“I know the truth—don’t bother me with the facts.”
We see this truism play out ever more frequently in our ever more fractured political culture. It’s one of the reasons our elected officials seem to agree on ever less. Reality is so clear, in their view, that they don’t need facts, like, say, new research, to interfere with their preconceived ideas.
We’ve seen this truism at work in the world of raw milk for decades now, most noticeably over the last ten years, as evidence has accumulated out of Europe that raw milk possesses possibly significant health benefits. Several European studies have strongly suggested that children who consume raw milk have lower rates of asthma and allergies than children drinking pasteurized milk.
But our public health establishment absolutely refuses to sanction research into these tantalizing results. Instead, the establishment continues to argue its version of “truth”—that there is no scientific evidence that raw milk offers any health benefits compared to pasteurized milk. American researchers have learned an important lesson: raw milk is off-limits for any serious research funding…unless you want to get black-listed for future research of any kind.
We see this exact same phenomenon playing out in the world of gun violence. The medical and public health communities are increasingly of a mind that our mass-shooting-a-day pace for 2015 (a mass shooting being defined as four or more people being killed or injured in a single shooting episode) is a public health problem. That we need a deeper understanding of what motivates individuals to carry out these massacres, and guidance for what we as a society can do to reduce their incidence.
Research and serious policy-related exploration–it’s a formula we’ve applied to other public health problems we’ve had over the years, like polio and AIDS.
But it turns out there is a prohibition on the books forbidding public health research into gun violence. The 1996 prohibition was enacted by Congress out of a fear that research could suggest such rational approaches as required background checks on people buying assault rifles or mandated personalized locks for firearms. The prohibition is based on such beliefs as “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people” and “Our country’s founders didn’t provide any exceptions for our right to bear arms, so neither should we” and “Cities and states with gun control laws on the books still have lots of gun crime—just look at California and Connecticut, sites of two of the worst mass shootings.”
With raw milk, the absence of research means that our regulators continue to work to limit its availability. Last week a Fort Worth dairy farmer was fined $3,000 for selling raw milk. We have the grotesque situation of a group of highly paid bureaucrats spending eleven years trying to solidify new rules to justify the truth they already know—that raw milk cheese is highly dangerous, even though there not only hasn’t been a single death, but there have only been a handful of illnesses, at most over that period.
With firearms, we have an even more grotesque situation— the absence of research helps determine that there are no limits at all on the availability of firearms. So crazies and terrorists go about their normal business of using children, college students, moviegoers, shoppers, and many others (they don’t discriminate)) for target practice or just to get their jollies. Since the 1996 prohibition on gun violence research, more than half a million Americans have been killed by guns.
The majority of our legislators and regulators repeat the truisms I listed above, without considering the reality that it’s possible to head off at least some of the most dangerous situations, without unduly restricting gun access for law-abiding citizens. Or that others of our basic rights, like freedom of speech, come with some restrictions to protect from excesses—you can’t yell “fire” in a crowded theater and you can’t defame other individuals just because you detest them, without risk of penalties. Or that any controls on gun access would by their nature work better if they were national rather than regional, since people who shouldn’t have guns couldn’t easily go shopping in another state.
Then there is the biggest claim: If we put limits on our access to firearms, only the criminals will have them. Well, right now, it’s the criminals that have them, and they are having a grand old time shooting up the law-abiding among us. It was three years ago yesterday that a disturbed individual killed 20 little children at a Connecticut school, and even after that atrocity, not a single screening requirement was placed on access to firearms.
Part of the problem is that we don’t know for sure what works and what doesn’t work when it comes to firearms screening, because we won’t allow ourselves the possibility of new ideas and approaches from research. So our elected officials have essentially said to us: “You are fair game for the crazies and terrorists who carry out the mass shootings. If you die, you are dying to uphold our Constitution’s Second Amendment. Yes, we are sanctioning murder of our own citizens, by giving free reign to the mentally disturbed, but we are doing it for the cause of freedom.”
But people are wising up. Increasingly, they recognize that firearms abuse is a public health problem, and they are taking rational steps to protect themselves. Buying guns to give your children to take to school isn’t what many consider a rational step, despite what our elected officials might suggest. But parents are buying their children bulletproof backpacks and clothing, to fortify them at school. Schools are running drills to hide children in the event crazies or terrorists invade and begin shooting. I expect more people to be carrying around non-lethal weapons, like laser scopes and pepper spray.
While such steps don’t necessarily offer a lot of protection, the fact remains, if you’re dealing with a public health danger, you do whatever you can to protect yourself and your family, right? You put helmets on your children (and yourself) when you ride bicycles. You put bug repellent on when you hike in the woods to cut the risk of Lyme disease. You wear a seat belt to reduce your chances of serious injury in a car accident.
Why should it be any different with guns? Especially when your government is refusing to lift a finger to reduce the risks, you are on your own.
So now we know what raw milk and gun violence have in common. Where they differ is that we have a willingness to enforce strict laws against a public health problem that barely exists for raw milk, and a refusal to take the slightest bit of action for a huge public health problem, leading to thousands of deaths each year, that does exist in gun violence.
I know some readers will disagree strongly with what I’ve said here, but it seems that if we’re going to demand research on the benefits of raw dairy, we should at least be consistent and demand research into gun violence. The only risk is we may be bothered by the facts we learn.
It’s crazy, isn’t it? You can’t get a glass of raw milk but no problems to getting a gun. Even Scalia said that the 2nd Amendment isn’t an absolute. We have no problems saying that certain speech (1st Amend.) is wrong and can be limited, but when it comes to guns and ammo, there can be no limits in many people’s minds. Many of these mass shooters have been using SSRI drugs which have a known side effect of causing suicidal and homicidal thoughts, which apparently are being acted upon. Many of these depressed people would be better helped with a correct diet rather than these drugs, and that includes access to raw dairy among other things.
Bob, I keep seeing references to what you say, that “these mass shooters have been using SSRI drugs,” yet when I try to find research on this, I come up empty. I wonder if the absence of hard data on this subject is something resulting from our ban on gun-related research.
The lack of hard data is an accident, David. In truth – SSRIs are proven to not work. They were approved by only mentioning 40% of the studies done on them, because they were the only studies which showed any “therapeutic” value for depression. Current review shows that the therapy is sometimes exaggerated. 20% of the studies showed NO therapeutic value – but negative effects mentally, and physiologically. The other 40% showed negative therapeutic values AND negative mental and physiological effects.
There are those who swear that they are only alive because of their Prozac, or Paxil, or _______.
So they did a study – of THESE cheerleaders. They had a rather large group, divided them randomly in half for a double blind placebo controlled study and told ALL of them that half of them were going to receive their exact same prescription; drug and manufacturer, dosage and times. The other half would receive a placebo.
BOTH groups had the SAME outcomes – they ALL tested out to have a reduction (of the same amount) in depression control. Obviously, the drug was not causing the drop in effectiveness – it was the mind. Obviously the depression control NEAR to what they had when the placebo group had been taking meds (being the same as the other group, mind you) received no benefit from any chemicals whatsoever.
There is a refusal to cover the drug issue in the media because 60% of the advert income for lamestream media comes from drug pushers. This is also why you don’t see articles and shows telling the truth about the stupidity of vaccination – especially mandatory vaccinations.
This group lets you see what drug has caused violence in which areas – and lets one report adverse events for that drug to anonymously add to the knowledge of the drugs. https://www.rxisk.org/Default.aspx
This is an interesting article on hiding drug violence: http://www.activistpost.com/2012/12/prescription-drug-induced-violence.html
This is the scary one: http://www.ssristories.com/index.php?sort=date
Excellent interview here with Dr. Whitaker who wrote the book Anatomy of an Epidemic: http://cdn.media.freedomainradio.com/feed/FDR_2069_anatomy_of_an_epidemic_interview.mp3
Like I said in my post, I’d love to see actual studies of the connection between anti-depressant drugs and gun violence. You link to publications that don’t have a lot of credibility. The site on SSRI Stories is an intriguing one. It would be interesting to see such “anecdotal” evidence mined in some kind of systematic and meaningful way.
That was really the point of my post–not to say there isn’t a connection between antidepressants and gun violence, but to highlight the lack of hard data. That lack of hard data seems to have been officially mandated, to make sure we don’t have the info we need, and instead continue to make the kinds of emotional and uninformed arguments being made by many in the comments here.
You know that a number of mass shootings (including San Bernadino) you have had in your country are false flag operations (stage settings) with political agendas and your government are behind them? (As in other countries, like the two attacks in Paris which both were stage events ) If you want to know how it works here is a good introduction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXuHbgx0GQE Here is an example of where they find crisis actors and cast who arrange and play this out:http://www.crisiscast.com
San Bernadino: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-PfHdKRplE
Bongo!
Bingo?!?
Actually, you need to pass a background check to buy guns in stores, and it isn’t always easy or available to buy them other ways. Unless you are a Mexican Drug Cartel and Obama and the ATF hand you literally 10,000 guns including sniper rifles and fully automatic weaponry.
The truth is that gun control is counterproductive. That is not my opinion, but from a study at Harvard. We did fine without gun control until drugs came on the market, and now virtually every mass shooter has been on pHARMa drugs or insane – which means on drugs. But they want to hide that because it drops drug sales….
Just because Scalia states the 2nd isn’t an absolute does not make that statement congruent with the constitution. The constitution actually FORBIDS THE FEDERAL GOVT FROM CONTROLLING PERSONAL GUN RIGHTS – it is NOT in their ennumerated powers – so any law made in regard to that issue is null and void – in the real USA and following the constitution. In the same way, the feds don’t have ANY right to make decisions and laws regarding our health or our food supply – those are state’s rights since they weren’t expressly given that authority by the constitution – and anything NOT specifically mentioned as their jurisdiction is nothing they can legally make a law about.
Yes, this means that almost all our federal government’s actions (and many state) are totally illegal, technically null and void, and we are instructed to not obey them. In fact we’re told in the constitution and the Organic Documents which are the legal papers of the country which instruct on interpretation of the constitution – we’re told to overthrow our own government if it becomes tyrannical.
Well – it is far worse than what the colonists fought against…..
You really need more to do David.. Again the gun is blamed for violence and “safety” is recognized as a helmet, bug spray or seat belt. Somehow we all grew up without these life jackets and I won’t use them now, but this equates to blaming the cow for the “inherent” danger of raw milk! I say we take the risk of being healthy vs being “safe”..
Alvin, I wish that was the problem, that I have too much time on my hands. I’m not blaming the “inherent” danger of guns for our violence problems, I am questioning why we would allow the most dangerous people, including the mentally ill and disturbed, to have unrestricted access to a product that becomes highly dangerous in their hands.
I would also argue that even in the most enlightened places in the world on raw milk, in European countries that allow raw milk to be sold through vending machines, or in American states that allow retail and on-farm sales of raw milk, like Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, and California, there are rules and standards affecting raw milk sales. There are government-mandated inspections, minimal amounts of allowable bacteria, bottling requirements, and so forth…..and the milk flows pretty well. Why can’t we do the same thing with guns–have some rules and standards that make it easy for law-abiding citizens to access guns, but much more difficult for those questionable individuals to access them?
A brilliant piece of journalism
It’s interesting that our 16th president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, was the first to die from gun violence. After that assassination, shooting deaths or attempts to shoot presidents happened about every 20 years.
I blame changes in the quality of the food supply for much of the “craziness” happening these days. Yet the mental health establishment has little interest in the connection between food quality and mental stability.
Excerpt from The Crazy Makers by Carol Simontacci: “Publicly the tales of our mental lives are told in the accounts that splash across the front pages of our newspapers about school shootings or violence in the workplace…Millions of people can’t get their mental lives together. Sometimes the resort to violence and seem driven to live life on the edge of destruction, but most often they suffer in silence. They are the ‘walking wounded’ who seem destined to fail or fall short in life because their minds cannot think properly.”
For more on this, Google – Crime Times Excerpt: Most current efforts to fight crime focus on sociological approaches: counseling and rehabilitation for offenders, tougher laws intended to discourage criminal acts, and better parenting and better education to prevent at-risk children from becoming delinquents and criminals.
These well-intentioned approaches have one thing in common: they frequently fail. Why? Because they fail to acknowledge that many criminals suffer from brain malfunctions which prevent them from benefiting from sociological or psychological interventions.
Also, Google – George Watson Nutrition, Barbara Stitt Letter, and Roger Williams Alcoholism
Actually, virtually every mass shooter since the Texas Tower shooting (Ritalin) has been done by a person on psychotropic, pHARMaceutical* prescription drugs. San Bernardino was faked – at least parts of it – and not just because 3 eyewitnesses state that there were 3, tall, caucasian shooters in black tactical gear. Look at the helicopter shot of that street. Starts to the right where that wobbly vid showed the black SUV creeping along, cop car behind (sound of blanks) then a few vehicles.
When the camera pans left down the street – there is THAT black SUV, the cop car, those vehicles – stopped at the next intersection. In front of that little stage, there are a LOT of cars “randomly” all over the entire road – when you are stopped by cops – you DON’T just start spreading over 4 lanes – and in front of that? A black SUV with cop cars “surrounding” it and pointed at it, like a shoot out. Stage # 2.
In front of that about a hundred or feet or so – there is a (surprise now) BLACK SUV!!! Door open, and across the street is a “body” which is the only thing around not casting any shadow – in a pool of bizarrely colored blood.
Sandy Hook? There are screen shots showing that donation pages to the Sandy Hook Tragedy were on the web DAYS before the shooting -and nobody has seen evidence of that, the original 911 call talked about multiple shooters (there was an “exercise” in the area about a school shooting at the same time) There are videos showing the supposedly bereaved father (whose son’s picture was shown as a killed child in some Pakistani tragedy recently) laughing and joking with a group of other bereaved parents and then putting on his serious face….
There are still Columbine students talking about multiple men in black on the roofs with guns.
The Aurora shooter chose the movie theater that was a gun-free zone – and while an exercise about a “mass public shooting” was taking place – this UNEMPLOYED man with over $60,000 worth of restricted protective gear, bomb mtls (and where’d he get his training?) and multiple guns chose that place to shoot so that he wouldn’t be interrupted. This is why 92% of the mass shootings take place in gun free zones.
For the record’s sake -during 9/11 there were dozens of exercises in the days prior and on that day – including the scenarios of planes into the towers and plane into the Pentagon. The Military had normal exercises rescheduled to make sure (?) there were only TWO fighter planes in the entire northeast that could respond – but Cheney, with Secret Service capability – shut down the FAA network during the attack from the WH basement.
London subway bombing? Exercise about london subway bombing. Madrid train bombing? Training exercise about train bombing. Sandy Hook, Columbine had a training exercise going on at the time. Aurora, San Bernardino is locked down in various areas every month – just “happened” to be there that day…..
SSRIstories.com has evidence that it is the drugs. Not all murders and murder suicides caused by these drugs – with KNOWN and common dangers in regard to violence, suicide ideation (suicide by cop?) delusions and more – not all the deaths caused are by guns. There are people who can’t remember taking an axe or knife, blunt instrument – whatever – and beating their parents and/or family to death.
While i think that there can be some valid studies regarding groups of people or individuals – i think ANY psychiatric panel is going to NEED oversight. This is the “science” that has zero proof. They have found no biological markers for any of their diseases and no markers to show changes through any treatments. Their new Diagnostic and Statistic Manual which lists mental illnesses – is infreakingsane. Did you know that if you are in conflict (teenager? work issues? sexual harrassment at work?) that according to the new DSM – your RELATIONSHIP (yup, that intangible interface of thought btwn 2 people) is mentally ill? The OBVIOUS solution is to drug the two of you…. Or there is that UCLA observation where the brainwave patterns of a person grieving for their newly deceased is SIMILAR to the brainwave pattern for physical pain – and their conclusion is that if your loved one dies and you take aspirin for three days and STILL feel the pain of grief – they have drugs……
Their drugs CAUSE some of these shootings, but their solution is MORE DRUGS??? And they want to decide who is sane?
*pHARMaceutical = keeping the harm large in medicine.
Yes, isn’t it ironic that at every terrorist attack there have been an exact similar training exercise the same day close by. It was the same in Paris and here in Norway.
Irony? Tragedy? Magic? i think it’s ultimately a good sign. The self-annointed “elite” power maggots need to try REALLY drastic things to get their way – and i suspect they’re eventually going to have to just declare martial law, get rid of all the local farms (Obama has an EO that makes any non-tracked food – thus all locally grown – “possibly contaminated” by terrorist threat – so goodbye locally grown food.) push GMOs, make everyone medical slaves, etc.
Another EO of O-bomb-ya’s shows that all Americans will be put to work at whatever their skillset is – and if your wife does X and you do Y – goodbye. Your daughter? Probably going to be a FEMA officer whore somewhere. Son that needs medication from vax/medicine damages? Toast – unofficially.
It’s not ironic no matter what. If true, it’s a coincidence.
Absolutely, any valid studies of antidepressants would need oversight. If the anti-depressant drugs are an important cause of mass shootings, then Big Pharma has a big stake in maintaining the status quo, since the anti-depressants bring in billions every year.
Isn’t it a contradiction to contrast raw milk with guns when both are inherent rights supported by the Bill of Rights and Constitution? You say raw milk is over regulated while guns are under regulated. However, that was not the case in the most recent gun violence carried out in California. “On December 6 the Associated Press pointed out that California’s aggressive gun control laws–expanded background checks, heavy regulations on “assault weapons,” and other regulations–all proved impotent to stop the San Bernardino terror attacks.”
As we well know in the raw milk movement, over regulation does not negate the underlying truth that drinking raw milk is not illegal. In similar fashion, we have a right to defend ourselves as individuals against terrorism, whether perpetrated from an individual, a group, or as government tyranny. We must each take responsibility for our own health just as we must also claim responsibility for our own safety, especially since police are under no legal obligation to protect us (http://tinyurl.com/c4kbf48).
Let’s be honest and not foolish. We all know that guns do not self-activate. Guns do not commit crimes no more than cars commit crimes. Humans do the crime. The reason the government purposely refuses to investigate the cause of these shootings is the same reason they fail to reveal the truth about the health benefits of raw milk, it would replace government power with individual power.
Investigations have already been conducted and are underreported. They show two things: 1) that stricter guns laws don’t mean there is less crime (See Harvard Study @ http://tinyurl.com/yobqcz), and 2) that shooters in this country have a history of “approved” prescription drug use. Our children are overprescribed psychotropic drugs like candy. These drugs, which include stimulants, antipsychotics, and mood stabilizers, carry the risk of serious side effects, including, ironically, psychotic symptoms (like hearing voices or paranoia), aggressive behavior, hostility, seizures, heart attack, delayed puberty, and more. Just do a google search (http://ssristories.org/) and click on murder/suicide. The call for investigation into this connection is thwarted by Congress (http://tinyurl.com/j96uxzj). The real investigation should be investigating the suppression of the truth by our government.
More restrictive gun laws have the same effect as more restrictive food laws, they serve to drive the actions to reclaim these rights underground. This is human nature. Human nature also suggests that criminals will always find ways to acquire guns (or cars) to commit crimes. Why would we choose to prevent an individual from defending him/herself and the family while our government has a history of providing weapons to terrorists (ISIS, al Qaeda), against our allies and against our best interests? Are these not the real questions that need to be addressed?
Thanks for this info, Rosanne. Once again, I’m not suggesting that we confiscate guns, or anything close. Simply that we allow some serious scientific research and look afresh at our growing plague of mass shootings.
That study you link to is a good example of the dearth of good research. It isn’t a Harvard study (it is published in a Harvard journal, but was done by a California and Canadian criminologist). It seems mostly geared toward showing that Russia has a higher murder rate than we realize, compared with the U.S. It says nothing about the mass shootings.
We have had more serious regulation of guns, without infringing on people’s basic rights. As I pointed out in another comment, the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System worked well for many years, but Congress refused to renew it a couple years back for national usage….for reasons not clear, and the mass shootings plague appears to have worsened. (Our public health professionals and academics can’t seriously research the issue, though, because we might learn some lessons different from the tiresome arguments made on this subject.)
https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/nics/reports/2013-operations-report
As I said in my post, state-by-state regulations of guns can’t possibly work effectively because it’s possible to evade regulation by going to another state….so stricter laws in one state, like California, will always be negated by an absence of regs in neighboring states like Arizona or Nevada.
Whoa… David, I’m weirded out by your stretch to relate raw milk and gun violence so it will “fit” on the blog. Sounds mostly like you were bursting with something you needed to rant about. Sad to not hear more coverage on the Ft. Worth farm you mentioned. I wasn’t aware of any ban on gun violence research and will read more, which I’m guessing is your point. I love your blog and follow regularly. That probably won’t change, despite the weird taste in my mouth right now.
Even mother johns and others have pointed out that the “mass-shooting a day” is not correct, like, at all… like it is terrible reporting/misinformation at best.
What does tie together most of the mass shootings? Gun free zones, various big pharma drugs, and a culture that is increasingly hostile to young men, especially in terms of the educational system where boys get drugged starting in 2nd grade (or sooner!) for well, being boys and basically keep getting moved along drugged through life and institutions that are hostile to the being male.
We also know a good bit already about how to deal with certain types of violence,
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/dec/14/turned-our-back-on-a-proven-method-to-curtail-gun-violence-project-ceasefire
“Not only are such programs far more successful at saving lives than any combination of background checks, regulations and assault weapons bans, they also don’t invite opposition from gun rights advocates, second amendment groups and the powerful lobbying arm of the National Rifle Association. But rather than expand the programs proven to work, municipalities constantly cut funding in the face of evidence that doing so is a bad idea.”
Raul, the idea of giving criminals opportunities to work at real jobs makes a lot of sense, and it’s easy to see that such a simple approach could work wonders. It looks like an example of the kind of thing our official ban on serious info regarding gun violence had in mind to keep out of the research realm. Maybe the police worried they’d lose too many jobs if too many criminals were working productive lives.
Gov’t “help” is, always has been, and will continue to be, the biggest threat to the people of the world. It doesn’t matter which country we’re talking about, it is elected officials and regulations causing the problems. That is because the elected officials are in cahoots with BigPHRMA, BigCHEM, BigPHOOD, and all the other corporate giants. Nothing the “regular” people can do will ever make a difference because logic is gone and money rules.
Worldwide History of Gun Confiscation
The following timeline traces a history of what has happened when rights similar to those outlined in the Second Amendment have been lost or taken away –
—
In 1929, the Soviet Union established gun control. From 1929 to 1953, about 20 million dissidents, unable to defend themselves,
were rounded up and exterminated.
—
In 1911, Turkey established gun control. From 1915 to 1917, 1.5 million Armenians, unable to defend themselves,
were rounded up and exterminated.
–
Germany established gun control in 1938 and from 1939 to 1945, a total of 13 million Jews and others who were unable to defend themselves
were rounded up and exterminated.
—
Guatemala established gun control in 1964. From 1964 to 1981, 100,000 Mayan Indians, unable to defend themselves,
were rounded up and exterminated.
—
more at
https://freethinku.com/experience/is-the-second-amendment-worth-protecting/worldwide-history-gun-confiscation/
The 2nd amendment is an absolute. Constitutionally speaking, there can be no restrictions on firearms just like there should be no restrictions on free speech, no cruel and unusual punishment, no search ever without a warrant, etc. There are serious limitations on all of the liberties guaranteed by the Constitution.
I find it confounding that you would look to the very group that restricts our right to raw milk and a harmless medicinal herb (Cannabis), wanting to take our raw milk cheese, restricting our rights to farm, to collect our rainwater, to go off-grid… this is the group you trust to regulate our weapons of self-defense?
The Founders were unapologetic that the 2nd amendment is there to protect us from our government. Not for hunting, not for sport shooting but for self-defense against the main group we have to fear: government agents. As someone who has been terrorized by the IRS for the last 12 years, I am intimately familiar with the lengths to which government agents will go in their quest to win a battle.
As long as they all have guns, I want whatever gun my government can have. Drones, tanks, whatever. Especially since my government can now decide to murder me from a secret drone two miles away, or detain me without due process forever.
Why are mass shootings in gun free zones? Did you know that ALL of the mass shooters in the last 20 years were on an SSRI or similar pharmaceutical? Including the women who drowned her five kids.
I’d love to take the time to review the list of mass shootings. According to statistics, at least 1/3 of those will be drug war related.
In the meantime, here’s a favorite video with facts about guns: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pELwCqz2JfE
I’m armed, I know how to shoot, we have lots of guns and, yeah, you’ll have to pry it from my cold dead hands if it comes to it. I’m in KY so not alone in this regard 🙂
Watch Farmageddon again.
Sally, I think your point about trusting the people who want to take our cheese, milk, etc. is an important one. Those people are owned by the dairy industry, and they serve the industry’s interests by trying to limit competition from raw milk producers.
Those aren’t the same people who have any authority over guns. Yes, they are employed by the same “organization,” but they really don’t speak with one voice. (There is even sharp division among our elected officials over the gun issue.) But it’s interesting, some states and the FBI do background checks using FBI criminal data. Since 1998, when these began (and were required of all gun purchasers), about 200 million gun checks have been done, with a little over 1 million denied. That’s about one-half of one per cent.
Here is a 2013 report from the FBI about the program.
https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/nics/reports/2013-operations-report
Those checks aren’t required any more for purchases at gun shows (as of 2013, I believe) because Congress refused to renew the program. And for purchases in gun stores, the checks have to be completed within three days, or the purchaser gets the gun. In one recent mass murder, the one of churchgoers at Charleston earlier this year, the murderer, Dylan Roof, had a drug conviction, but because the criminal check wasn’t completed within three days, he got the gun he used to murder the nine churchgoers.
http://www.thetrace.org/2015/07/background-checks-nics-guns-dylann-roof-charleston-church-shooting/
What’s clear is that the regulation can be very gun-user-friendly.
David Gumpert … please take to heart the admonition which is the last line of your latest essay : even if you may be bothered by the facts you learn, I dare you – a seasoned journalist – to apply your talents to answering the 33 questions very much pending, to do with the Sandy Hook pretended “mass shooting”. Since you refer to it, twice, as the premise for you argument, onus is on you to provide so much as one single bit of hard evidence, that ANY human being died at Sandy Hook Elementary school, 3 years ago.
I am saying that it was a monstrous hoax.
you / millions of Americans, have been taken-in by a psy-op, which has as its main purpose = stripping citizens of their “Liberty Teeth”. I most strongly urge you to go re-read the writings of Jews who survived the Nazi regime, castigating themselves for their docility, having been herded-off to the concentration camps, without having made armed resistance to …. what was … by then, undeniably genocide.
I dare you to read the law enacted by the government of the Third Reich to do with controlling guns in Germany. It reads literally word-for-word the same as what the gun-grabbers propose for the U S of A
in your examination of the topic, it only fair to fold-in the FACTS as to how many crimes are deterred, daily! by a person who has a firearm ready. The NRA has those facts
“you can’t rape a 38”.
Regarding your comment, and others suggesting that Sandy Hook and other mass shootings were hoaxes, never happened, were false flag events….I always wonder: How could so many people participate in the hoax, and no one spill the beans? Not only the police, but the survivors, doctors, EMTs, parents and other relatives. Regarding your request for “one single bit of hard evidence that any human beings died, you might want to view these interviews of parents of children murdered:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToQNVJE4xgk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhXPlCjr0Vw
re the videos of supposedly grieving parents. That is not hard evidence .. it’s a critical part of the propaganda. Let’s see some official death certificates…how come the FBI does not list that incident on its crime reports? … things like that.
… As for so many people keeping a secret… that won’t last. The Truth will out. For example = It took half a century for it to come out about Pearl Harbor : that FDR ahd set it up to inveigle America into war, against the prevailing opinion of isolation-ism. Anyone who said otherwise at the time was locked-up in a mental hospital. Ezra Pound being the handiest example.
… The Sandy Hook hoax was a made-for-media psy.op. I could fold-in Goebbels’ quote here, about “a Big Lie being told often-enough’, but every sensible person knows it by now. Has your govt. ever lied to you before?
Onus is on those who deny that what happened at Sandy Hook is monstrous hoax, to explain why the state passed a law, sealing every single scrap of information about what went on that day. If anything ought to whet the curiosity of an investigative journalist, it’s government officials refusing to provide material which is routinely available in every other instance. Perhaps start by getting a straight answer out of Amazon, as to why the book “No-one died at Sandy Hook” has been banned, even as sales took off?
I am not going to pursue the Sandy Hook Hoax on this forum. I leave all concerned with the conundrum … how come the accounts opened for people to donate $$ to the families of the “murdered children” were opened DAYS BEFORE THE EVENT TOOK PLACE?
if gun control is a “health issue”, then it’s better called a MENTAL health issue.
David I will give you another example as you seem to have a difficult time believing that these attacks can be orchestrated. Here is a video (3 min) from the recent attack in Paris showing that they had the whole script and story published in the French newspaper Le Parisan in the MORNING at the same day as the attack happened, in other words many hours before the actually shooting happened: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUTLQXqLnEs
And here you can see actual film and real footage how everything was prepared and staged in front of the event, go to the end of the video if you don’t want to see the whole thing:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmguLiG0wQI
Well, my French isn’t great, but from what I could tell, that French newspaper was discussing terror in general, not the attack in specifics. There had been an expectation for weeks that something could happen in France, after the murders earlier in the year at the satire magazine.
Besides, what would have been in it for the French leadership? Hollande’s Socialist party has already taken a pounding from the right wing in a couple of local elections. As in the U.S., people are very nervous, and looking for salvation to the pols who talk the toughest.
I second Michael Schmidt’s comment: brilliant journalism David! For a perspective from outside the U.S. see this 3 min youtube sketch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OZIOE6aMBk
Thank you Joanie (and Michael). I love the line in this comedian’s routine, “If it’s for protection, why do they call it an ‘assault rifle’?” Reminds me of the day I spent several years back at a police firing range. I got to use automatic rifles, hand guns. They worked so effortlessly. I had been undecided about getting myself a gun, but at the end of the day at the firing range, I decided I didn’t want a gun, because it was just too damn easy to screw up–shoot a family member by mistake, or shoot someone who really wasn’t intending to harm you. It was also easy for someone else in the family, like a child, to find it and screw up.
I don’t begrudge other people their guns. It is our right. I just determined guns weren’t right for me. And in the hands of mentally unbalanced people, they are killing machines.
“The only risk is we may be bothered by the facts we learn.” Your right David, those facts are a real can of worms. But we the people need um, motivation to think more critically – about everything. Its important for us to question our views…things change. So thank for making us think.
If one bad farmer serves tainted milk do we criminalize the milk or the careless producer? Gun free zones are kill zones. These predators always prey upon the innocent and unprepared. You can stay unprepared and take your chances working and living in these kill zones. Or, become prepared, get educated on proper firearm techniques and training. Everyone needs to be personally responsible for their own actions. Education is the key. The weapons used in Santa Barbara were illegal in California and two of those were law enforcement issued weapons. It is not the cow that produces swill milk, it as a bad person that is to blame, just as it is not the weapon but rather a bad person that makes these wrong decisions in life. But regardless of the gun rights argument, we are now living in a world with a populace that is no longer living by the Golden Rule and the Ten Commandments. There is a new culture of hate that is spreading throughout the world. All mass killers agree that gun control works, for example: Lenin, Marx, Hitler, Mao. Gun control worked for them and millions died. The threat of extinction is no longer exclusive to Israel, it now includes Europe and the USA. Israeli’s have taken a page from our Second Amendment, chock full of restrictions, to protect themselves. The need for a well educated, armed, and trained populace is now more important than ever. End the gun free zones, allow the citizens to protect themselves as they do in Israel from the terror threats they face on a daily basis. All terrorists know that gun free zones are kill zones. The founder’s put the Second Amendment in place to protect our nation from a totalitarian government, the Second protects the rest, without it we will be no better off than those unarmed people in NAZI Germany.
AM- I think you need to look into the history more. Israel IS a terrorist state. The harm they have done to other nations and especially the Palestinian people is horrific. If you start researching you will see that they have a hand in all of the terrorist attacks that have happened over the last years in addition to the US, England and NATO. It is all a part of a bigger plan. And regarding guns- how is it that this so called (false) mass-shootings has explode after Obama took over then the four former presidents combined? Do you all think this is a coincidence?http://truthstreammedia.com/2015/12/02/why-have-there-been-more-mass-shootings-under-obama-than-the-four-previous-presidents-combined/
I am not saying this to be rude- but the American people need to seriously WAKE UP. Your government is corrupt and you have been lied to again and again. But with so much information which is easily accessible today there is no excuse for you to research this yourself. To go with what the mainstreem media presents to you as valid and true information is to be naive.
I am not a fan of guns at all and they are not allowed in my country but to take away the guns from the citizens in the US is NOT a good idea. I say that because this is what Obama and your government wants, that is one of the reasons to why many of these fake terrorist attacks has been arrange. If you give them your guns you will also give ALL the power over to your government and that is exactly what they want.
And just to make it obvious- taking away your guns equals taking away your freedom of speech. That is just the reality of it. Once they have your guns they are going to go after the free speech and there is no way for the American people to defend themselves.
Strange, we in Canada have strict gun laws and we still have freedom of speech. We didn’t lose ours.
Firearm-related death rate per 100,000 population per year:
U.S. 10.64
Canada: 2.22
Evans- yes, that may be true but you can’t compare your country (the politics and amount of power and corruption) with the US. The loss of guns will a totally different impact on the US citizens sadly.
For anyone interested in actuals facts and numbers in regards to gun control you are highly advised to watch this video, the truth about gun control: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hyQDQPEsrs It shows that there clearly are no correlation. How can you still continue to argue that taking away guns is going to solve anything when you see the numbers presents?
David -you have not done proper and honest research but just gone with the propaganda that the main stream media and government has present. Please comment on the numbers and the correlations. Thank you.
Severin, I don’t know who the hell this guy is who is presenting. Would be nice to know the source of the info, as well as his source of stats. But I’ll grant you that he is articulate and does an excellent PowerPoint. His conclusion: blacks are responsible for much of the gun violence. Okay, but I don’t get any sense that blacks are responsible for the worst of the mass shootings we are seeing.
All that is beside the point I made in my post. One more time, I’m not advocating taking away guns. I’m advocating learning more about what’s happening, especially with what seems to be a surge in mass shootings. Are they being triggered by antidepressants? Are gun-free zones the source (even though schools, shopping malls, etc. have generally been thought to be gun-free zones)? Is there a connection between race and mass shootings? Can criminal background checks reduce their number? Lots of Qs. Not a lot of good answers.
Instead, you (and many others here) revert to all the cliches and sources who agree with your preconceived notions. You know the truth, so don’t want people like me looking for facts.
I think it should be much easier to obtain weapons. It should be totally unregulated. AS should be milk. The ONLY way to get freedom of (fill in the blank) in our lives is to support the freedoms YOU don’t care about(access to machine guns for example). You can’t be for raw milk and also for restrictions on drugs or weapons or etc etc. Freedom has pain. Restricting freedom means subsidizing YOUR inability to act alert, defend yourself, or raising kids “drug-free.” Sorry, your point is dead wrong in my silly brain. BUT, I unfortunately/fortunately believe your view is actually the majority opinion(SANS the raw milk stuff. people are ready to quarantine us raw dairy wackos).
LOL!!! Once again well said… One thing I can tell you – asking a card-carrying nut if he’s a card-carrying nut is, well… nuts. Who in right OR wrong mind is going to tell the truth on a form knowing that chances are the research – if done at all – is faulty at best, and often non-existent?
Gotta have a laugh when you go into a store to buy a gun… Not so funny if your local farmer runs in the house and hides if you bring an empty gallon jug to the door though.
On another note:
Merry Christmas to all, and many blessings!!
GS
We often remember a great man, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
A man who believed in peace and who never carried a gun…
Let us please also note that the MAIN REASON that he didn’t carry a gun was because THE APPLICATION HE FILED WAS DENIED in 1958 —
black men, just like Catholics, freed slaves, union members and any other group that people WITH guns wanted to oppress at some point in history have been legally denied the right to their own protection.
Despite being denied his right to carry one, Martin Luther King Jr. DID OWN guns and kept his guns in his home.
Rev. King was worried about state monopoly on force
and was also worried that a criminal with a gun,
who did not follow the laws, might try to kill him….
Were he alive today and applied for the SAME license he applied for he would AGAIN be denied in many states.
In the eyes of the law, King, a man arrested and who served time 14 times, was, is and will always be a criminal
and ineligible for a license to carry firearms.
more at
Today, Martin Luther King Jr. could buy a gun at a gun show, without any check of his record. There is less regulation today of firearms than at almost any time in recent memory. But even if the criminal background check program instituted in 1998 (and then abandoned in 2013) was still in effect, there is an appeal procedure for those with criminal records and extenuating circumstances (like King) and he would almost certainly have been approved.
“Today, Martin Luther King Jr. could buy a gun at a gun show, without any check of his record.”
Absolutely NOT true-at least in the state of Oregon. A new/recent law just a few yrs ago REQUIRES background checks of ALL “guns” sold at gun shows. And yet apparently many were killed in Roseburg, OR this past summer… in a “Gun Free Zone”. Even many Oregon police have admitted the requirement is just a time/money waster that has resulted in ZERO “criminals” taken off the street. It just adds inconvenience and extra cost to the average person… AND detracts from Oregon State Police “real criminal investigation” as they have admitted.
GUN-FREE ZONES are DEATH TRAPS
How is it that virtually all the supposed “mass killings” occur in “Gun Free-Zones”??? It is obvious to anyone that uses reason and logic as opposed to emotion to determine that Gun Free-Zones are really Victim-Rich Zones since there is likely no one there to defend themselves and others and are easy pickings. Is the evil/psycho/whatever person going to commit their act where someone might shoot back, or where there are a bunch of defenseless people? The answer is obvious… to anyone that uses reason and evidence…
GUN REGISTRATION LEADS TO CONFISCATION
Most of these “background checks” and related are just Orwell speak for gun registration. And history is clear (as others have outlined here already-look up “Democide” for more) that after confiscation its just a matter of time before genocide…
In the end, like we all here would like to see for Raw-Milk, Real Food etc…, we should all strive for VOLUNTARY interactions among those that we deal with IMO…
Less regulation, yet a drastic decrease in gun related violence and homicides, except in the areas of the country that still restrict access to guns strongly… Aka, gun free zones are the only areas that have not experienced the same declines that most of the nation has seen at large, http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2013/05/07/gun-homicide-rate-down-49-since-1993-peak-public-unaware/
remove the top 10 hot spots for gun and other violence/crime in the USA (which all happen to be strongly liberal/democratic cities), and the US violence/murder/gun violence numbers decline dramatically to say the least… aka, all those claims our rates are worse than other nations is because we have concentrated areas of massive violence, which all have a few things in common… liberal leadership, strong gun control… whereas look at Plano TX or similar cities with similar population densities but more guns per capita than shoelaces…
perhaps you need to do a bit more investigative and actual reporting work on this issue?
Thank you for that, Raul. Problem solved. It’s all the fault of the urban liberal Democrats. Whew!
Just one question. I’m looking at the sites of America’s deadliest mass shootings. Which of these 10 most recent ones are urban liberal Democratic strongholds? Washington? (Where the site wasn’t a gun-free zone, but a U.S. Navy yard facility)
-San Bernardino, CA
-Colorado Springs, CO
-Chatanooga, TN
-Charleston, SC
-Isla Vista, CA
-Ft. Hood, TX
-Washington, DC
-Santa Monica, CA
-Newtown, CT
-Brookfield, WI
http://timelines.latimes.com/deadliest-shooting-rampages/
Damn, and there I thought you had it all figured out. One more time, I’m not debating gun control, I’m questioning the refusal to do public health research, inquiry, into what seems to be an escalation in these bizarre threats to people’s health. Wondering why people seem so darn locked into their version of “truth.”
US Navy Yard and military facilities are gun free zones. All military facilities are gun free zones except Military police, etc. I never said it was the fault of libs, merely pointing out that your facts/figures, etc. are wrong (there isn’t a mass shooting a day, even Mother Jones and others have pointed that out), and that the US isn’t some wild west compared to other nations, only certain areas/parts have problems, and these problems tend to cluster around highly populated, gun controlled, D leaning areas.
The first rule of concealed weapons…is to not reveal that you are a concealed weapons owner or carrier.
That being said….I really believe in biology and the genomics model of life on earth. If there are pathogens….then we really need probiotics. Probiotics are not passive and in fact carry a lethal punch to control pathogens. However….we must ask ourselves why we are creating conditions which favor pathogens to begin with.
I favor the Swiss model….responsible gun ownership and a highly trained public with a locked up rifle or machine gun in every house with training to go with it. These are the probiotic conditions that suppress pathogens and encourages a high level of responsibility and training.
I totally agree that back ground checks are badly needed and should be performed as a bare minimum. I also think that our government should immediately pass a national Concealed Weapons Permit program. At this time it is a state by state program. True CCW permits are not about brandishing or display of weapons…ever!!! It is a program is complete concealment and secrecy. Criminals and would be ISIS creeps…would never ever consider in location safe for ambush. God knows who and where the each and every well trained armed would be. That’s probiotics on the human scale.
I wish we had peace on earth & good will towards all men, but we do not. In fact, there are groups of madmen that are trying their level best to kill off innocent good people.
Guns and probiotics…kind of gives a little different perspective. We could also use a national civilian carried Tazer program. Ballistically energized Tazers drop criminals better and faster than a bullet and mistakes do not generally kill.
Lastly…it is essential that our countries scientists grow some balls and declare some pharmaceuticals as down right dangerous. We must “fix the gut to fix the brain”….the brain pulls the trigger. People don’t kill people…people with bad nutrition….kill their own gut that then kills their brains and their ability to rationally think!
“Mass Shooting Delusions” http://www.creators.com/opinion/jacob-sullum.html
Good article. Lots of truth in there, but I’m not trying to change people’s pre-conceived notions about guns or gun ownership and who should or who shouldn’t or whatever. The article simply makes some good points to consider.
Mark is right when he says the first rule of being a concealed weapon carrier is not to reveal that you are one!
I’m sorry, I did not realize that was a *roving title site* when I posted the link above. There is now a new article at that link. Best way to find the article on Mass Shooting Delusions is to go to Jacob Sullum’s page at Creators.com and look for the date of that article, which was 16 Dec. 2015. As of right now it’s still in the line-up on the left-hand side of the page, but as he posts new article, it will be bumped down the page and will soon disappear, so if you’re interested in reading the article, you will eventually have to do a search of the site itself. Again, my apologies for this.
David,
Please explain. I posted days ago, yet only one post shows after mine….but the counter says many more posts have been posted. I don’t understand . How can it been. I thought the posts were sequential. Where are all the new posts and comments?
Mark, I’m not sure what counter you are referring to. I have seen a response to one of your earlier comments about Michael Schmidt, but no responses to your comment on this thread, “The first rule of concealed weapons….”
That being said, I’ve experienced some weirdness, as have some others, with the comments section the last few days. I’ll ask the webmaster, see what we can find out.
Hi Mark,
Webmaster here 🙂 The comments counter at the top (just above the first comment) says 55 comments and I counted 55. When I post this, it should say 56. Tell me which post of yours is the one posted days ago and you think there are other posts after it? Then I have something to research and I can figure out where the glitch is.
Posts are sequential, but if they are replies to another comment, they will show up under that comment, not in the main list in the order posted. Does that make sense? So some comments have been made after yours, but they won’t show up after yours. They’ll show up under the comment to which they are a reply. (Not sure about that grammar, lol. But hopefully the meaning is there)
Ok …I am not aware of how a “comment to a comment” works. I will figure that out. Thx
David,
Just an FYI. In order to LEGALLY buy a gun from a dealer one must fill out a form 4473 and have it submitted to NICS for approval. Usually takes only a few minutes, to a couple of hours, but if word does not come from the feds within 72 hours, it is approved by default. This is also true of sales at gun shows or other trade events. Shotguns, rifles AND handguns. In 41 states, one must have a permit or concealed carry license to buy a handgun.
This is from the CDC web site:
All injury deaths
Number of deaths: 192,945 Deaths per 100,000 population: 60.2
All poisoning deaths
Number of deaths: 48,545 Deaths per 100,000 population: 15.4
Motor vehicle traffic deaths
Number of deaths: 33,804 Deaths per 100,000 population: 10.7
All firearm deaths
Number of deaths: 33,636 Deaths per 100,000 population: 10.6
According to the Law Center to prevent Gun Violence of the 33,636 firearms deaths, more than 19,000 were suicides, accounting for slightly more than half of all suicides. I think the 19K would have found another way if they were determined to do themselves harm. The US suicide rate is about the same as Great Britain, Canada, Denmark, Switzerland, and Iceland and well below France and Greenland.
Of the 11K homicides the Law Center does not say how many were justifiable or defensive or by various law enforcement persons.
Another site, http://www.usconservatives.about.com, quotes FBI statistics which cite 35-50% of homicides in New Orleans as gang related and up to 80% in Chicago. Other sites show that removing the 5 worst cities for gun violence in the uS (Chicago, Los Angeles, New Orleans, New York and Washington DC) would put the US homicde rate below about 180 other countries.
Stick to milk, please.
“revelation of the method” = this is how it’s done : Chipotle sabotaged with poisoned produce in the supply chain … targeted because the company advertises its restaurants do not use Genetically-engineered produce
at this URL is a piece of dis-information propaganda
http://www.vox.com/business-and-finance/2015/12/12/9910642/chipotle-gmo-e-coli
http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/jlpp/Vol30_No2_KatesMauseronline.pdf
David Gumpert, you only want Liberty for your interests but want to take Liberty away regarding things you don’t like. Anti-gun/anti-liberty/anti-self preservation arguments have been made by many people over the years (Hitler, Stalin, Mao Tse Tung, etc.) . It is a well established fact that governments are by far the perpetrators of mass murders/mass shootings throughout history. Take me off your emailing list, I don’t care to read anymore of your bull manure.
Jim Sinnema
Old Silvana Creamery
Arlington, Washington
P.S. We are a raw milk dairy, one of the largest in our state.
Jim, appreciate you identifying yourself.
You can unsubscribe yourself by clicking on the link at the very bottom of the email.