One of the most important aspects of legal argument and writing is the sources one cites in suppor of such an argument. This man is permitted to teach law students.

So if I can find a paper that claims Reynolds blows goats when Boortz is through with them…

No. That would be wrong.

I wonder if Boortz would support my right to carry an explosive device at all times because a bad guy might have an explosive device and if he has one and I don’t something bad might happen.

I don’t really have anything to say that I haven’t said before.

Nu and Impr00ved Glenn Reynolds!

I don’t really have anything to say.

It’s not fair to hold conservatives to the same standards we expect ourselves to live up to.

They are just not equipped, morally, mentally or physically, for such a strenuous lifeway.

Hopefully, any minute now, Saul or someone equally mentally challeneged will show up to prove my point.

Is there some way we can sequester the Reichtards into their own seperate events? Like they do with the Special Olympics?

Hopefully, any minute now, Saul or someone equally mentally challeneged will show up to prove my point.

I can’t believe I wrote that either. I’m going to claim sarcasm.

Why is anyone surprised that Barak Obama is shooting people in malls? He is after all a jihadist trained in Indonesia. I saw it on a videotape by those people who helped that innocent Dumond guy get out of jail.

I’m amazed every time I hear that someone listens to Boortz voluntarily. O’Reilly and Hannity are vile, bottom-feeding demagogues–but at least they’ve got style, and a modicum of charisma. Even Glenn Beck has a kind of waxen good looks; if you mute the TV and let your eyes go out of focus, he’s not even that objectionable.

Neal Boortz, on the other hand, is the deranged love child of Grover Norquist and the crotchety old lady from those Shoebox cards.

Evidence regarding survey:
http://johnrlott.tripod.com/surveysupport.html

Responses from the authors who published the paper with the pretty trivial coding errors
http://johnrlott.tripod.com/link3.html
http://johnrlott.tripod.com/postsbyday/6-9-03.html

Problems with relying on some of the sources that you rely on:
http://doubletap.cs.umd.edu/WikipediaStudy/namecalling.htm

Levitt case
http://johnrlott.tripod.com/uploaded_images/LevittCorrection-735079.jpg
http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/2007/08/steve-levitts-correction-letter.html

Whoa, hold on. We need to sue the company on whose premises one was shot by a random nutjob, but it’s morally and legally wrong to sue the company that armed the random nutjob? It seems to me, as they say, that the mall is no more legally culpable than the gun seller or manufacturer.

I presume without fear of contradiction that Ol’ Perfesser would not approve of lawsuits against the company which manufactured an item someone has used to murder people. Which is a defensible position. But he’s just proposed lawsuits against a company that forbade the murderer from bringing the weapon onto their property specifically because they have rules that say weapons are not allowed on their property.

Is he, you know, *high*?

I’m surprised Boortz didn’t blame teachers for the shooting.

I think it’s appropriate to cite this information that Reynolds blows goats when Boortz is through with them.

Is there some way we can sequester the Reichtards into their own seperate events? Like they do with the Special Olympics?

They’re doing it all by themselves.

Interestingly, Reynolds does not provide a link with this statement: The pattern of mass shootings in “gun free” zones is well-established at this point. I am wondering if there is any body of data that establishes any such thing. Are mass shootings more common in “gun free” zones than in (what’s the opposite — “guns welcome” zones? Are there any of those?)?

Are mass shootings more common in “gun free” zones than in (what’s the opposite — “guns welcome” zones? Are there any of those?)?

Dan Someone, I believe so.
Appomattox, Deadwood, Tombstone. Ypres. Normandy.
Most recently, Fallujah and Baghdad, to name a few.

The pattern of mass shootings in “gun free” zones is well-established at this point, and I don’t see why places that take the affirmative step of forcing their law-abiding patrons to go unarmed should get off scot-free.

Is “scot-free” a legal term of art in Tennessee?

A few months ago Ogged put up a “When Did You Realize Ye Ole Professor Was a Right-Wing Hack?” post at Unfogged. I found the discussion entertaining and enlightening.

Do any of these people even comprehend what a gun is?

Countdown to the return of Larry the Troll and his barking at us about ROE.

This just proves that Reynolds does not understand how rights work. If the Constitution really does guarantee an individual right to bear arms then it DOES NOT MATTER if guns make us safe or not. Mall shootings, personal safety, none of that matters. RIGHTS don’t depend on such things.

We have the right to free speech and IT DOES NOT MATTER if that speech is Thomas Paine-like in its political eloquence or Jenna Jameson doing a roomful of guys. A right is a right.

This is why these fucking idiots don’t understand that torture is wrong, EVEN WHEN IT IS EVIL BROWN PEOPLE BEING TORTURED! It is still against their rights.

J—, I had forgotten all about Larry. It was nice while it lasted. Since revisiting that thread, I have been working on ungritting my teeth.

The pattern of mass shootings in “gun free” zones is well-established at this point, and I don’t see why places that take the affirmative step of forcing their law-abiding patrons to go unarmed should get off scot-free.

Hm…let’s think about this:

“Mass shootings” = “shooting a whole lot of people”.

Let’s assume that, by neccessity, “mass shooters” specifically target locations where a whole lot of people gather.

The pattern of pickpockets and common thieves in “whole lot of people” zones is well established.

Assuming a concealed carry law, law-abiding, armed patrons are just as likely to be targeted by pickpokets and common thieves as anyone else.

The possible results of that targeting are
A) somebody gets shot
B) a common thief gets his hands on a gun that can’t be traced
C) some combination of the two

Is it possible, then, that the owners of these locations might be more concerned about adding GUNS into the mix of “normal, everyday bad things that tend to occur in crowded places” than they would be about the, what, 2, maybe 3 “mass shootings” across the country each year?

Naaaah. It’s the damn, gun-hating liberals, same as always.

What evidence, one might fairly ask, would it take to convince a Glenn Reynolds that his ennobled teenage stubbornnesses, worn like a jaunty hat atop his natural camouflage of dockers and Tenessee-poly-blend sports shirts, are not made out of ‘objective scientific evidence?’ Science itself has proven powerless.

If I were not a good progressive, I would suggest conducting an experiment involving medium-velocity introduction of a 2×4 to Glenn Reynolds’ jaunty-hat-wearing region, to be repeated as needed. But, alas, I am old enough and smart enough to know that violence is not a good teaching tool, even though contemplation of such violence can be a soothing stress reliever…

An armed society is a polite society — ask any Iraqi!

Glennbot, Lott the Lesser, and their fellow gun-worshippers are confusing a tool with an icon. Whatever one’s personal opinions about their use and ownership, guns are TOOLS, like chainsaws or power snowblowers. Not everybody needs to own a chainsaw or a snowblower or a gun, and even those individuals who do have a use for them don’t need to carry them around 24/7 or distribute multiple chainsaws around their households. A gun is not a civic icon, like a voter registration card, or a driver’s license, or a Bible; possessing one or more guns doesn’t indicate one’s status as an adult in good standing. And wearing one like a scapular or a temple garment will not provide protection against ill-intentioned individuals, bad financial choices, impure thoughts, or vaguely-conceived Doubleplusungood Unpersons.

I love this quote:

“Perhaps we need legislation. If it saves just one life, it’s worth it.”

Do you suppose he holds this standard for any other laws?

While we’re at it, let’s make it OK for patrons of banks and 7-Elevens to carry guns too. I’m sure nothing bad will come of that.

I salute Boortz for his readiness to dispence with such bourgois nonsense like property rights.

I do not follow the news all that keenly, but the last mass killing in my state was by some deranged guy shooting girls in Amish private elementary school Imagine how different this tragedy would be if the little tykes were allowed to pack heat.

And now consider universities. Clearly, it is sooo convenient for professors to have students disarmed when they return tests graded F. Because they are such cowards, every 20 years or so we have a massive tragedy.

To see that this is arrant nonsense, consider that there are very few true gun free zones, perhaps federal buildings and some highschools, plus airports. I seriously doubt that shopping malls in Nebraska and Utah have prominent displays urging shoppers armed with concealed weapons to go back to their cars and return without weapons. I read about patrons being ejected for an unpatriotic T-shirt, but for a concealed weapon? Unlike T-shirts, they are, well, concealed, and there is no patting on the entrance or X-rays. Unlike in Israeli shopping malls where they got shootouts under control.

Lott’s apparently-nonexistent data for the apparently-fraudulent 1997 survey was ‘lost in a computer crash’ when a bookshelf ‘fell on his computer.’

Aw man. I can sympathize. The exact same thing happened to the computer that held all the data I gathered from 5,000 goats, 74.9% of which answered in the affirmative when I asked if they’d ever been orally stimulated by John Lott.

Do any of these people even comprehend what a gun is?

They think its a magic wand that makes everything perfect 4eva. You can try to tell them otherwise but they’ll just sulk.

* he almost certainly fabricated a mysterious survey and certainly behaved unethically in making claims for which he had no supporting data
* he presented results purporting to show that “more guns” led to “less crime” when those results were the product of coding errors
* he pretended to be a woman called “Mary Rosh” on the internet in order to praise his own research and accuse his critics of fraud.
* he probably was the person who anonymously accused Steve Levitt of being “rabidly antigun” [to Glenn Reynolds, as published in a National Review piece by Reynolds]

Also, he apparently plucks his eyebrows.

Shalom gentlemen.

The bottom line is, where there are more law-abiding citizens carrying guns there is less violent crime. Consider two areas of the Country with roughly the same number of people Washington D.C. and South Dakota both with 600,000 people. D.C. doesn’t allow law-abiding citizens to carry or possess firearms and it has the highest homicide rate in the nation because only criminals have firearms. In South Dakota however, all law-abiding citizens are allowed to own and carry firearms either open or concealed and South Dakota has one of the lowest violent crime rates in the Nation. John Lott’s excellent book “More Guns Less Crime” definately hit the nail on the head.

Gavin, you gotta warn people about pics like that. I already read this post before the pic was added, came back later, and it literally gave me a brief scare. Made my heart skip a beat.

Of course we need more armed civilians. Because amateurs trying to shoot a nutjob on a killing spree couldn’t possibly miss the (original) shooter & hit someone else. Nor could the police, when they arrive on the scene, killt someone waving a gun around, only to find later that it was a civilian trying to do the police’s job.

Imagine Virginia Tech: You hear shots fired, get your heater out, stick your head out the classroom door, & see someone else w/ a gun sticking their head out of their classroom. Do you plug them? Do they plug you? Do you say, “Hey, are you the nut shooting people?” Do you take their word if they say, “No, really, I’m not.”?

And if Perfessor Cornpone thinks “Gun Welcome Zones” will somehow act as a deterrent, does he not realize most of these nutjobs are not expecting to go down to the mall & shoot until they’re out of rounds, walk out unharmed, go home & watch it all on the tee vee? These are suicidal people, Prof. They want to die. They proably can’t be deterred, certainly not by the possibility that someone else may have a gun.

I think we do need profiling though. Everyone should have a check-up from the neck-up, receive a color-coded card, & have to show it to get into any public area. If you’re considered a risk, you have to be frisked. Special attention should be paid, it goes w/o saying, to Anglo males, especially teen-aged & middle-aged ones w/ crummy jobs. If any of them have recently lost jobs or sex partners, they should probably just stay home.

I anxiously await Mrs. Malkin’s next “I am John Doe, & I am watching you, crazy middled-aged white guy” posting. (Isn’t Mr. Malkin on some sort of disability for mental problems? And doesn’t he have a history of unprovoked violent rage? Safety begins at home, Michelle.)

Awesome display of logic there, Saul. And I’m glad you overlooked the huge differences in population density between your two ‘analogous’ “areas”. Cuz that, among many other factors, totally has nothing to do with it.

Okay, as a European, I don’t really understand.. Why would a person think ” I’m going to out shopping to the mall.. have I got everything I need? Car keys.. yup. Wallet? yup. Credit cards? yup. handgun? oohh, cant leave the house without THAT now can I?

When did it become a civic obligation to carry around lethal weapons? Because obviously, death and destruction are a natural part of a shopping trip?

The bottom line is, States with higher levels of civilian gunownership such as the States in the South, Midwest and the West have much less violent crime rates per capita then the liberal States in the Northeast and the Coastal areas. Criminals know better in the Heartland than to burglarize a house or attempt a robbery, they know they will be leaving in a bodybag if they try anything. In the liberal areas it is the opposite because the gun laws are draconian and only evil people can own guns. Here in the Heartland we shoot criminals dead in their tracks which is the way it ought to be.

By the way, I applaud the law-abiding homeowner in Houston Texas who shot and killed those two illegal alien drug-dealers who were trying to burglarize his neighors house. I would have done exactly the same thing, where law-abiding citizens are armed, there justice is served.

Guns are lacivious phallic symbols to these guys, having one tucked in your pants makes the other gun just as hard and powerful (in their dreams anyway). I’ve shot the type of rifle the killer used, and anyone who thinks they have a chance against an SKS and the element of surprise with their little waistband gun has watched way, way too much 24 (or whatever gun masturbation is on the teevee these days). But I guess that was a redundant analogy, wasn’t it?

Bye Saul.

The bottom line is, you liberals are anti-Constitution and anti-American.

The pattern of mass shootings in “gun free” zones is well-established at this point.

I’m wondering what “gun-free zone” means. I’d like to think that even in the glorious border state of Tennessee, it means most places where humans congregate, excepting of course target-practice sites and such. If so, wouldn’t that logically be the most likely place, excluding war zones, where mass shootings would occur?

I don’t see why places that take the affirmative step of forcing their law-abiding patrons to go unarmed should get off scot-free.

Let me parse this sentence for just a moment. The “affirmative” step of “forcing” their law-abiding patrons to “go unarmed”? Blegh? Like mall cops confiscate firearms at the Baskin-Robbins and Pottery Barn entrances and by noon have huge wire baskets full of AK-47s and .37 magnums and Nancy Reagan-style petit-point pistols or what have you (I know nothing from firearms)? WTF? So the disturbed teen, who apparently no one suspected of being capable of such a thing, who enters the mall armed and kills people should not be disarmed; or the good law-abiding “others” who naturally carry heat wherever they go should not be disarmed, because then they wouldn’t have their assault rifles to take out the disturbed teen who also was armed? Or what?

Just for the record, the malls in Tennessee, as far as I know, are perfectly safe “gun-free zones,” although I avoid them anyway for general mental-health reasons, as any sane person anywhere should. But I’m just more than a little weary of trying to defend my corner of the world, which can be quite beautiful and liveable, against the constant, odious stereotype promulgations of dipshits such as Instapudding® and Bill Frist and Lamar Alexander and Freddy Thompson, and good Lord looky there, it’s way past cocktail hour, praise Jesus.

Well, Random Id, you Euros just don’t get it. Our great American tradition of “getting it ourselves” (up to & including entire central sections of continents) means that we take responsibilty for our self-defense, whether against marauding red-skins who happen to be on our land, or Muslims at the mall. Death & destruction are a natural part of American life, not just our shopping trips.

Your European central governments, denying you the rights we have granted ourselves at the barrel of a gun, & relying on our largesse for your defense against the godless Eastern hordes, have turned you into pathetic weaklings who will soon be under the thumb of the Islamofascists. Then you’ll understand, but it will be too late for you.

Too many puppies are being shot in the dark.
Too many puppies are trained not to bark.
At the sight of blood that must be spilled so that
We may maintain our oil fields.
Too many puppies
Too many puppies are taught to heal.
Too many puppies are trained to kill.
On the command of men wearing money belts that buy
mistresses sleek animal pelts.
Too many puppies.

Too many puppies with guns in their hands.
Too many puppies in foreign lands.
Are dressed up sharp in suits of green and
Placed upon the war machine.
Too many puppies are just like me.
Too many puppies are afraid to see.
The visions of the past brought to life again,
Too many puppies, too many dead men.

The bottom line is, if law-abiding citizens were allowed to carry guns into that mall, that massacre would not have taken place. The shooter would have been rightfully shot dead in his tracks.

The islamofascists? So first comes the takeaway curry restaurants, then comes the final solution?

Okay, fine by me, as long as the jihhad is heavy on the jeera and chilli, and comes with a side of popadums and paneer.

The bottom line is, if European Jews were allowed to own firearms in the 1930s and 40s the holocaust would not have taken place. The Gestapo thugs would have been shot dead in the streets and my people would not have experienced the murder of 6 million of thier own. Gun control works all right, just ask Hitler, it worked in preventing the Jews from defending themselves and allowed the holocaust to happen. If the Jews had been allowed to own guns Hitler would have been immediately removed from power and 6 million Jews would not have been murdered.

The bottom line is, the minimum age for concealed handgun carry should be 3. If a toddler in FAO Schwarz had been packing, none of this would have happened.

MzNicky, here’s how it work in WingyWorld:

An unpleasant, unforeseeable event occurs. Normal people think “God, that sucks,” and “Oh, those poor people must have been frightend,” and “What a dreadful thing to happen and right before the holidays,” or what have you. But the inhabitants of WingyWorld are born without empathy so they don’t have to waste time with any of that sissy feeling sorry for others crap. In addition, where you have a space in your head that is reserved for empathy, the WingyWorlders have a big solid node of pants-soaking fear.

They view this unpleasant, unforeseeable event and think “OMG, I go to the mall, that could have been me! I’m in danger! Why isn’t someone trying to protect me??”

(Did I mention the WWs are more self-absorbed than a bus load of pop stars?)

So the WingyWorlder gets mad because he’s had a scare and he looks around for someone to punish but his choices are limited because he doesn’t want to say anything that might make him look like a … liberal … so that leaves the gun makers out. But the mall owners, can’t find any talking points that say mall owners are good, so it’s OK to attack them.

Some might be interested in this data.

So lets see if I have this right.. Being a right wing american means suffering from crippling paranoia, whilst investing a lot of your ego in pretending to be a tough guy? You know, in most countries, people like that get sent to therapy, not elected.

And of course, to be a troll like saul, you have to be unable to see the inevitable result of a war between a million or two of jews armed with whatever they can manage to buy, and the entire armed forces of the third reich, who were somehow powerful enough to conquer most of continental europe…. Yeah, i can really see that one resulting in a win for democracy and freedom..

And of course, to be a troll like saul,

Don’t try to understand our wingnuts. You can’t, because neither can we. Also, Saul isn’t an American. He’s a hired netvocate operating out of Bangalore.

The bottom line is, the holocaust would not have happened if European Jews had owned firearms.

It’s so far beyond stupid, they are going to have to invent a new word, like megastupidfragilisticexpialidocious. Or something.

I have carried weapons, not just handguns but, oh, a grenade here and there, a MAC10 on occasion, pipe bombs, short shotguns, all manner of lethal and highly destructive devices.

In the mall. In the restaurant, in the bar, at the movies, I’ve been armed and dangerous in all sorts of places.

And never had any opportunity to stop a mass killing. As high/drunk as I usually was, I’m a VERY good shot and pretty good under fire. But c’mon. If this idiot had any experience, he’d realize that these things happen FAST. It’s not easy to determine where the fire is coming from, and tactical doctrine requires that you find solid cover, get the civilians clear of the threat, locate the target and maneuver to attack, all before you can engage.

Frankly, the only real, serious exchange of fire in a public space in America I’ve ever been involved in, was a very rough bar on Francisco Blvd in San Rafael in 1973. If you lived there then, you know the one. Yep.

Close to a hundred rounds got fired among maybe eight guys. I was really drunk and very high on LSD and ran through the 18 rounds of .357 I had from behind the end of the bar laughing my ass off.

Exactly NOBODY got hit. When the cops finally came in, everybody was gone. It was more fun and funny than anything else. I’m pretty sure it’s a bad idea to think you can engage a spree killer. He’s gonna flip his switch when he’s done anyway, you’re not gonna save any lives…

mikey

Okay, so if the wingnut blog-troll falls into the “doesn’t pass the Turing test” category, what about the people that post these articles in the first place?
It seems clinical insanity and the scariest eyebrows I have ever seen do not disqualify a person from seriously advocating a constant state of cold war between armed shoppers eyeing eachother with malice, prepared to fight to the death over discounted Whatevers.

I really do wonder if republicans realise that for every good bush voter with a concealed carry permit, there is a stoned hippy nam veteran like mickey with a grenade carefully stored down his Y fronts.

That cant be very reassuring for all these weirdos that have some kind of hard on for a re enactment of the american civil war…

Hey mikey — I know everyone keeps telling you to write a blog (as if you didn’t have one) but I’d like to propose a different course of action. I think you ought to run for high public office (in every sense of the phrase) on the gonzo ticket as a stealth candidate. Wouldn’t that just flip the wingers’ shit on some level?

C’mon, Mortician. The Oppo research on me would be hilarious, sure, and it would be kinda cool ’cause I’m sure they’d find a bunch of shit I’ve forgotten, but when they got through combing thru my past I couldn’t VOLUNTEER for dogcatcher…

mikey

I don’t understand how this man is still employed in any professional capacity. Wtf? That is SCARY.

Mikey for preznit!

I’m on board. Just think of the campaign slogans!

It does make me wonder if I had the time and discipline to actually write regular blog posts, I might be able to live a life of ridiculous leisure.

Oh wait. Never mind…

mikey

Well, everytime I hear someone imagine how it would go down if someone armed had been at the scene of one of these killings, I always remember my friend who had a concealed-carry permit, and liked to brag about it, too.

We were working some long days, and he had a couple beers at dinner break. When he came back to work, he got into a dispute over a parking space with another driver in the street nearby, and one thing led to another and he pulled out his gun.

He got the parking space, but what he didn’t know was that the other driver also worked at the theatre, and when he recognized him in the hallway, he told management. So my friend ended up being taken off the job and disciplined by the union for conduct unbecoming a member.

For some reason, I can really imagine guys like Ace or Gun-counter Gomer in that scenario a lot easier than I can imagine them saving the day.

I think I want Bimler – er, Clyde, for my campaign manager.

Some weird overeducated germanic from New fuckin Zealand of all places, in town on the political management visa, engaging the peeps in retail politics.

Bimler: Vote for mikey!

Person: No! Are you outta yer mind?

Bimler: Have another akavit. Now, vote for mikey!

Person: Um, geez, I dunno, that dood kinda scares me.

Bimler: Have another akavit. Now, vote for mike!

Person: Right ON!, mofo, I’ll vote for his ass!

We only need to raise a few million to buy akavit. We’ll win for sure.

And our long national hangover will only last a day. Ok, maybe two…

mikey

Hey, better than a national hangover that has lasted 7 years and counting..

I think I want Bimler – er, Clyde, for my campaign manager.

I’m only mildly put out by this. Could I at least volunteer to be, oh I dunno, maybe activities director?

And as for the oppo research — fuck ’em. Forewarned is forearmed. Or forearmed is foreskinned. Or something.

a stoned hippy nam veteran like mickey with a grenade carefully stored down his Y fronts.

I’m sure he does, squire, I’m sure he does…

Hey, Mikey, can I be your spokescat?

If Lott’s blog is a reflection of how he teaches, he deserves to be fired. Gah, that blog is full of ridiculous generalizations and bizarre observations. (Apparently he listens to Limbaugh, too.)

Judging from Lott’s very carefully scrubbed Wikipedia article, he’s one of the world’s leading authorities on pretty much everything.

…his research interests include econometrics, law and economics, public choice theory, industrial organization, public finance, microeconomics, and environmental regulation… In terms of total academic journal output from 1990 to 2000, John Lott ranks 26th worldwide among economists, and in terms of citations in the same period, he ranks 86th… He has published over 90 articles in peer-reviewed academic journals related to his research areas, and has authored five books… And blah, blah, blah.

There is some mention of controversies, but in the Wikipedia entry these are presented as a few flimsy allegations made by left-wing malcontents.

Yet another example of why I’m wary of Wikipedia.

Oh, hey, Mortician, we’re gonna desperately need somebody who can speak without drooling.

Dana Perino is my model, but she is entirely in the thrall of the night creatures, wearing a human skin she took from the body of a nice lady from Grand Rapids. It’s sad and ugly, and that’s exactly why I think you’re just our guy…

mikey

Hey, Mikey, can I be your spokescat?

I think this is singularly brilliant. Not only is my spokesman a non-human (hey, diversity is GOOD, asshat!), but she’s halfway around the world and in the other hemisphere!

When I refer people to my spokescat, that gives us two-three days to develop a plausible explanation.

For anything…

mikey

Let make a summary of crazyness.

1. Virtually all the media, and I mean you! FoxNews! are in the conspiracy of silence on the issue.

2. The issue is that unbeknownst to the public, virtually all the media and the gun conceiling citizens, malls are “gun free”.

3. Studies conducted in Africa revealed that tribal massacres are less bloody when the tribes involved have access to firearms, as opposed to machetes, axes and other traditional methods. [Hey! It could even be true!]

Serious questions left unaswered: who caliber, muzzle length, number of rounds etc. is necessary to make a difference? I mean, some of those concealed guns are good for pistol whipping but not much else.

My favorite angle: the perspective of bicycling commuters. Every year 5-7 hundreds of bicyclists are killed by drivers, and I have read but one story on a bicyclists who was hit by a car (obviously, not lethally), who subsequently pulled out his gun and killed the driver. Should we encourage bicyclists to carry guns, preferably, in easy reach, like in a pouch hanging on the frame? Drivers would quickly learn that rules like “no passing” “yields” etc include “do not pass bicyclists too” “yield to bicyclists too” etc.

We should use guns to solve a wider variety of problems, nit just mass killing that, frankly, do not kill all that meany people.

When I refer people to my spokescat, that gives us two-three days to develop a plausible explanation.

And even then, your spokescat can wind up batting at the microphone instead of answering the question.

Well, yeah, Mikey, but fvcked up as you may have been, you still thought of the weapons you were carrying as tools. Inappropriate tools, maybe, not well-designed for the job you might have had in mind, but nonetheless just much-improved versions of a chimpanzee’s ant-fishing twig.

The Glennbot, on the other hand, seems to think that his gun is a magical wand that keeps skeeery islamohomosuicidofascists and libruls from laughing at his tiny limp penis, I mean philosophy.

The Nebraska Mall Madman conceived of his weapons as tools to “make the news” and get some tiny snippet of public attention before blowing his own head off. His plan didn’t work as well as he may have hoped because, at approximately the same time, another sad damaged soul was using some road flares to create a “hostage situation” on the other side of the country. But Glenn’s precious gun wouldn’t have made any difference to the poor sap in Nebraska, who already intended to end up dead, although if Glenn is as Differently Ept in person as he is in print he might well have pushed the carnage numbers up quite unintentionally. The NH nutcase, on the other hand, specifically didn’t want anybody, including himself, to suffer physical harm – he wanted help, he wanted to survive, and he was sane enough to understand that a gun was *not* an appropriate tool for the achievement of his goals.

Perhaps we need to re-write the Marines’ “This is my weapon, this is my gun” mantra for the general NRA membership?

“this is my firearm, this is my wanking arm”?

Bimler: Vote for mikey!
Person: No! Are you outta yer mind?
Bimler: OK, look at this spud gun.
……[BOOM]……..
Person: Hey, that’s pretty cool.
Bimler: And during Mikey’s term of office as sheriff dog-catcher town seneschal, every citizen will receive his or her own spud gun!
Person: What about trebuchets?
Bimler: Mikey has undertaken to consult widely with a range of stakeholder groups before formulating his trebuchet policy.

It’s kind of funny. The people who developed the righteous handgun combat doctrine, from Cooper to Weaver to Marshall to Keith to Ayoob are pretty much all wingnuts.

But they understand the tactical necessities and the realities of combat, and give you real-world tools to manage the craziness and reign in your more, er, fantastic imaginings.

I’ve trained at gunsite. I’ve qualified at LFI. I don’t love these guys politically, but they ain’t crazy/stupid like these idiot pundits, for whom they would have exactly NO time.

When they give you a task on the course of fire, they expect you to bring your brain. It’s not a “spray and pray” kind of thing. You are expected, nay, REQUIRED to know where every round is going and why it’s going there, and you bloody well better be prepared to answer the question if you want to still be enrolled in the class tomorrow morning.

Real combat instructors recognize the awesome responsibility that comes with the ability to casually take a life, and make you understand the tactical doctrine you MUST follow to operate armed in American society.

I say again. These people are ALL wingnuts. But they also are real combat shooters, and they know what that means, what that entails, and the responsibilities that come with the title…

mikey

*AHEM*

Good evening. I’d like to address the questions that have arisen around my trebuchet position. I have a brief statement, then I’ll be delighted to take questions.

My Trebuchet policy can be summed up as “Build it/Own it/Use it.

That is, I will not allow, and I will support legislation to prevent, the sale of Trebuchets in our jurisdiction.

However. If you build a Trebuchet, or for that matter any kinetic projectile launcher modeled on medevial siege engines, you are perfectly welcome to own, posses, transport or operate those siege engines to you hearts content. We believe this is well covered in the second, fourth and mumble, mumble amendments to the US constitution.

Thank you. I hope that clears up the whole Trebuchet/Siege Engine issue, and we can move forward to more important issues.

For example, where is the bright line between Salutes and Pipe Bombs?

That is clearly open to debate.

I’ll take questions now..

mikey

Let’s not forget the Boortz.

The truth is that there was really no way to keep a gun out of the hands of this nut job. The only real hope those people had when Hawkins walked into the mall was that there would be someone else there with a gun capable of stopping him. That would have been a security guard or a private citizen with a concealed weapons permit and his gun.

I’m wondering today if the Westroads Mall had a policy of prohibiting people with carry permits from carrying their weapons into the mall, or if there was something in Nebraska’s laws that prohibited same. We’ll try to find out today.

From yesterday’s Nealz Nuze (that’s its real name).

[updated the picture, btw]

Can we haz PeeWee Hermann pixture 2, plz?

This too, also

or maybe this

GASP!

In this picture Lott has eyebrows. The one up top looks like someone took a branding iron and lifted them off.

oh yeah, now if only Lott could be persuaded to adopt G Glitter’s hair style.

Hmmm.

It occurs to me, “more guns = less crime” can be pretty well debunked, because people still fight wars.

“Lott’s apparently-nonexistent data for the apparently-fraudulent 1997 survey was ‘lost in a computer crash’ when a bookshelf ‘fell on his computer.’ None of his alleged assistants or hundreds of survey participants has ever been located.”

…bullshit? Hard drives are fairly resilient, especially ones made after the early-mid 90s. That actual computer itself may have very well been 86’ed, but a simple hard drive swap would bring it back to life in about five minutes worth of work.

I don’t get this. They argue that somehow packing the mall with guns would have made everything better? I’ve never been in actual combat, meself, but I hear that a primary adjective used for them is “confusing”. Knowing who’s doing the shooting, what they’re shooting at, where they’re shooting from, who’s been hit, etc.
I’ve heard a story of an army officer in Vietnam, served two tours, who had learned by the end of his first tour that, when he hears a fire- fight breaking out, he stays off the radio for a good five minutes before asking what’s going on and if they need assistance, because no one knows what the hell IS going on when it just breaks out.

So that’s professional, trained, equipped and organized soldiers. What the fuck makes the gun nuts believe that scattered, terrified (not that the soldiers aren’t, but you see my point) un-trained and disorganized civvies won’t turn into a Spy v. Spy / Reservoir Dogs blood bath of paranoia and reflex?

Can Trebuchets be used to launch the sugar confectionery projectiles of flaming marshmallow death?

Inquiring minds want to know.

It’s even worse than that, Some Guy.

Suppose there’s, oh, I dunno, TWELVE armed individuals in the mall. One of ’em’s a crazy fucker with an SKS, a 30 round mag, and no training whatsoever. The other eleven are all disciplined shooters, trained and skilled.

Nut boy is spraying 7.65 around the mall. The rest of the players are trying to mount some kind of defensive operations. Everybody with a gun is a suspect. By the time they figure out who’s doing the shooting, where he is, and what might be the appropriate tactical response, he’s killed himself and they’ve all shot at each other.

Stupid, and unlikely as hell…

mikey

They argue that somehow packing the mall with guns would have made everything better? I’ve never been in actual combat, meself, but I hear that a primary adjective used for them is “confusing”. Knowing who’s doing the shooting, what they’re shooting at, where they’re shooting from, who’s been hit, etc.

Seems to me that the armed citizen in a mall who reacts to the lone gunman mass killing his fellow shoppers by pulling out his weapon and firing off a few rounds may end up taken out by the responding SWAT team.

Just a guess.

Better to use marshmallows. Or kittens. Or wear armor.

I’d like to be there when Instaperfesser’s Con Law class collectively slams down its pieces on the desks, come grading day, just to see how wide the shit puddle at his feet spreads.

Keep in mind people like Ye Ole Professor and Lott are working with a detterence argument. “If a depressed young man who just got dumped and fired and decided life wasn’t worth living knew the mall allowed or encouraged (wingnut’s dream!) concealed firearms, he would think twice about doing it.” The final paragraph of Lott’s piece at Fox News:

Most people understand that guns deter criminals. If a killer were stalking your family, would you feel safer putting a sign out front announcing, “This Home Is a Gun-Free Zone”? But that is what the Westroads Mall did.

From the “another mass shooting in a ‘gun-free’ zone” link above.

detterence deterrence

The Oppo research on me would be hilarious, sure, and it would be kinda cool ’cause I’m sure they’d find a bunch of shit I’ve forgotten, but when they got through combing thru my past I couldn’t VOLUNTEER for dogcatcher…

mikey, pleasepleaseplease can I be your running mate? The oppo would liven up the whole campaign, what you haven’t done I have and vice versa. We could run on the slogan “So Fucking What?” or maybe “Like *You’re* Perfect”.

If nothing else, research on us would simply *bankrupt* all opponents. When they got through with us, nobody’d ever be able to run negative again, the floor would be way, way too low. It’s practically a public service in itself!

Just to start the ball rolling, I am completely fucked up right now on a combination of migraine medications, cold pills, and painkillers, and hallucinating zombies in Santa hats. Aren’t I *exactly* the sort of person you want making drug policy?

I want Sidhe to meet with Amedinejad, and explain our position, not on nukes, no, that doesn’t matter for shit, but rather our position on Persian Zombies.

That’ll scare the fucking pantiwaist…

mikey

Seems to me that the armed citizen in a mall who reacts to the lone gunman mass killing his fellow shoppers by pulling out his weapon and firing off a few rounds may end up taken out by the responding SWAT team.

Am I the only one wondering if the guys pushing this line of “Dozens of armed guys in a mall, what could go wrong?” bullshit have just been playing Dead Rising too long? Well, I probably am. I blame the zombies.

I for one would totally vote for someone—nay, anyone—who would run on a “So Fucking What?” campaign. I don’t think I’m alone. If just once one of these pol-bots would screw the script and when a media whore says something like “What do you say to charges that you don’t love Jeezus enough and that you smoked pot in college and once dabbled in Buddhism and said something vaguely pro-choice once upon a time?”, she/he would say, “Yeah, I did. So what?” I truly believe that person would be elected to office, hands down.

And mikey: I would totally be your press secretary. I’ve got a master’s in journalism and everything. It’s that damned background investigation thing that might fuck it up though.

mikey for preznit is a ticket I would feel proud contributing my vote to.

I would assume that anyone who could pass an FBI background check would be politely sent off to apply for a position on another campaign.

And Persian zombies are just like any others. You jab ’em with a wooden spoon and start calling ’em all Mabel and they’ll fall in line pretty quick. The sad thing is, everything I’ve taken tonight is legal.

Mabel? Does that really work?

Suppose there’s, oh, I dunno, TWELVE armed individuals in the mall. One of ‘em’s a crazy fucker with an SKS, a 30 round mag, and no training whatsoever. The other eleven are all disciplined shooters, trained and skilled.

Nut boy is spraying 7.65 around the mall. The rest of the players are trying to mount some kind of defensive operations. Everybody with a gun is a suspect. By the time they figure out who’s doing the shooting, where he is, and what might be the appropriate tactical response, he’s killed himself and they’ve all shot at each other.

I saw this movie. I think it was Die Hard 1, 2, 3 and 4. It’s fun when there’s popcorn and nobody gets hurt.

Perfesser Bluetooth

Best. name. ever.

Mabel? Does that really work?

Surprisingly well. Zombies are not, on the whole, Gilbert and Sullivan fans.

And even then, your spokescat can wind up batting at the microphone instead of answering the question.

And that would still be a bazillion times more honest, straightforward and a coherent than anything you get out of the soon-to-be-former Prezidont’s spokespuppets.

And I’d go to the Fortune 1000 Political contribution team and say:

What the FUCK is wrong with you people. We’re WAY too crazy to steal your money. We’ll take power in some kinda weird-ass electoral coup, and you’ll be glad you knew us when.

‘Cause we might just legislate your ass outta bizness.

Still think you don’t wanna play?

Sucker….

mikey

Surprisingly well. Zombies are not, on the whole, Gilbert and Sullivan fans.

No, I have it on good authority that’s true.

But they are, I’m told, serious Roger Clyne fans.

And those fucking Zombies kick it all loose and rocknroll when Roger’s playing….

mikey

Anne Laurie: “Not everybody needs to own a chainsaw or a snowblower or a gun, and even those individuals who do have a use for them don’t need to carry them around 24/7 or distribute multiple chainsaws around their households.”

Come on now, Anne Laurie. Here in the midwest, I’d be ashamed to put a visitor into a guestroom that didn’t have its own chainsaw.

Awww, I used to voluntarily listen to Boortz, he just isn’t on live where I live anywhere now. He used to be fucking hilarious, too! I used to love it when he’d get going on fundies and then bash them when they’d call in. Even better was when he’d be supporting gay rights and then REALLY bash the callers who kept calling in to say being gay is “a lifestyle choice”. Talk about a nice time just getting to hear someone let loose on those little neo-fascists. And his anti-Wal-Mart eminent domain abuse tirades.

Did he just go completely off the rails on the “Islamofascist” track or something? He used to just be funny, but like I say, haven’t heard him in a few years. He’s always been a little kooky, but even my die-hard liberal Grandmother used to listen to him at work back in the 70s and giggle over him. Not agree with him, but liked hearing him tell people off who were idiots.

One day he went off on mimes too, that was pretty good. Far better than listening to Limbaugh trying to bore the world to death with GOP talking points, at any rate.

Come on now, Anne Laurie. Here in the midwest, I’d be ashamed to put a visitor into a guestroom that didn’t have its own chainsaw.

Cowalker, I’ll bet you have some fascinating houseguests!

stringonastick: I’ve shot the type of rifle the killer used, and anyone who thinks they have a chance against an SKS and the element of surprise with their little waistband gun has watched way, way too much 24. . .

This is the answer to a question I was wondering about, being uneducated about guns. To be truly prepared to prevent mass mayhem by a suicidal gunman, wouldn’t we all have to carry automatic weapons?

I can imagine myself shooting someone I had actually seen in the act of shooting innocent bystanders, but panicked crowd scenes are rarely that easy to sort out in a matter of seconds. If 10% or more of the onlookers pulled out their guns, would we be able to figure out who the criminal shooter was? And when police arrived, only ballistics evidence would count in assigning responsibility for shootings. Presumably police would have to run tests on the guns of all those who were carrying at the scene, to determine who fired, and to match recovered bullets to guns.

Would we really be safer in a culture that considered it normal for all citizens to carry a firearm for protection? I can see some fairly awful results flowing from the “every citizen an enforcer” ideology.

Armored marshmallow kittens.

Mikey, I’ve been reading your comments and your blog for some time now and I don’t see anything that would disqualify you from public office in Nevada. At the very least, you could easily run for, say, Clark County commissioner, possibly the state legislature. Current criminality doesn’t disqualify anyone here, much less past crimes.

You’re already far more articulate than our governor. And he committed a sexual assault a month before his election, though it was buried by the wingnut cops here in Vegas.

You’d have to leave California though. Might not be worth it.

So, homebuilt siege engines are ok, but no sales of same?

But what is your position on pneumatic fruit-loaded artillery?

http://geocities.com/zbig10inch/

I don’t see how any of this matters to anyone, given that in the next fifty years, the human population will reduce to about a billion or so.

As a white male, I’m surprised I didn’t have to take off my shoes when I went to the mall today. I’m sure mall security deliberately ignored me and went after some brownish-colored fellow instead to be “politically correct”.

mikey, i’d sign up to work on your campaign too! perhaps i could be the west coast press secretary? i think that with a kitty in the southern hemisphere, mz nicky on the east coast, and me, you’d be pretty much unstoppable.

Zombies are not, on the whole, Gilbert and Sullivan fans.
Tee-shirt slogan of the thread.

Can Trebuchets be used to launch the sugar confectionery projectiles of flaming marshmallow death?
Perhaps not. But
(1) spud gun
(2) Tennis-balls soaked in kerosene
(3) US Embassy down the road

Some assembly required.

The sad thing is, everything I’ve taken tonight is legal.
Second choice for tee-shirt slogan.

On the subject of of Persian zombies, the go-to book is The Blind Owl. I can hardly wait for the film.

Guns, shmuns, wot a buncha old ladies! The real problem is that nobody at that mall had the nads to bum rush the punk. Haven’t you people watched the United 93 dvd lately?

The Derb

Did someone mention The Zombies?

And mikey, not only would I be in another hemisphere altogether, thus dealing a blow to all those who are confused by time zones, I’d also confuse:
1) those who’re so isolated linguistically that they can’t understand other accents (like Strine), due to never seeing, hearing, or thinking about anything from outside the US. So they’d never understand and we’d have a readymade excuse; and
2) anyone who doesn’t like waiting around all day for me to finish my naps. Cats do sleep about 20 hours a day, you know. It’s vital for our health.

concealed-gun carriage
I think I will stay with the Magic Bus.

Gah, that blog is full of ridiculous generalizations and bizarre observations.

A fairly ordinary blog then.

Has anybody noticed that the death counts involved in shootings like these are pretty consistent? Usually 5 to 15 deaths or so. Guns contain a limited number of bullets, and the shooter has a pretty limited amount of time before everybody has run away.

When they run out of targets, they usually shoot themselves. I would imagine that happens about the time they have to reload.

In such a situation, what is going to save you? More exits. More directions to run in. No matter what the weapon, people have stereo-articulated eyes, and only 2 hands. Only an expert would have any real hope of hitting two targets running away in opposite directions at once.

People who do shootings like these seem to be very consistent in their desire to die, either by their own hand, or by the SWAT team. That is why they are over with very very quickly. The last thing they want is to be captured alive.

If they wanted to stay alive, they wouldn’t go psycho in such a public manner. They would murder on quiet dark streets instead, one victim at a time.

I think even in a nation with so many guns as the US, even modest gun control measures can help a lot. Some guns are designed primarily for shooting deer, or gophers, or target plinking.. and some are designed to kill as many people as possible in as short a time as possible.

Americans keep saying that guns are tools. They are right.
A hammer is for hitting nails with.
A screwdriver is for turning screws.
A quarter inch plugging chisel is for removing old pointing from a wall.
A single shot, bolt action rifle is for hunting deer
An assault rifle is for murdering lots of people very quickly.

[…] Lott, in comments, contributes the following: John Lott said, December 7, 2007 at […]

Why all the half measures? All malls should be armed with a nuclear device. A policy of Mutually Assured Mall Destruction would probably bring about a quiet detente between the Mall of America & Jersey Gardens.

If everyone only had magic missile the world would be safer.

mikey, how do you feel about concealed-carry trebuchets?

If just one person had been at that mall with a trebuchet, none of this would have happened.

If you and your local leather-goods shop can get together and design a concealed-carry rig for your Trebuchet, I can see no reason why you shouldn’t use it.

From a practical standpoint, I’d suspect that carrying the projectiles might be just as problematic…

mikey

Yes, but think of the reduced crime rate, simply due to the fact that it’s too much fucking trouble to pack heet.

If one life could be saved, it’s worth it.
Uh, right?

I for one would totally vote for someone—nay, anyone—who would run on a “So Fucking What?” campaign. I don’t think I’m alone. If just once one of these pol-bots would screw the script and when a media whore says something like “What do you say to charges that you don’t love Jeezus enough and that you smoked pot in college and once dabbled in Buddhism and said something vaguely pro-choice once upon a time?”, she/he would say, “Yeah, I did. So what?” I truly believe that person would be elected to office, hands down.

That’s why I’m an Obama guy. It ain’t “so fucking what?”, but it’s as close as we are likely to get.

“The bottom line is, States with higher levels of civilian gunownership such as the States in the South, Midwest and the West have much less violent crime rates per capita then the liberal States in the Northeast and the Coastal areas.”

That’s not true. States in the South have some of the highest murder and rape rates in the country.

States in the South have some of the highest murder and rape rates in the country.

Also suicides. Which us filthy Nohthrunners sneer is perfectly understandable, since the only sane responses to finding oneself in the Pellegra Belt are emigration (hello, Bill C) or suicide. Although the bleeding hearts say it has a lot to do with the fact that deeply depressed people have trouble getting up the initiative to go find a bridge to jump off or even planning an effective carbon-monoxide-in-a-closed-garage death, but if there’s a gun right there in the nightstand next to the bed they can’t crawl out of, well…

Re: trebuchets. Are those the contraption with a scoop arm and a counterweight? I can imagine havoc arising from neighborhood disputes. A typical American home is not trebuchet-proof. In my subdivision, you just can install a trebuchet at night (next to slides and seesaws in the little park), have a bunch of stones that one can purchase in a landscaping store (or from a tombstone maker two blocks away; thinking about it, just rob some tombstones), and then start throwing the stones at the earliest dawn.

I presume it would take a while until anyone would get an idea what is going on, especially if you will eschew easy targets and lob stones at least 300 ft. With standard tombstones one could calibrate the trebuchet and hit homes quite reliably, targeting windows rather than roofs.

The only thing that saves humanity is the fact that folks who can figure all the needed technical details usually enjoy rewarding professional carriers.

Confectionary question: when the trebuchet is loaded with a tombstone, one can laddle melted marchmallows over the stone and lit them. Or some other flammable goo.

If you and your local leather-goods shop can get together and design a concealed-carry rig for your Trebuchet, I can see no reason why you shouldn’t use it.

From a practical standpoint, I’d suspect that carrying the projectiles might be just as problematic…

I googled for “strap-on trebuchet harness”, mikey, but nothing looked sufficiently sturdy.

As for projectiles, you’re just not thinking: the mall will be full of things to fling. Plenty of children, for one thing. If you can’t find something to lob, you’re just not trying.

You know what might have better served all those currently under-lifed people that were at that mall? Better, more accessible, more affordable mental health care in this country. I guarandamntee you that would save more innocent lives than more people packing heat would.

With standard tombstones one could calibrate the trebuchet
You’re right! That’s a really good idea!

Niemniej jednak, nie przystancie, ze zeszly paragraf martwic dlatego ze niezmiernie cokolwiek kredytodawcow isc w rzeczy samej w oddali bez dobrego powodu. Twoj kredyt byc moze wywrocic az do masz dosc niemalo pieniedzy, by go, a poniektorego z lepszych kredytodawcow ubiera ograniczenie na najazdy, ktore wloka posilkowych oplat. Poniektorego zatrzymac spozywa w dwoch, a wytwarza chronos, tak aby dostac sie do fury a na splate. http://deepskincare.socialmediapresskit.com/en/content/po%C5%BCyczki-pozabankowe-payday-british-fast-cash-advance-loans-quick-cash-advances-salaryday Obecnie nie musisz obawiac sie uzywanie do kredytow, bo informacje zadluzenie wierzytelnosci jest do Panstwa wytycznej w wiekach niepienieznych zguby. Twoje zadluzenie pozyczka Informacje jest wspanialym urodzeniem i do glebi koresponduje az do dowolnego wariantu wiadomosci na przedmiot daninie wierzytelnosci.
Sprzymierzency fortyfikacja, iz panszczyzny pozyczki koszty przetwarzania gwoli tych kredytow nie roznia sie od nieprzyjezdnych dlugow. Trajkocza, iz srednie autostopy wyskokowego w celu lichych uzyczonych sumy i epitetow krotkich nie bylaby lukratywna. Na przyklad, 200 dolarow debetu tygodniowe, w sasiedztwie 20% autostopy wreczy kredytodawcy lecz 72 centow siurkow, jakiego nie zakrywaja nawet sumptow fabrykowania.