's how it goes]
especially if it got more guns registered.